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August 4, 2012August 4, 2012

Travelling day

Today we took a car from Danau Toba to beristagi, a journey of about four hours. First we hiked a couple of miles with our rucksacks back to the German bakery which we had previously enjoyed for breakfast. Having taken full advantage of the buffet options, we caught the 9 am ferry to Parapet. There we were met by our prebooked car to drive us to Beristagi. The journey involved more random acceleration and deceleration, hairpin turns and blind overtaking it. I took my mind off it by spotting me favourite uses for a moped. They included twelve (or was it 13) children on one scooter travelling home from school, the man with a full size fridge freezer strapped to the back of his (how do you balance that?), the one with a home-made 6ft by 6ft “windscreen” made from bamboo and sheets of plastic, the ones converted in mobile hawker stalls who can pull to the side of the road, pop up an umbrella and cook you whatever you would like for tea, and the one with chickens on the back! I also noticed that in the UK we seriously underutilise the opportunies to honk our horns. Here you need to honk at every other vehicle and most of the pedestrians you pass. Plenty of value achieved 🙂

We’re staying somewhere a bit more upmarket in Beristagi but the altitude means that the temperature is lower. I think this might restict our use of the outdoor pool. Phil and Luke have braved a local barber for haircuts. luke looks like a different child – his hair is very short now! He’s happy and i’m pretending i don’t mind the lack of curls!

We’ve booked a guide for the climb of Sibayak tomorrow. We are all excited to climb a real live volcano, although there’s been no actual activity for a long time!

July 20, 2012July 23, 2012

Settling in to KL

We arrived in KL slightly bleary off the night train. We had a real adventure with our five top bunks through the jungle but I don’t think anyone actually slept all that well. A quick stop in KL Sentral station for breakfast and then on to find our hotel. Two interlinking rooms this time, very lovely and very friendly staff.

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We couldn’t check in until 2pm so we went to look at the shopping centre opposite. Turns out it has a theme park on the top levels including a full size roller coaster. Only Phil was tall enough and brave enough to go on the big one, but we still enjoyed the smaller rides and we had the place pretty much to ourselves for a good deal of the afternoon. For tea we hit the hawker stalls and had fabulous beef ball noodles! A broth with beef balls in and a separate bowl of noodles with soy sauce mince on top. Delicious and very filling.

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For thursday we had taken the plunge and booked a tour to the Malaysian elephant sanctuary. It was highly recommended by both locals and travellers but we were very disappointed. Bathing the elephants was cancelled due to high water levels, feeding them was much as you can do at Colchester zoo, and the “ride” was only a 20m circle. Not at all what we had hoped for, and very expensive for what it was. We visited deerland on the way and the kids held an albino python.

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Today we have redressed the balance a bit by playing in a free playground all day. The kids had been in their pants in the water play / paddling pool as we didn’t know they would need costumes. The water provided some much needed cooling from the blistering heat. I’m trying not to moan as i know those at home are still hoping for some summer weather but, my goodness, it has been hot on this trip!

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This evening there has been a thunderstorm so we have been out for dinner at the indian just a few doors from our hotel. As we walked there i thought maybe one korma, one biriyani and one hot one for Phil should do. Once we got there we realised that making plans like that is hopeless! It turnedout to be a canteen type effect with no words of english spoken so we pointed at some random things and hoped they wouldn’t be to spicy for the children. The staff couldn’t have ben more welcoming. It turned out just fine with delicious food and enough that the children could manage, just far too much. Child size portions seem so far to have eluded us completely. Normally we order three adult meals and share but today everyone wanted a chance to choose from the counter so we ended up with five adult meals. No chance of starvation tonight…..

July 18, 2012July 23, 2012

Kota Bharu tour

Our last day in Kota Bharu came round very quickly and we spent it being chaufferred around in a Mercedes/Nissan from the late seventies. Our taxi driver “Mun” took us first to a kite factory, the work going into these amazing flying “moons”, “birds” and “cats” is painstaking and so fragile. We wished that we could buy one but they would not last a week in our backpack.

Next stop was the shadow puppet maker. On the 30 minute drive we established that the taxi had airconditioning and that it was on but that all the windows were open. That would make it quite tricky to cool the car down but I could not coax the drive or anyone else to shut the windows. Then Susie leans out of hers and her hat blows off so we have another conversation in pigeon English to get Mun to turn round. I wish I could speak some more Malay but even the little I would have learned would leave me wanting trying to explain “my daughters hat blew off while she was leaning out your window.

What really floated our boat was that he took a genuine interest in teaching the children and getting them to have a go at all of it. He was so welcoming. We ended up buying the one in the picture.

The puppet maker was a true joy. In a ramshackle tin hut by the river he first traces a design of a character on paper and then glues this to a piece of cow hide he has de-furred and ironed flat. Then he punches along the lines with a hammer and nail to make the patterns.

Next he paints the character in bright, water-fast dyes and articulates the joints if required.

There is not much more to it than that but I have massively over simplified the task. It takes about 8 days for each piece! Because it is hide the characters last for ages. He showed us one that was 130 years old.

We also saw the batik factory but this was not significantly more amazing than doing it ourselves except that the scale and professionalism was magnified ten fold.

Much love to Mun our taxi driver who then got us to the hotel to pick up our bags and drop us at the train station for the overnight express to KL.

