Kuala Lumpor... the last leg home

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Kuala Lumpor... the last leg home

To avoid making it home with a bad case of jetlag, and because I had never been there before, we decided to spend 4 nights in Kuala Lumpor on the way home from London to Australia. Air Asia, the Airline that we were travelling with have their home base in Kuala Lumpor, and all of their London and Australian flights go through there.

We landed at KL in the early evening, and as the airport is way south of the city, had a 1 hour bus trip to KL Centraal train station before the mandatory barter session with the taxi drivers, then finally the trip to the hotel.

We chose the Swiss Garden hotel for our 4 day stay in KL, as the price was pretty good (around $90 per night for a 4 star hotel ), and it was located in the Golden Triangle, which is the prime hotel and shopping precinct. The Patronas Twin towers are about a 30 minute walk away, and the KL Tower is about 20 minutes away. Chinatown is about 10 minutes in the other direction.

I find thet KL is an interesting place, with at least 20 different tourist sites to look at. Within a 4 hour drive there are lots of other tourist areas, including Malucca to the South. Singapore is a 4 hour drive in a car, or 6 hours in a bus. I personally didn’t get that far, but within the KL Area, there are lots of freeways to help with the traffic.
The problem is that there is very little in the way of coordination between the tourists, and the tourist areas. It is very hard to get information about the tourist areas, and even harder to get there. It is much easier to go downtown and shop in the multitude of shopping centres.
If you want a look around i would suggest either the Patronais Towers , or the KL Tower. The Patronas Towers are free, however you have to go there early in the day (between 8 and 8:30AM) and be prepared to queue for an hour to obtain a ticket and secure a time for later in the day. I turned up at 9am on the Sunday, only to miss the allocatioon of tickets by about 10 people. The visit then takes about an hour, which gives you about 15 minutes up in the towers, on the walkway between the towers. You can’t go any higher. The KL Tower entry costs RM38 which is about $A13, but it is reasonable value for money, and the entry fee includes entry to a couple of attractions located around the base of the tower. The viewing platform is actually much better than the Patronas towers as it is at the top of the structure, instead of being halfway up, and the tower is on top of a hill, making it nearly the same height of the Patronas towers.

If you like theme parks, then the Times Square hotel/shopping precinct have a theme park on the 11th floor. It includes a large indoor roller coaster. Below the theme park is a huge 11 storey shopping and restaurant centre. The prices at the shops there are pretty good and can be comparable to the markets for similar items. While you are there, you might like to try the latest in Massages... using small fish to pick at your feet. Interesting.......

If you like the bartering style of shopping, and want to pick up clothes, handbags, copy perfume and DVD’s, then Chinatown is your place. It runs from 10AM to 10 PM and is easily accessible. When we were there, there was a movie being shot in there, and at first it was a bit of a shock as we walked through the crowd to be confronted with 4 guys fighting each other with baseball bats and wooden planks!!

To go to one of the tourist attractions to the north, I elected to catch a local bus, for RM2.5 instead of joining a local tour that cost RM80. I survived the bus trip to the Batu Caves, even though the driver had a bad day and was taking it out on the other traffic, as well as guys on his mobile phone and hand held walkie talkie at the same time. When I made it to the caves, I took a couple of photos of the 285 steps to the top of the caves, and then the heavens opened up. The caves are on the side of a large cliff, and at one stage the lightening was hitting both the top of the hill and the top of the huge Buddah that stands next t the steps. After the rain had fallen for about 2 ours, I decided to call it quits, but as I was locating my shoes (I took them off to shelter in a temple, and where I had put them, with about 20 other pairs, was now a 10cm deep torrent of water) some very kind people from the Philippines approached me, and asked if I would like to come with them, as they had rented a cab for the afternoon, and had been stuck in the temple as well. I decided that that was a much better offer than going back in the bus, so I then got to see many locations that I had no other chance to visit. So If you are good at bartering with the cab drivers, these guys had the cab for three hours for RM30 per hour ($A10/hour) and the cab driver was a wealth of information.
We also visited Putrajaya, which is to the south of KL, and is the new capital city. A lot like Canberra, this city is totally planned out, and is the centre of Government agencies and government. It is a very neat and tidy city, with beautiful bridges, lakes and well designed and integrated buildings. It is a total contrast to Kuala Lumpor.

The shopping is great, the weather is stinking hot, and the traffic is crazy, but Malaysia is a place really worth visiting.
Greg

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Comments

[Greg]

What a Look
Looks like you had done enough walking for the day Cathy.