After 18 hours of travelling by boat and bus, we finally arrived at Penang, Malaysia. We headed into Goergetown which is just over the bridge that connects the island of Penang to the mainland. We checked into the Red Inn hostel and went to the open air food court in search of some food, even though it was late now and we were exhausted. We watched a bit of the live entertainment going on and then dragged ourselves off to bed!
The next morning after a bit of a lie in we thought we would take a walk around and check out the sights of Georgetown. I really needed a doctor now as my foot is definitely infected, so we stopped off at a small clinic and I got my foot checked out as it has been a week and it is not any better and causing me considerable pain. I got anti biotics and painkillers to help me sleep, and some cream to apply, and then it was cleaned and bandaged up for me. If it is not better in 2 more days I have to go to the hospital! I am panicking a bit now as we are trekking in a few days at the Cameron Highlands, and climbing mount kinabalu in 11 days!!! The doctor says there may be glass still inside and I will need an X-ray if this is the case to find it and have it removed!! I am praying it will work its way out on its own!
I can hardly walk on this foot and am frustrated as I want to do stuff. I feel I am holding the girls back, so tell them to go on and do their own thing, I just want to be left alone as I now feel miserable from lack of sleep and the constant pain. They agree to do a cyclo tour as I don't want to walk any further and see the sights that way as this is what I was planning to do today, which was sweet of them, because I know they didn't really want to. We hired the cycle driver and jumped into 2 cyclos and got shown some of the sights of Georgetown. Little India, Chinatown, the fort and lighthouse etc.. After an hour we decide to go and eat, and had enough of touring this way, as it was pretty expensive. I asked my guy to wait and take me back to the hostel, and the girls were going to walk around more. We had lunch which was fish Laksa and not at all to my taste. I was really disappointed and hungry as I skipped breakfast, but it put me off eating anything more for now, so I quickly went to the pharmacy to get some hair colour as I have decided to go dark again to look more natural, and as my hair keeps going lighter in the sun on the ends, so want to even it up, and because it will give me something to do this afternoon ha ha. They did not have the exact colour I was after, so I am taking the plunge and going for Chestnut Black, which I fear may be too dark!! However it will wash out in a few months so why not?I said goodbye to the girls and came back to the placeI left my driver, but he was not there! I looked around and got a juice and waited for a bit, then I asked some of the staff at the food court if they had seen him, and they did not know. I owed him 50 ringit which is about £10 so quite a bit of money for here and I did not know what to do. Maybe he thought I had left when I went to the pharmacy, but had only been gone 10 minutes. I felt really bad, but could not wait any longer as by now I did not think he was coming back, so I started walking and hailed a taxi back.
I arrived back and thought I would try out my new look! I was right, wow, was very black, now I looked like a local, and since having it done I have been constantly asked if I am south american, so perfect, will blend in well in a month then, although I have a new shade, a tad lighter coming for then with my brother :) The girls arrived back in time for dinner, they are leaving for Langkawi, an island off Malaysia, in the morning, early, and I have decided not to go as I may need to go to the hospital soon about my foot, and I can't do anything anyway, so it will be a waste of money. Also I do feel a bit like 2 is company, 3 is a crowd and all that, and as I am being miserable right now, this is a good chance to have some more alone time before we head to Borneo.
So what to do? I have made a plan that while the girls are away, I will go to Batu Feringgi, which is the most popular beach resort on the island. I have found a home stay online, called Annie's Homestay, which has great reviews, and sounds like a wonderful place to meet fellow travellers and hear their stories and just chill out. I leave at lunchtime tomorrow, so I get a lie in too which is just as well, because after we return from dinner, I am online chatting with Michael, a guy I met partying on the beach in Koh Samui, and he is in town!!! We agree to meet up at Slippery Senoritas, a club just around the corner. It is about midnight, and the girls are asleep, so I quietly get ready and call a taxi and off I go. Wow, so this is where all the action is!! It is Saturday night and the place is crawling with people from everywhere. I am worried now that I will not find him as the place is so crowded, but I finally catch up with Michael and his friends and we party for a while and then head to some bars. I took a painkiller before leaving and don't think I should be drinking on them as you are supposed to take them before bed, but this was an unexpected turn to the night! Oh well, 1 or 2 won't hurt! Anyway Michael is in a far worse state then me as he has obviously been on the booze for a while. He is from Adelaide and in the Australian Army and working out here for a while, so eventually he needs to get back to work and we say our goodbyes again, he is such a lovely guy, and is such a babe at 21, he is one of those rare people with a big heart and a special gift of making everyone around him feel special and he is so full of life and so much fun to hang out with. I feel so bad for him though, as I can't imagine he is going to hold it together for much longer after I left him as he was looking decidedly green, and as if he was about to be sick. I don't know, the youth of today!!! It was such a fun night! Maybe we will meet again, the world is such a small place!