The train ride was fantastic. Bumpy yes, long yes but a great way to see people, countryside and another part of malay life. We are now safe and sound in a lovely hotel.

July 16, 2012July 18, 2012

Malaysia Kota Bharu to Kuala Lumpur

We are getting into the swing of things now we are back from our all inclusive resort. It is tough in the heat but we are determined to get the best experiences under our belt.

To that end we visited the cultural centre at Kota Bharu today and since we arrived early we sat and had a bottle of water at the adjoining cafe. They have 6 children and so ours played games with them and generally mucked about in the mid thirties heat we were experiencing. We were then entertained at the cultural centre as they put on a drum show, a martial arts demonstration, chong ka lessons, kite making and batik craft displays.

Once complete we felt exhausted but we had decided at the cultural centre that we would leave Kota Bharu for Kuala Lumpur tomorrow evening so off to the train station in a taxi to buy tickets. I have been really looking forward to a good long train journey so 14 hours should take the edge off that desire nicely 🙂

It is generally cheaper in Malaysia to get a teaxi than a bus when you are a party of 5 since we fit comfortably in one car.

Earlier in the day we had some essential purchases to sort at the mall. Blessed air conditioning and of all things a Clarks shoe shop! This was perfect since Susie’s shoes had given up a week ago and she had been in knock off crocs since. The shop assistants had to unwrap the shoe measurer for its first use and a full training session began for the other two assistants who clearly are not used to measuring before purchase.

It is approaching Ramadan now and attention is turning to fasting and the festivities planned for the occasion. We are looking forward to sharing with the primarily Islamic population their special period and it might make picking up food during the day more interesting.

July 14, 2012July 16, 2012

Check this diving video out

I am putting an HD version of this on too but I think I am asking too much of the local internet services to upload 265 mb so it will probably fail.

However let me just say that this dive was my best ever and I will always remember it.

There was so much to see and I have had to remove so many things to keep it succinct.

I had two more dives subsequently and they were great too but not like this one.

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HQ is 260mb so may take a while to download!

https://vimeo.com/45748079

July 14, 2012July 14, 2012

Chilling!

We’ve been far too relaxed here, even updating the blog has seemed to be too much effort! The setting and weather have been ideal, the kids had been happy playing on the beach and snorkelling and i have finally got stuck into some of the books i brought on my ereader.

Phil has had some great diving. After my refresher course i just did one dive. Unfortunately it was marred by too many stinging jellyfish to avoid at that particular site on that particular day. Then i ruined it completely with my error on set up (someone had already turned my air on, so I turned it all the way off and back on half a turn, instead of all the way on and back half a turn) meaning that my air stopped very suddenly. My buddy and i had to quickly put into practice our training and ascend together using only her air. Wouldn’t have been much fun at the best of times but through the jellyfish it was pretty horrid. All in all i’ve decided to leave the diving to Phil for now 🙂

Today we have to drag ourselves away from here, several stone heavier and a good deal browner? We will spend one more night in the same hotel at Kuala Besut and then move onto to Kota Bharu.

July 11, 2012July 11, 2012

Island paradise!

We had a nervy start, arriving in Kuala Besut by taxi and being taken straight to an agent and not he hotel we had asked for. After too much debate we finally got to the hotel to find it was closed for refurbishment! We had a fairly stressed half hour looking for an alternative whilst being shouted at and followed round by touts on mopeds we finally landed on our feet and found a large, clean family room with air conditioning.

The next difficulty was that everywhere we wanted to stay on the Perhentian Islands seemed to be full for all of July and August! With office hours finishing we settled for some internet research and a bit of quiet panicing.

In the morning we grabbed an early breakfast, took a deep breath and headed into an agents office to see if hey could help us out. Luckily, they could! They tried wuite hard to talk us into a cheapie chalet option, but the photos looked grim and it semed a shame to visit a tropical paradise and stay in a dump! It took a while to persuade them that we actually wanted to spend more money but they got it in the end and booked us ino BuBu Resort. At this point it transpired that they only accepted cash and the nearest cash point was 1km away! Amazingly they trustingly loaned Phil their scooter and sent him off to find the ATM! Wouldn’t happen in the UK.

The ATM had a very low withdrawl limit so Phil and to make two trips – one to withdraw on the credit card, and another to use the debit card. Finally all paid up at 10.50am. The boat crossing was at 11am, cue frantic checking out of hotel, sprint to the jetty etc but we made it!

Having arrived we are delighted with our decision. Lovely room, fabulous service, unbelievable food and the most amazing location! Phil has booked me for my dive refresher this afternoon (he did his yesterday and is on his first proper dive now). I’m nervous because its been so long, but if he snorkelling off the beach is this amazing i can’t miss seeing the diving.

July 2, 2012July 2, 2012

The next stage…..

We’ll be going offline for a few days now as we say a sad goodbye to the lovely Hunts and head off solo. We have so enjoyed our time here – it has been a luxury to be so well taken care of. Today we arrive on the Malaysian island of Sibu.

Last night we did a river cruise which enabled us to see some of Singapore’s more famous sights. A lovely trip with a cooling evening breeze. Later we stopped at Guzzlers Bay, a famous hawker market to get some food. Very busy, compounded by a heavy metal concert going on next door, it was quite a relief to get take away to eat back at home.

We can’t wait for the next part of our adventure……….

July 1, 2012July 1, 2012