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Published: January 26th 2016
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Monday 25 January
Decided to leave the heat and smells of the City, for the cool air of the surrounding Hills. After breakfast in McDonalds (no apologies, clean, good toilets good coffee and OK Internet) , we took a twenty five minute bus ride to the base of Penang Hill, in the district of Bukit Bendera. Purchased one way tickets for the steep Funicular rail journey to the top, 830 metres above sea level, it wasn't as exhilarating as we hoped as to keep the flow of people going the trains were fully packed so little chance to view much of the journey. Once up however, the views are magnificent. Although there are some attractions on the top we thought it a little too commercial so decided to start straight out to the descent which is an extremely steep and winding Tarmac road, often the gradient was 30% (signs indicated this fact) about 5 km down, finishing at the Botanical Gardens. Leo armed himself with a stick as there were greedy Monkeys on the Hill who apparently demand food and steal if not fed. We never saw one! We were surprised that it took us seasoned walkers 2 hours to
complete. Along the way we passed a couple of small groups walking UP the hill, we did not envy them. We then waited at a bus stop for transport back to Georgetown, and waited, and waited......... Deciding to walk onwards to consider other options, it soon became obvious that we were in Waterfall Street, the site of the Hindu Festival, and became embroiled with hundreds of gaily dressed and face-painted worshippers spilling out of their temple. Numerous food and clothes stalls lined both sides of the narrow street. Together with the motorcycles and double-parked cars, there was never a chance of the bus getting through. We did find it around the next corner, patiently waiting for it's passengers. This was the nbr 10 bus. It took over half hour to complete it's route to the Jetty, before which we jumped off as it was the most indirect journey we have ever made. We seemed to scoot along a main road, then circled a roundabout and came all the way back to where we got on! This zig zag route was repeated over and over again, much to our amusement, we decided it was a sweeper bus. Sweeping anyone and everyone
from every single possible bus stop within a one mile radius of Georgetown. We rather over optimistically decided it was time for a cool refreshing beer, another thirty five minutes of traipsing the hot and humid streets, finally found a not too clean restaurant who served cold beers in an ice bucket ignoring the squalor and smells, we delighted in the almost "Ice Cold in Alex"experience. Refreshed we decided to explore more of historical Georgetown, so headed towards the Clan Jetties, located along the Weld Quay. Built on stilts during the nineteenth century, they housed, fishermen, traders and dock workers. Wandered around happily for a while, then negotiated a direct route homewards, stopping at our local Gama hypermarket to browse and make some essential purchases before retiring for the evening.
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Diane Jones
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keep on trekking - safely
Great pics - how do you keep your white stuff so clean? really am enjoying all the text - I've never been to places like these, closest I got was a penfriend on 3-yr study at Wrexham, but came from Penang. Glad to hear your ankles are better- you've clocked-up so many walking miles since. Have you managed to try satay foods yet? any food photos?? Take care both xx p.s. bus trip sounded a nightmare!