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Published: October 9th 2007
Perhentian sunrise
We woke up to this sunrise on the first morning in our beach shackUpon Dave's fantastic suggestion of finding a beach shack somewhere in Asia, I was convinced that I should try to discover a bit of Asia before my Aussie visa runs out. When else will tickets be so cheap? So I booked super cheap Tiger Air tickets, Darwin to Singapore, and off to Malaysia I went!
I started out on the trip after a 22-hour Greyhound ride up to Darwin from Alice. Had some interesting conversations during those long hours; the most interesting was chatting with the driver who used to guide for big tour company. So I didn't get much sleep and arrived in Darwin pretty tired. In the couple of hours there, I ended up running into people I knew, which was a great way to pass the time before my 3:15am flight. Why most flights in and out of Darwin continue to be at stupid hours in the morning is beyond my comprehension.
I arrived in Singapore fully sleep deprived around 6am and met up with Kristin. After a bit of food and sight-seeing, I eventually checked into my hostel and went with Kristin and her friends to get hawker food...yay dinner for 3$! After passing out on
Another Perhentian Sunrise
The last morning we had another gorgeous sunrise one of her friend's couches, I decided I should try to get a bit of sleep before Dave arrived at 4am...and proceeded to sleep through my alarm leaving Dave locked out for a few hours. Great start to our trip...oops.
But the rest of the trip went very well.
In fact, it was simply AWESOME!! We spent a couple days exploring Singapore, spoiling ourselves with yummy Coffee Bean cappuccinos and cheap Chinese food as well as a fancy Mexican dinner at Cafe Iguana by the Singapore River.
We then started on our Malaysian adventure. We purchased bus tickets to Kuala Terrengganu in the north-east part of peninsular Malaysia (and from there we would get to some beautiful islands), and proceeded to try to get across the border by bus. I think if we didn't have so much stuff we could've walked across the causeway connecting the two countries. A few stamps later, we were on our way to catch our overnight bus.
After a long night of shivering in our seats (the Lonely Planet was right...Malay bus drivers seem to think their passengers are perishable goods that need refrigeration!) we were woken up by the bus driver. In
Lanterns
It was the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival (aka the Lantern or the Mooncake Festival)...beautiful! the not-quite-awake-yet confusion we left Dave's new Lonely Planet on the bus (I think that was my fault..oops) and somehow agreed to wait for this private taxi for several hours. The driver kept assuring us he was trying to help us get to Kuala Besut, but he needed to have a full car to make it worth it and he
only needed two more passengers. Never mind that we were the only white people on our overnight bus (likelyhood of finding another 2 gullible tourists: slim). We missed our first bus, which was kindly pointed out to us by a local as the bus left the station. We then tried to get to the other bus station where more local buses departed from, but no one seemed to know about this second bus station and we were redirected back to where we had came from. Eventually there was a bus and we left the seedy taxi driver and were on our way to the jetty.
It was fun watching the scenery go by, watching the bus driver stop for food at a road-side market, and seeing the reaction of locals to us.
We were dropped off at the jetty, where
Shopping at the markets
Some of the markets in Kuching we got our tickets to paradise and waited for our boat taxi out to the islands. Upon the recommendation of the driver, we booked a shack for 20RM per night at Rock Garden on Long Beach on Perhentian Kecil.
And what a shack it was. It was just what we were looking for...it felt like we were sleeping in a tree house! Although it may have been rather crude, we loved the shack and we loved the sunrise views. We spent the next few days sitting at cafes on the beach, swimming in the warm waters, finding a private beach below our shack, and booked a snorkeling trip from Bob for 70RM. The snorkeling trip was amazing...the water was the perfect temperature for snorkeling; we saw turtles, reef sharks, and lots of amazing corals and colourful fishes!
It was hard to leave paradise...at least it was cloudy when we left, as if that were any consolation prize. We taxied to Kota Bharu with some other backpackers who were on their way to Thailand, then caught a cab to Wakaf Baharu where we caught an overnight train to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia. The train ride was long, but
Old Man of the Forest
Coming out of the jungle for feeding time at least it put us in at a more reasonable hour than an overnight bus.
