Day 23 - KL to Sydney

Our flight home leaves KLIA at 9am so we are up at 6:15 but even so it's a bit of a rush. We've already checked in so only need to drop our bags and then head out to the satellite terminal. KLIA is such a change from the dog's breakfast that Sydney airport is... even with the recent refurbishment.

We grab a quick coffee and muffin and then down to the Immigration and Security before hoping on the monorail out to the terminal. Even at 7:45 it is busy so the train is crowded.

Boarding call is at 8:30 and we reluctantly say goodbye to Malaysia as we board the Boeing 777 and settle into our seats. 9am comes and goes and I can see the fuel tender is still under the wing. The Captain comes on the intercom and announces they have a high pressure problem so our departure is delayed by 30 minutes.

Half an hour later we take-off and head south past Melaka and Singapore basking in the sunlight below. It's quite cloudy and every so often we pass thunderheads as we make for Indonesia. This whole area is dotted with small islands and we see the occasional fishing boat... or is it a boat load of asylum-seekers heading for Christmas Island?

Mid-afternoon we finally reach Western Australia and the rich red barren landscape of home. You can't see any evidence of human settlement out here but it's interesting to think that there must be billions of tonnes of undiscovered minerals buried under all that red dirt.

There is a lot of cloud over Australia... we fly above most of it but occasionally the seat-belt sign comes on and we experience mild turbulence through big thunderheads. Meanwhile the cabin crew provides snacks and drinks... Malaysian Airlines is the best we've ever experienced.

As darkness rapidly approaches around 8:30pm we watch the flight track on the monitor and see that we are dodging storms around Goulburn and eventually we make an approach to Sydney's runway 16R, passing the familiar sight of Sydney at night through the left side windows. As we touch down, 8 hours after leaving KL, we realise our holiday is over and it will be back to the old grind before too long.

We grab some duty free on the way through arrivals and get through Immigration ok... we have a couple of wooden items (the mango peeler I got at the cooking course in Hoi An, and some chopsticks) and we don't want to be stars on Border Security so we declare them to Customs. They ask what we are declaring and we tell them... they wave us through without checking so we are all done and out in record time.

Charlie meets us at the Short-Term pickup and we head home... our holiday well and truly over but we are already planning on returning to Vietnam.    

Day 22 - Langkawi to KLIA

It's our last day in Langkawi, and the day before we head home, and I realise I've made an inconvenient miscalculation in the planning. I've booked the latest flight of the day out of Langkawi in order to give us, in effect, an extra day here. But what I didn't count on was that check-out time of the hotel is 12 noon and we'll have 6 or 7 hours to kill before our flight. We don't have car, don't really have time to visit anything and our luggage needs to be stored somewhere. And where do you freshen up before the flight.

It seems we've either got very early morning flights or late ones and either way it's inconvenient. I call Malaysia Airlines and ask if we can catch the 3:40pm flight out of Langkawi... sure they say... for an extra 300 ringit. That's what the original flight costs! So me accept the reality that we are gonna have to wait in the hotel bar for 5 hours and at least we'll have somewhere for the bags and we can keep relatively cool. But we ask Reception about a late check-out and they graciously let us have the chalet until 3pm without any additional cost. Loyalty does count sometimes.

So we stay cool and watch a little TV before packing and checking out at 3. We grab a taxi to the airport and have a coffee and muffin and Liz does some shopping... it's all duty free here but we're not gonna carry bags of booze and other stuff down to KL.

We arrive at KLIA right on 8:30 and I message Ben and Rahmat who have planned to meet up with us for a late dinner. Together with Zol (who has the flu but makes the effort to be there because he said he would), all have travelled a couple of hours to be here on our last night and we really appreciate the efforts they make to see us off before we leave.

I haven't seen Ben for the 3 months he's been here so it's great to catch up with him even though he's heading home on Saturday. The others soon arrive and we grab a couple of tables in the food court and Ben orders some Malaysian dishes for us. As usual with this crowd, there are lots of laughs and bagging each other, notably Zol who has bought along his Nikon D1... Ben and Rahmat are Canon men and I'm a recent convert to Canon but my main cameras are my Panasonics. I think the other guys secretly think they are toys but they have paid for themselves in the prizes have won with photos taken with them.

