Hi from Georgetown Penang

We have been in Malaysia for 3 days now and what a fun packed time we have had!! Anji arrived in KL on Wednesday evening and we started as we meant to continue with a couple of glasses of white wine! Our hotel lobby is very grand though the rooms less so! Les also arrived in KL that night and we linked up with him on Thursday morning.
LK is a compact city, very hot and humid and has grown from a prospectors town to the most prosperous city in Malaysia in just 150 years. It is monsoon season now so it rains like clockwork every afternoon! It is another mix of old and new and we began our exploration of the city on Thursday . We had a map and were looking for the tourist information centre wandering the hot and dusty streets in hopefully the right direction. KL does not have the best signage system in the world! And guess what we found the Petronis Towers those two shiny twin buildings linked by a walkway. Unfortunately we were too late that day to get tickets to stroll from one tower to another on the 45th level- what luck i thought. But my two friends had an alternative plan and off we sped to the very tall KL telecommunications Tower where I was forced to have lunch in the revolving restaurant on the 85 floor!! Oh my giddy aunt not only have I been up the 2nd tallest building in the world but now had lunch floating in the sky! I was not a totally happy bunny though I had to admit the view , when i could bring myself to look , was stunning.
Having had breakfast and lunch you would have thought we might have given dinner a miss but oh no we were off again to the most fantastic restaurant i think i have been too in many a year. It was ultra modern rather like a roman temple with a pool in the centre of the columns. The food was sensational and anji and i had the tasting menu while les opted for the usual 2 courses. plus a very expensive bottle of red so whats new there then?! London prices but well worth it! Needless to say we were all extremely stuffed as puffins and waddled back to sleep it off.
Yesterday we left KL early in the morning and headed for the Cameron highlights some 200 Km north of the city and around 1500 mtres. It is where the British went to escape the heat and where they introduced tea production. It is really amazing to experience the influence that we Brits have had , it can be seen all around ,tea and scones ,strawberry growing and wonderful mock Tudor buildings straight out of surrey or ambleside. We visited a tea plantation and learnt about production from growing to drinking , we also visited a butterfly farm and saw some rather large beetles, spiders and snakes luverly jubbly!! Our diver dropped us off in the main town and we had the most tasty curry which amazingly stayed in my stomach rather than finding its way out rather quickly!! Finally we found our hotel for the night which was indeed a mock Tudor renovated ex school which while very pretty and quaint to look at was rather primitive in its rooms but hey ho just for one night! Les was taken back to KL that night for his flight to cambo the following day.
Anji and I travelled on to Penang we had booked our hotel from the Lonely Planet in George town - the capital of the province. On arrival we did check in but decided that we couldn't’t stay and have ended up in Penang’s premier hotel where Somerset Maugham, Rudyard Kipling, Noel Coward and now Miss Anji Loman Field have stayed so writers be on your guard. It is a wonderfully restored colonial hotel with supposedly the longest sea front in the world ( yet another record!) and financed by the same man who built the Raffles hotel in Singapore another place to be visited in a week or two!. Anji and i have decided we are not budget girls!! So we have 3 days here to explore this island off the coast of the Malaysian peninsular before we fly to Sabbah for our jungle trip!!
With love
Caroxxx

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