Kuala Lumpur and Singapore - Towers and Rides!

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It's time again for a new blog. We are actually in Australia now and I thought I'd just put something about the lack of photos on this blog. We have a virus on our memory card which is putting the month of May's photos in jepordy. We have been to a camera shop who can recover the photos but unfortunately everytime they went to put it on a cd it crashed their computer. They didn't seem to be experts so I'm going to wait until I can get to a big city and find a specialist. I'm really upset about it all but fingers crossed they will be ok. These photos are so important.

Being back in Kuala Lumpur was good fun as we felt quite used to the city now and we know how to get around. We spent the first couple of days relaxing, just wondering around while I was getting better. Didn't want to do too much and we had a great movie channel on our tv in the room which we definetely took advantage of! We went back to KLCC one night where the Pertronas Towers are to get my night shot of the towers all lit up! We had a nice wonder around the park there.

Where we were staying in KL was right near the night market on Pentaling Street so for a couple of nights we went and did a bit of shopping - both buying some cheap addidas trainers for Oz and Andy bought some jeans for the cooler weather. I really do love the market there and could spend hours there. The handbags were great - I don't know designers that well to know if the bags are fake or not but some of them look really good. Some tourists we were chatting to say that some of it is actually the real stuff just off the "back of the lorry" types. Who knows. But the trainers look real and he even put a lighter on mine to show they are real leather or something. I was just thinking stop burning my trainers - you only have one pair in my size!!!

We were contemplating going up the Pertronas Tower skybridge but I was disappointed its only on 41st floor not even half way up and it used to be free but now you have to pay. So instead we decided to go to KL Tower where they have revolving restaurant right at the top! It stands at 421m and is the highest viewpoint from the city. The Pertronas Towers are only about 30m higher and most of that is the tall points! We decided to go up in the afternoon and have afternoon tea up there. Getting to the tower was really hard on foot. The guidebooks are right - KL is not very pedestrian friendly. They just want you to get taxis everywhere whereas we much prefer walking and using the monorails. From the entrance gates to the tower was a really steep winding hill to get to the reception that we huffed and puffed our way up. When we got to the top we couldn't believe when we saw the sign for a free shuttle bus to take you there and back! Typical! Hehe!

Luckily, there was a lift to the restuarant at the top and we were rewarded with amazing 360 degree views of the city. We sat down by the window and it was lovely because we were the only ones there for ages. We had a pot of tea and huge slice of chocolate cake while the floor just revolved around and we had different views. It was really nice. We timed how long it took to go all the way around - 1hr 30mins we sat there watching every part! It was a really nice thing to do for our last day in KL.

We decided to go on the train to Singapore - it's a couple of hours longer than the bus but we are really fed up of bus journeys after Borneo and wanted a change. It took all day in the end to get Singapore. At the last stop in Malaysia immigration came on and just stamped our passports but then the first stop in Singapore everyone had to get off the train with all our bags and stand in the long queues for immigration. This took the train journey up to 9 hours! The next station we pulled in at was really run down and dirty and the chap came along and said this is the last stop. We were really shocked as we didn't imagine to arrive into a station like that. There was no MRT (monorail), no buses and the nearest ATM was a 10 minute walk. We had no choice but to get a taxi to our hostel. We were not very impressed.

For the first day here we decided to have a wonder around Orchard Road which is a massive long road full of huuuuge shopping malls - designer store heaven, electronics everywhere. We didn't stay too long, can't fit anything else in our bags so no shopping allowed :-(. We headed to the Botanical Gardens further along and had a walk around there for about 4 hours. It was established in 1860 and covers around 52 hectares, with about 600,000 specimens. It was really impressive! The gardens were lovely, I've taken hundreds of pictures of all the unusual flowers and plants. Admission was free which was really good, we decided to go into the orchid garden where you paid a little sum but the flowers were really impressive. We watched a video of how they make these flowers so perfect. They sow the seeds in the labs and then put them away for four years to see how they turn out. We said it's a long time to wait and see! It was really nice to walk around but our legs were killing!