We have a great time and it's hugs all round when we finally bid them farewell and jump onto the Pan Pacific Hotel buggy... with the group standing there waving and laughing as I clown around. What a great bunch of new and old friends. It couldn't have been a better send-off.

We check into the Pan Pacific, where we were the same time exactly 3 weeks ago, only to find we have been upgraded to the Club Floor. This is a 5 star hotel and we have to admit, one of the best we've stayed at anywhere. Unfortunately all our stays have been one-nighters, either going somewhere else or coming home.

Although it's 11pm, we need a cool drink so we head to the Travellers Bar and Grill where the cute Asian duo belts out some golden oldies while a large group from the Italian MotoGP team noisily share the next table... I hope they are not riding tomorrow because they are ordering jugs of Carslberg like it's going out of style.

As we leave for bed, the group performs a pretty decent rendition of Pink Floyd's Another Brick in the Wall. Then it's up to level 9 and we watch “The Artist” win Best Picture at the Academy Awards before turning in for our early 6:30am wake-up call. Our last night away on what has been an arduous trip bit one which we have enjoyed immensely.

Day 21 - Langkawi

Today is a "Pool Day" so after breakfast Liz heads for the circus... I mean Pool Area... while I catch upon on some reading and stay cool in our air-conditioned chalet. I remember last time we were here and the air-con broke down and for a few hours we had nothing but the ceiling fan... bloody unbearable!

Liz returns about 3pm and we have decided that tonight, our last night here and, except for our night at KLIA before an early morning flight Tuesday, we will have dinner tonight on our little balcony and watch the sunset from here. We'll order room service dinner and of course a few cold Tigers and we'll be set. Besides, we don't have to get dressed up and travel far so that suits us.

I grab the G2 and tripod and get some final shots of the resort and the view of the bay and islands... it is bloody hot out in the sun so I don't linger but get some nice bright sunlight shots. Nothing to write home about and more snaps than anything else but they will do to remember the warmth of Langkawi when the icy cold winter arrives back home.

Liz's eagle eye watches me from our balcony to see that I don't slip and fall in to the water... in light of my bad record with water features and cameras! It's nice just sitting on the balcony and soon enough I arrive back and dump the shirt and cool off again.

The view from balcony where we will have dinner tonight... providing the mozzies and other bugs of the night take the night off... actually we haven't noticed many mozzies or bugs here but where there is rainforest, there will be bugs. Should be a very romantic end to our stay in Langkawi.

Our dinner is delivered promptly at 5:30 and the guys set it up on the balcony table for us. There are several restaurants at the resort but none has the view that we have from our dining room. It is sheer magic sitting here, with delicious Malaysian dishes and of course, a couple of Tigers. Doesn't get much better than this.

Dinner at our chalet with a million dollar view.

A few minutes after we finish dinner, I go inside to grab another Tiger when Liz calls out... a family of monkees clambered down our balcony post. Both Liz and the mother monkee with baby onboard were startled... both got a fright before they jumped to the palm trees and then climbed a tree across the road where the family of four fed on berries. 

  

Not many restaurants here where you get a floor show like that! 

Day 20 - Langkawi

We wake to another brilliant sunrise and  head to breakfast just a short 200 metre walk from our chalet. We are really lucky being so close to the lobby... some of the chalets are hidden away over half a kilometre away up in the rainforest. The trolly busses regularly run around the resort so you don't have to walk but sometimes the wait can be quite long.

Today is an "Out" day.... Liz reckons every second day is her "Pool Day" when I catch upon the Blog and have a read while she heads for the pool only to find that the smart ones have already staked out their claim to a couch by putting their towel on it as soon as the towel guy opens his stall. Still, she manages to find a spot amongst the "Pink Brigade"... they haven't heard about skin cancer and like the ad back home says... there are a lot of skin cells under extreme stress here. Madness! 

Liz wants to head back to Pantai Basir Hitam (Black Sands Beach) because the stalls there have some cheap clothes... the 747 will definitely need a trailer on the flight home! Guided by the reliable TomTom it takes about 25 minutes, wheeling through pretty kampongs and rubber plantations. 