We spent the day exploring KL, seeing markets and beautiful architecture, the KL Tower just before sunset, and of course the famous Petronas Towers (or the Twin Towers as they're referred to there). We found amazing hawker food on J. Alor, and were entertained by lion dancers (probably part of the mid-autumn festival). We finally retired to our shabby accomodation (I seriously wonder how they got the bed into that room, as if they had built the bed around the room! Could they have at least chosen a decent mattress?)
The next day we caught an express bus back to JB; it was quite possibly the most comfortable bus ride as the bus had full-on arm chairs for seats! With leg rests and reclining seats! Yay for cheap luxury buses! (Greyhound should invest in these seats!)
Our flight to Borneo was short, and soon we arrived in Kuching in the province of Sarawak. A cab driver drove us to the Mandarin Inn, where we were met by the friendliest receptionist ever. She gave us lots of tips and information, and was just lovely! And
Yum!
Grabbing some fruit it was a treat to stay in a real hotel with air conditioning and fresh sheets and towels every day (for only 50RM! Yay!).
That night we checked out the Mooncake Festival (also known as the Lantern or Mid-Autumn Festival) on Carpenter Street. It was bustling! We picked up some street food, got hair cuts for 1RM (with a crowd watching) and drank and danced with some very friendly locals. What fun!
We explored Kuching the next day...it's quite possibly one of my favourite Malaysian cities. It's clean, small but well developed, with a lovely waterfront and great markets. The mooncake festival added to the fun! We also visited the Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Sanctuary, in hopes of seeing the semi-wild orang-utans. It was amazing. Simply beyond words.
After catching a rickety old local bus back to Kuching, we had a bit of lunch at the wonderful Life Cafe (of course Chinese food...don't visit Malaysia during Ramadan if you want to sample Malaysian food!) on Carpenter Street, then caught another rickety local bus to Bako National Park. The bus ride got fun after the bus filled up with rowdy school children just before our stop...we saw that high-school kids everywhere are
The town of Bako
The river front in Bako the same! It was a scene from an American or Australian or Canadian or European high school...guys on shiny motorbikes picking up girls, groups of girls giggling, groups of boys messing around, the older guys being jerks to the younger boys, etc. Only difference was it was a Muslim school! And they loved that we were on the bus!
Bako National Park was beautiful. We stayed overnight, watched a beautiful storm from the beach, hiked up to a lookout point in the rain, and saw lots of long-tailed macaques, who according to various signs were "naughty" and prone to stealing things. After a feeble breakfast the next morning, we set out on a trail, but the long way around. You would think two people working as tour guides would know better than to attempt a full day of hiking with only a packet of biscuits on very little breakfast, but we did. In total, we probably did close to 11km that day through some rather challenging jungle tracks, up and down hills, over tree roots, through sandy creek beds, muddy sections and across mossy logs placed over reddish-brown waters. It was so much fun! From 9am-3pm we hiked...by the last 2km
Pitcher Plants!
These plants were everywhere in Bako! my legs were jelly! By the last 100 meters I felt I just couldn't push on, but then we got a nice break at 80 meters to go.
Proboscis monkeys!!! They were amazing, swinging through the trees above us...probably a group of 10, monkeys of all ages. What a day!
Then it was back to Kuching that evening. We spent one last night exploring the waterfront and markets, then flew back to JB and re-entered Singapore. It was an amazing trip, and the time flew by. Dave flew on to Vietnam to start his cycle-around-south east Asia trip, and I stayed on a few more days with Kristin, visiting markets, sipping coffees and spending lots of money in the various shopping malls. Singapore is a peculiar city, full of contrasts (Little India and Arab Street and Chinatown...might as well be 3 different countries!). It was great!
I think we'll have to go back to Malaysia and explore more of the wonderful country.
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