KL & The Petronas Towers

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From Singapore we took the 9hr sleeper train straight to Kuala Lumpur (KL). We arrived at 6am - on time but a longer journey than necessary in our eyes largely due to an over-complicated boarder control system, owing largely to the Malaysian ownership of the Railway Station in Singapore. However, we had slept intermittently in our reasonable-sized sleeper compartments (see photo), and soon found a hostel nearby. As there were no beds available we headed straight out to KLCC - the city centre - and went straight for the city and country's showpiece - the Petronas Towers.

You arrive at the KLCC LRT (Tram) stop and immediately walk out beneath one of the towers. It was immediately recognisable, although it's sheer magnificance was masked by the angle and only revealed itself as we rounded the nearest tower to reveal it's identical twin.

Now I'm sure you are all avid fans of Megastructures (I know of at least one, A.G.O.) and are already experts on the structural concepts and impressive scale of the buildings, but if not you can hopefully get an idea of their size and elegance from the photos. Truly staggering.

We queued inside the main atrium between the two towers for about an hour, and at 9 o'clock we were in some way grateful for our over-night journey and unavailability of a room as we were amongst the first groups to take the high-speed lift 42 floors up to the viewing bridge for unique views of Malaysia's capital city.

After a very relaxed 20 mins on the bridge (it is extremely sturdy and feels spacious and safe) we descended at 6m/s back to Ground Floor level and the already humid climate of the centre. Having seen the towers, we headed back to our dorm where 3 beds were now available and caught up on some much needed zzz's before haggling for food and designer label T-shirts in the street market.

Although it seemed nice, we decided a day was enough in KL, so booked ourselves onto the 8am bus out to nearby Taman Negara - Malaysia's largest National Park and reputedly the oldest rainforest on earth.....

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Photos

Sleeper Train Bed
Sleeper Compartment on the Singapore-to-Kuala Lumpur Express

Total Relaxation
Liam enjoying the space and comfort of the Night Train

The Petronas Towers
The two Petronas towers - both 451.9 high - in early morning

2 Towers, 3 Friends
The 3 of us at the Towers