While Liz hits the stalls I head down to the beach for some shots of an amazing cloud bank hanging over the Ko Tarutao islands to the north. Lot of other visitors walk down to the beach and it seems they all want a photo so I am kept busy taking shots of them using their cameras. Most are Arab tourists and can't speak a word of English but they are polite and thankful for the photos.

I meet up with an Australian couple enjoying their first time in Langkawi. They have been up in Phuket but they reckon here is better... they like the unspoilt villages and less crowds. They try to take a shot of themselves with their heavy DSLR so I grab their Canon and we make sure we get the islands and scenery in the background. We discuss the political rubbish happening back home and agree that our country has become a laughing stock. They are staying at the same hotel so we might meet up for drinks.

A couple of local lads from the nearby kampong are flying their kites and keeping cool in the water. They speak no English but are keen to have their photo taken so they ham it up and pose for some shots. 

It turns out they are from the local fishing village which is called Kampong Yu... about 300 metres away towwards the cement factory. I've been here once before and it is tucked away down a side road so no tourists go there. It is very picturesque so we drive around and manage to capture some of the magic. 

These small fishing villages are the soul of the island... they are generally unkempt, with rusting engines and other gear laying about and the smell of fish is ever present, but they are fascinating places with so much character. Seafood is a big part of the local diet both here and on mainland Malaysia so these villages are kept busy.
 

We head back to the hotel for a quick shower and freshen up... it seeems a waste of time... step outside the air-conditioned hotel room and you break a sweat almost immediately.

We then head out to visit Dr Abdul Hussain, Rahmat's brother, who lives on the other side of the island. He's retired but is doing research into herbal medicine and he conducts tours of his herb garden called Dr Ghani's Herbwalk and even former Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir (the one who crossed swords with Paul Keeting) is a friend of Dr Hussain and has visited.

We enjoy cups of tea and some Malaysian sweets while sitting under the trees in the garden and Dr Hussain tells us all about his work and family. He has nine children... 5 with a former wife and 4 with his current wife! As the sun sets over the rainforest, I can already hear squadrons of mosquitos warming up in the nearby mangroves, preparing for their nightly sorties to cause havoc amongst the human invaders. 

Time for us to go so we bid the Dr and his family farewell and we decide to dine at the restaurant owned by Tun Dr Mahathir and recommended to us by Rahmat, The Loaf at Perdana Quay, right next to the Mare Blu where we dined a couple of nights ago.

We score a table right next to the marina overlooking the expensive cruisers and yachts moored just a few feet away. These two are both over 100 feet long and we find out that the weekly charter rate is 280,000 ringit (about $85,000!)


The end of another interesting day... tomorrow is "Pool Day" so Liz will soak up the sun... and get a little more pink before we head home on Monday.

Day 19 - Langkawi

Gerry Seinfeld does a skit on one of his shows about travelling and being on the road. He observes that the most frightening human experience is when you go to the bathroom and flush... and the water comes up. Well... this morning that's what happened!!! 

No there will be no further descriptions and definitely no photos Ian... but needless to say, we ended up having to dial "1" and a polite young man arrived shortly after and disappeared into the bathroom. He emerged shortly after and scurried outside (I assume to be sick!) to return soon after with some tools familiar to plumbers. All in a days work I guess, but just in time for Liz who was heading out to the pool.

So the blog is up to date... the sun is shining, the birds singing, the monkeys swinging.... and the toilet back in service... more later!

... Later...   

Liz is back from the pool and sports a little redness but she says a lot of the English and Eurpoean guests down at the pool are like lobsters! Crazy stuff... they obviously haven't heard of skin cancer.

After a shower and freshen up we head off in the little Banger... which I have discovered is a Perodua Myvi... never heard of them but a nifty little car... and we're on our way to Kuah Town where Liz wants to get something at the Mall and then we'll have an early dinner at Wonderland, our favourite restaurant in Langkawi and very popular on TripAdvisor.

Sure it's a street side restaurant like the thousands of others over here in this part of the world... it has plastic chairs and tables, there is a tepid waterway running right behind it and the occasional street cat wanders through every now and again... but it is famous for its excellent food and cheap prices. We came here last trip and vowed we would be back.
 

Our favourite dish here is the grilled Tiger Prawns and these babies are BIG and delicious. We order a plate of Seafood Fried Rice, Baby Kailan and Assam Prawns. We are not disappointed ... they also serve ice cold Tigers and Diet Coke so we are happy campers.
 

