Our last night in Singapore was spent at the night safari. An entire zoo experience open to visitors at night so that you get to see the animals in more natural envrionment. We went with a bunch of people from our hostel including a guy named Simon we’d gotten friendly with. It was loads of fun, and the animals we got to see were mostly ones that none of us had ever seen before. We got back and popped to the local aussie pub for a quick drink before going to bed, only to have to get up a little later to get to our train. The first train we took was from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, it took about 7 hours and we had the second class seats. They were so spacious that we had enough room to pretty much lie down, and it was also beautifully air conditioned so we all managed to sleep most of the way.
Singapore Night zoo
Kuala Lumpur
We arrived in KL and eventually managed to find our way to the monorail to make it back to our hostel. We stayed at the Attapsana guesthouse, a really lovely and very homely place. It was especially welcome after the place in Singapore which none of us had been too happy about. We only spent two days in KL, most people i’d spoken to said you don’t really need that much time there and we agreed. Especially having just come from Singapore, we didn’t have a lot of interest in another city. We’d also all managed to pick up a cold somewhere along the way, so one morning we ended up sleeping in until about 12. The guesthouse owner was really nice and very interesting to talk to, he reccommended a great little restaurant just near the hostel which did really good malaysian food, very cheaply. On our first day in KL we’d been desperately hungry and stopped at the first place we’d found – an Irish bar. They sold Strongbow, for six pounds a pint, and our meals cost about five pounds each. IN this malaysian restaurant (Nagasari Curry House) we each had a huge Banana Leaf Set meal for less that one pound each. The traditional food was beautiful, if a little spicy!
Kuala Lumpur
We visited the KL tower which is one of the tallest telecom towers in the world, but just our luck, the rain moved in and the visibility from the top was minimal. We did get to place in their Winter wonderland park though and see some massive snakes and spiders in the wildlife display. That was when the rain moved in. WE were a 15 minute walk from the hostel and none of us had any rain gear, umbrella or money for a cab. So when we thought it was lessening off we decided to make a break for it. The heavens opened when we were about half way and we were instantly drenched. The roads quickly became rivers and the thunder was so so loud you couldn’t hear our hysterical giggling over the top! I managed to slip over as my flip flop broke right in the middle of trying to get down a slippery hill on the pavement which had quickly become a river. Not my finest moment.
On our last day in KL we went to the central market and the chinese market which were great for just wandering around as it rained. We all tried a Mee Sup ( a noodle soup with veggies and fish balls) – very tasty but far too much food in one bowl of soup! And then very quickly it was time to leave Malaysia. We were ctahcing an evening train overnight to Butterworth where we got the ferry to Penang. We’d treated ourselves to a first class cabin, which has two bunks, a sink and AC.Alan was in another cabin, but unfortuantely his roomate was a smelly asian man who had the call to prayer as his ringtone and kept getting up and opening the cabin door every 15 minutes. At 4:30 we pulled into Butterworth, hauled ourselves off the train and dragged our bags across to the ferry point. Put our 1.20RM (20p) in the turnstile and sat and waited for the first Ferry of the morning.
Ferry to Penang
It only took 20 minutes to get across and we then grabbed the first bus at 5:50 to Batu Ferringhi where our hostel was. We finally got to the hostel about 6:30 to find no sign of an open reception, but over the road the barman was just shutting up the bar. We chatted to him for a bit, explained our situation and he mostly seemed genuinly upset he couldn’t get us a drink. But he did say we could sit at the bar and leave our bags there. Just as we were about to drift off on the table he had a quick word with the owners of our hostel and before we knew it we were checked in and into our room. So at 7:30 we all collapsed into bed and slept until 1 that afternoon.
Penang
Our time in Penang was incredibly lazy. The drinks were all really expensive so we couldn’t even really go out. We did enjoy spending time on the beach which was right outside our hostel but it was a very commercial with people constantly offering Paragliding and Jet skiing which was priced for the Park Royal Hotel guests just down the road. So we spent a lot of our time watching movies and wandering through the markets. We had a wonderufl slap up meal the first night, where Gem and I got to share a bottle of wine and try a Thai green curry. The restaurant was so pretty as it was completely covered in fairy lights!
Our last day was rainy the entire time so we were resigned to being stuck in our room and watching movies all day. but by the evening we were able to go to one of the food courts and have a nice and cheap traditional dinner. We decided a must-have experience after this was a Shisha pipe. We chose the strawberry flavour tobacco and it was mostly just very strange. Tasted like haribo hearts.
We were up early the next morning to catch out ferry to Langkawi.
Langkawi
We all really enjoyed Langkawi. The beach was very near to our hostel but to get to it you had to go through the Holiday Villas hotel. The beach was absolutely beautiful (definitely getting closer to what we had expected from malaysia) and we spent the entire afternoon swimming, reading and sneaking into the hotel pool. The biggest problem we had was that neither the sea or the hotel pool was cool enough to feel refreshing.
Waterfall on Penang
The next day we rented a car for the pricey sum of ten pounds a day. It was a tiny little thing with an 0.8l engine. and 20RM (4 pounds) of fuel was enough to get us around the entire island. We went to the Cable car to go up the mountain, from which you can see almost the entire island! When we got back down from there we were all so hot and sticky, luckily there was a hotel in the grounds, so we crashed their pool and felt positively human again afterwards. Our next stop on the island was the Temurun waterfall. However when we got to it we found that there was no water running from it, and we found out later that we’d have to wait until about August if we wanted to see it runnning. At the bottom of the waterfall was a little cafe called 3 where we grabbed a sprite and started talking to the owner. He was a really nice guy giving us great advise about places to see both on Langkawi and in Thailand.
We drove onto see another waterfall called the Durian Peringan waterfall. This time there was water flowing and it was nice and cold and refreshing, just what we’d been needing. There is no such thing as a hot shower over here, you just don’t need it. However, when we saw hot springs on the map we though they were worth a visit. But when we got there it looked halfway through being built, but a sign insisting the springs were open, led us to some large stagnant pools of water. We didn’t stay very long there.
We drove to the Friday night market and almost immedietaly ran into the owner of the 3 cafe there with his friends. They were collecting food to eat on the beach for sunset and he suggested we join them. And with the food available we coupldn’t resist. Everything looked so good and it’s all cooked up fresh right in front of you – pancakes wityh papaya in them, fried bananas, chicken, fish, corn fritters and even coconut rice. It was very much a local market and we were pretty much the only foreigners there. According to the cafe owner (we found out his name was Jeff) it was a market where to food was very influenced by the local Thai cuisine. Jeff even bought us some of the different little fishy bits to try. Everything was so cheap and for less than a pound each we ended up with more food than we could eat between the three of us. We managed to get the wrong beach to meet them on for sunset though. So after we’d eaten we found the right beach and sat with them watching the lighting over the mountains. Jeff’s english was brilliant and he was able to tell us loads about the local culture and about things to see in Thailand.
We had to rush back to our hostel, return the car to the man who was waiting in the office at 11 o’clock for us, and get packed up for our early flight to Phuket the next day.
And the tales of Phuket will have to be in the next update as I am now getting on a bus towards Koh Samui. Have to go to the seven eleven to get some snacks for the journey. Alan’s a little worse for wear this morning after sharing a bottle and a half of rum with our friend Dave who missed his flight home last night and decided to celebrate in style! It’s going to be a long bus/ferry journey!
More soon, hope everyone’s well. Miss you all!
Sarah (Alan and Gem)
Related posts:
