An end to the 'Search for Strongbow'

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Kuala lumpur was an enjoyable two hour flight from koh samui onboard fireflies twin prop aircraft, which in Emilies eyes was obviously going to crash as you could see the propellors and they made a lot of noise!
Once safely on the Tarmac in KL (please excuse the abreviation as it sounds so pompous to me but aids the speed in which I can type this blog and everyone I speak to seems to use it) we got talking to a fellow backpacking Brit and decided to save a few ringets and share a cab into the city. We headed to the cultural mecca found in the centre of every city and ordered our happy meals to justify using the very helpful free wifi all Mcdonalds now offer. Very helpful as I was able to call Barclays for free via skype and resolve the most recent saga involving us using (or not as the case was then) bank cards abroad, all with burger in hand.

After being laughed at by half the taxi drivers in KL for asking for the fare to be calculated by the perfectly adequate and perfectly desinged machine for calculating taxi fares by distance travelled, known as a meter, not by some mythical formula known only to Asian taxi drivers or by how many lights are on in the Petronas towers on that particular evening, we found a driver willing to take us.

We stayed in a nice place right next to Petaling street, which for those of you unfamiliar with KL is in the heart of Chinatown and the centre of night markets and the best place to enjoy the vast array of street food available.

There are lots of sights on offer to the tourist in KL but without a wheelchair to push the invalid Emilie around in (which I know she would have loved) we settled for a city sightseeing open top bus tour. Unfortunately ours didn't have an open top and the sound guide was broken, so after taking a few snaps of the one landmark we did obviously know about before, Emilie had a lovely sleeping tour for the next three hours and left camera duties to me, as you can imagine both parties were quite happy with this arrangement.

With the excitement of the tour over you will be pleased to know that KL saw at last an end to the 'search for Strongbow'. After six countries and three long months without the drink of choice for tramps on park benches across the UK, we stumbled upon an Irish bar that sold the golden dream by draught. At £8 per pint however I was limited to a meagre Tongue quencher of two pints!

Drinks aside, KL has a lot to see and offers some interesting contridictions as a strong Muslim country embracing everythng the 21st century has to offer from, low cut prada tops to the latest Mercedes while still retaining it's heritage and strong Asian influences. It was also where much to both of our enjoyment we found a Harrods store, where I was able to get behind the tea & coffee counter and Emilie could critique the patisserie.

After four days walking Emilie looked like she had gout in her foot, so we decided to head for the idylic Perhentian islands for some R&R.

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Comments

[Darren]

Strongbow !!!
Yeah, at last. Bet it was worth the wait Tom :D