The staff run around as the tables start to fill... this place doesn't get going until after dark when it is hard to get a table.


It is still light and I'm hoping we might be able to catch a little sunset before it dips below the horizon. We drive back to our hotel and the sunset looks fabulous again but we're not going to make it to a beach with palms in time so we stop along the way, where the road runs amongst the rice paddies and coconut palms, and perching the TZ20 on top of the car, I shoot the last of the sunset....
 

It is spectacular as always and the scene seems to linger... with each passing second the colours change and I keep shooting... it is magic to watch. 

Day 18 - Langkawi

I don't know what has happened to our body clocks on this trip... I'm up at 7am and the sun has not yet popped up from behind the mountains to the east so I grab the tripod and head down to the rocks just 50 metres away.

Already people are on the beach for their morning jog but there are several with cameras ready to catch the sunrise. It's pretty spectacular and up here it seems to take on a whole new light not seen back home. That's not to say we don't get good sunrises but it's different.

After breakfast we organise a rental car like we did last time here. We go for a small car and end up with a tiny box-like car and I wonder if it will make it up Gunung Raya, which is the highest mountain on the island at 881 metres, and which has a lookout and a hotel on the summit.

We head off for the day and immediately fall in love with our little banger... it has plenty of up and go and plenty of room... it will suit us fine and is all we need for exploring Langkawi. We rented it from the guy at the hotel and while it may be a little more expensive than the flock of car rental places at the airport, the cars are in good condition and reliable.

First stop is the shopping mall at Kuah, the island's largest and only real city. Amazingly this must be the only shopping mall in South East Asia that Liz hasn't visited! I need some socks and she discovers they even have a Big Mens store... what a think to say!!! But I'll come back and maybe get some shorts which are easier up here in the heat.

We then head towards Black Sands Beach, the TomTom leading the way across the roads which criss-cross the island. Of course I stop every now and again for a photo opportunity while my pretty assistant holds the cameras and scouts the map for other possible sights.

While driving through small kampongs (villages) and rubber plantations, we are reminded that most of Langkawi is untouched by tourist development. The main tourist place is Pantai Cenang (Cenang Beach)... it's as if Surfers Paradise has been transplanted... very touristy and gauche... not my cup of tea at all.

We head up the 12 kilometer climb up Gunung Raya and the little banger (I don't even know the make of this car!) zooms upwards with no trouble... passing rainforest and monkeys along the road until we reach the summit where you can see the whole island and Thailand to the north.

It's pleasantly cool up on the top of the mountain and we enjoy the views before heading back down and stopping to try and take some shots of the camera-shy monkeys who gather in groups beside the roadway as it winds through the rainforest.

We arrive at Black Sands Beach where I shot some scenes at the fishing village during our last trip. Liz was at the pool that day so this is the first time she's been here and as there are beachside stalls she investigates. But her pressing need is a toilet and after finding only squat ones she decides to wait until later. It's a girl thing!

I see some potential shots along the beach front so that's me sorted for the next 20 minutes and then I punch the airport into the TomTom where there definitely will be western toilets for Liz. 

I really want to get some sunset shots this trip... last trip here it was overcast every day so I missed out but I am determined to get them this time. So we head to Pantai Cenang Beach... absolute bedlam and Liz comments that even though some of the top hotels on Langawki are located here, the crowded beach and main street don't appeal to us. We are more than happy with the Berjaya... it is out of the way but no crowds and a better outlook. We scout for potential sunset shoot locations and make a mental note of a boardwalk at the northern end of the Pantai Cenang.

I recalled seeing last trip some advertising saying the best place to see a sunset was from the Lighthouse Restaurant, a couple of kilometres north so we drive there and find that the beach is not as packed as Cenang but there are 2 or 3 parasailing outfits operating along this stretch of sand. 

The front deck of the Lighthouse Restaurant does indeed look inviting... maybe we'll have dinner there one night... but Liz is content to sit on the sand and watch the antics of the parasailors who come dangerously close during someof their landings... while I set up the G2 on the tripod and fire off a shot every few minutes as the sun works its magic on the clouds and water.

A couple of young guys from Dubai ask if I can take some shots of their impending parasail flight... they have more guts than I do... there is no way I'd harness up and take off one one of those contraptions after a 5-minute instructional chat! 