We were so excited for the next day. It was Andy's birthday and we deiced to go to the zoo and the night safari! The zoo was unbelievable! I don't think I'll ever be able to go to another zoo in England. It has more than 4000 residents on 28 hectares of land and it is a far cry from the concrete confines some zoos have. There were no cages and every animal had outside space and inside space. The only thing seperating us from them were man made moats around their little islands. It even to my delight had the world's first free roaming orangutans. They are literally living in the trees right above and only come down when called by the zoo keepers for feeding. We watched the feeding of them, they mechanically lower a tree branch down for them to climb down then they all come down and sit on a horizontal branch at eye level and enjoy some coconut juice and fruit. I had my picture taken with them which was really good but I wasn't allowed to touch them :-(

I paid for Andy to feed the giant tortoises which were amazing. They weighed about 300kg and were about 70years old. Andy gave them apple pieces on twigs which they loved. They actually move quite fast when they saw the apple! The zoo keepers told us to watch our feet as they'd had a few broken toes! The keeper took a picture of us with them and told us to keep the tortoise still we had to scratch his neck near the shell - they loved it and didn't move an inch! Andy really enjoyed that!

As well as seeing a host of other animals, the lions (asleep), the white tigers (beautiful), the giraffes, rhinos, pygmy hippos, penguins, zebras, parrots, chimps, probiscus monkeys, lemurs, peacocks, etc we went to see a few shows! The first show was called The Rainforest Fights Back!! A group of men dressed as Amazonian tribe men came on with sticks and shields and did some dancing. Next thing we know Andy is called up to the stage and told to take his top off - much to his shock. He had some massive cheers from the crowds. I was laughing my head off. He had to copy the chap with some muscle flex moves and growls to the crowd, it was brilliant. I've got it on video too - screenings will be shown when we get back! He came back to the seat and said it was the most embarrassing thing he's ever done, bless him on his birthday too!

We also saw a sea lion show which are always fun to watch and an elephant show that showed how powerful they really are. When the day at the zoo finished we went to the night safari next door. We had a lovely meal and I bought Andy this massive ice cream and brownie sundae for a birthday treat. We queued up to get on a 45 min tram ride around the park. It was really great fun! It was pitch black and all the nocturnal animals were just wondering around, munching on grass and staring at us. I didn't take any pictures anyway of the night safari as flash wasn't allowed (which didn't stop some people). After the tram ride we went into a cave and saw lots of spiders in boxes and bats flying around. We also went to the Creatures of the Night show - it was amazing! There were different cats climbing ropes, one looked like the cheshire cat. They had 2 otters come on stage to teach us about recycling, they actually put cans and plastics in the correct bins, it was soo cute!! It was a brilliant day out but we were soo shattered when we got back to the hostel - we had been walking around for about 14 hours!

We decided the next day to just chill and see some sights, so we went to Raffles Hotel for a wonder around the courtyard. We were wearing shorts and flip flops but they still let us into the Long Bar where the famous Singapore Sling was created! We crunched our way along the floor as they have many monkey nut shells all over the floor - tradition to crack them and then just throw them. We decided to get 2 slings and we sat at the bar. It was a very cool experience. The drink itself was quite nice, it was a bit too sweet though. We nearly fell off our stools when we got the bill, we knew they were a bit pricey but the bill came to $58!! Which is about 30 pounds!! For two drinks!! Total exploitation of the tourists! Hehe!

Universal Studios had just opened in Singapore - so we decided to spend the day and go across to Sentosa Island on the MRT. It's a massive resort place where the locals go to get away from the city. We had a really really good day out. Reminded me a bit of Disneyland as there were different movie themed areas with rides and shows. Madagascar, Jurassic Park, Shrek, The Mummy, Battlestar Galactica and New York and Hollywood sets. There was a Waterworld show, the movie was rubbish but the show was brilliant, lots of explosions, stunts and fighting! We saw a Shrek 4D short film, I wish every film could be seen this way. We have to sit in a seat and then the seats move and rock up and down when the characters were moving. We got sprayed with water when Shrek sneezed and fake spiders came out from underneath the seats to tickle our ankles. It was great! We were again shattered when we got back to the hostel!

Singapore was brilliant, I'd definetely love to go back again one day, there is so much to do and you could really spend a fortune there. As I said we are In Oz now having a brilliant time but you'll have to wait for the next blog to find out what we've been up too!

Thanks for reading! Take care all!!

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Comments

[Chris maher]

wicked cool
love the blog little dude. Hope u get ur pictures back did not know camera cards had viruses. Hav been doing some research about vagas for u cheap place to stay. Singapore sounds so cool. Keep having fun little dude. Xxxxxx