But I get some fabulous shots as the towed-parasail passes across the face of the sun... I even manage some burst shots of their less than delicate landing and they seem thrilled with the results.

 

I'll email the photos to them... who knows, they might be Arab oil billionaires who might treat us to an all expenses paid holiday in Dubai... well, we can but dream eh!

As the sunset really starts to get going and the colour in the western sky becomes a golden glow, I continue firing shots... it all looks amazing and hopefully I'll get a couple of good ones from the batch. It is hard to process the images in Lightroom on the small screen of my notepad so I'll wait untilI get home before working on the shots. It will be a tough job picking the best... in the LCD, every shot looks amazing. 

We couldn't have wished for a better sunset... it all just fell into place. I'd love to come up herefor a shoot with The Jolly Boys + One... we'd get some amazing shots here boys and girls.


We had planned to eat at Wonderland in Kuah, with it's amazing grilled prawns which are almost 12 inches long, or according to TripAdvisor, the best restaurant on Langkawi, the Priviledge at the new Perdana Quay. Perdana is just a few minutes from our hotel whereas Kuah is 19kms in the other direction. So, we give the Lighthouse a miss for tonight and head to Perdana Quay. 

Liz reminds me that we've been out and about all day and we both probably stink from the perspiration... maybe the Priviledge won't let us in... she is dressed for the beach but I'm wearing smart casual (probably still reek a bit). When we finally find the restaurant, they tell us that without a reservation they have no room... Liz reckons it's because we looked and smelled like a couple of strays! But the maitre de recommends Mare Blu down on the boardwalk and it too looks packed but they find us a table. 

We overlook the marina and there are some seriously expensive cruisers moored here... not much change out of quite a few million for these Big Boys Toys. And they hail from ports all over the world... maybe the Dubai guys own one!  




We are hungry, having skipped lunch which we tend to do while on the road... breakfast is big and it's too hot most of the time for lunch other than a cool drink. Liz grabs a G&T and I order a mug of icy cold Carlsberg... bloody beautiful, and cheap too. The food here is good too and you tend to forget that side dishes here are bigger than the usual postage-stamp-size dish of sauteed muchrooms etc at home, so we are swimming in food which we cannot finish. My duck breast is simply delicious and Liz's salmon equally so.

Big sheets of lightening light up the whole mountainside and marina, but the tropical storm heads out into the Andaman Sea and we crash into bed after parking the banger in the carpark and walking back to our chalet.   

Day 17 - Langkawi

 

We had intended sleeping in this morning... we've been on the go for 2 weeks and with some early mornings, we needed a rest. Liz has been slow to get going most days... maybe jet lag catching up as she's normally up and about at home around 6am ... but I'm up this morning at 7am and the sun's not up yet. I let her sleep as I try for some sunrise shots from the balcony of our chalet. It's a nice view to wake up to... very hard to take!     

This is our chalet amongst the rainforest just as the morning sun's rays light up the resort. All the chalets are in the rainforest ... either single ones like ours or double ones and then there are the ones on the water... maybe we'll get one of those next time.

The breakfast restaurant is packed at 10am and there is a wide variety of different foods to cater for the different nationalities here. The Egg Station cooks are working overtime as they wield their spatulas like white-hatted sword-fighters! 

Liz heads off to the pool and finds it hard to stake her claim to a poolside chair... apparently many of the guests are from Russia or Germany or thereabouts... her assessment is they should not be wearing bikinis! I'll have to head down and check them out... Before she headed for the pool I told Liz that I would volunteer my services as a Bikini-Line Technician but she reckons it would be a tough job even for me!

Liz has booked a manicure and pedicure for 5pm and then we'll have dinner at the Beach Restaurant. In the meantime, the blog is up to date and I'm gonna chill out and catch up on some reading.

Liz's indulgence went ok so we get ready for dinner at the Beach Restaurant just down from our chalet. It's still hot and humid at 8:30 but there is an occasional cool breeze as we look out on the twinkling lights of the other resorts and enjoy a western meal for thefirst time in 3 weeks... pizza and pasta. I so miss the Vietnamese food...

We head for bed as the sounds of the rainforest which surround us helps us drift off to sleep.