I wake the girls when I come in as they need to be up and leaving and go to bed to catch up on some sleep as I don't need to check out until 12. After check out I get a cab to take me to Batu Feringgi, it is about 30 minutes drive from here. I arrive at Annies, introduce myself to some of the other guests, in particular a guy from Devon called James, as he seems to be a long term resident here, get the heads up and head straight for the beach! I spend the rest of the day relaxing in the sun before heading back, grabbing a shower and heading out for dinner. I find a place at the end of the road, I am so tired and just eat and head back to bed for some rest and relaxation!!!
The next day I wake up feeling a bit poorly, with a bad stomach and headache, so I have some breakfast and head back to bed. I finally surface about 3pm and head out to find some wifi at KFC up the road and grab some lunch. I think the anti biotics are starting to work as my foot is looking and feeling better today, but I am sure they are what is upsetting my stomach. On the way back I meet a girl staying at the same place as me and we get chatting, she is from Chechoslavakia, probably spelt that wrong :) and we arrange to go for dinner and the market that evening, and turtle beach the following day! When we get back James decides to come with us and we all head off to the food court where I pick a delicious meal of prawn noodles! We join a dutch couple and their 2 year old baby who are also staying at Annies and are there having dinner. They have cycled with their baby from Phuket, Thailand to Penang, Malaysia over a month stopping at various places along the way and this is the end of their trip now. After dinner we returned back to get ready for our beach day!
We were greeted this morning by rain to our great disappointment! It looked like it was here for the duration, so we cancelled our trip to the beach and everyone decided to go to Georgetown for the day instead. I was heading back there anyway to meet up with the girls again, so we shared a taxi and I checked back into the Red Inn and dumped my stuff, and Zoe, a girl I met from Alice Springs, Australia, and I, went for a tour of the town. I had already seen a fair bit so I showed her around and we stopped off for lunch in Little India. We decided to get a bus to Penang Hill to the viewpoint, but unfortunately when we got to the bus station we were told it was closed. This was not our day today! I was pretty tired by now anyway, so Zoe headed back to Annies place and i went for a siesta at my hostel and waited for the girls to arrive.
The girls came back about 6pm and we booked our accommodation and bus to the cameron Highlands for the morning and then I went off to get some dinner at a little place just across the road. I met a couple in there who had just come back from climbing mount Kinabalu, and we got chatting away about our travels and all the places we were going and where we had been. It was really fun swapping stories, as they had also been away for 4 months and were at the end of their tour. They also suggested lots of places to check out in Borneo which was helpful. It was getting late now, so I bid them goodnight and we went our separate ways.
The next morning we caught the 8.30am bus to Cameron Highlands. It took about 4 hours to get there in this little minibus with the crazy driver who insisted on overtaking anything and everything, especially on the last leg of the journey as we were climbing up the hills going around the winding roads, with loads of blind bends. By the time we got there I felt a bit sick from flying round and round the corners!! We checked into our room which was very nice and comfortable and then headed into the town for a wander around and to see what tours were on offer. I decided not to do the trekking because I am going to rest my foot for a few more days. I chose to do the countryside tour, which involved going to a tea plantation and factory as this is big tea growing country, followed by the butterfly farm and insect house, the bee farm, the strawberry farm, a temple, and the time tunnel which dictates the history of the Cameron Highlands since it was founded in the 1800's. This is a hill station which has a fantastic climate for growing flora and fauna and that ad trekking is mostly what goes on here. It used to be where people would come for a break to get away from the heat of Malaysia as it is much cooler up here with a temperature that ranges between 10 and 25 degrees on average.
The next morning we prepared for our tours, the girls were going trekking and as we were getting ready the rain started to come down, and it rained and rained, and it did not stop all day! I was now happy that I had chosen this tour as it was probably the best thing to do on a day like this as it was mostly undercover. However the girls enjoyed their trek, despite the rain and mud, and had a good time. I particularly liked the butterfly and insect house, they had some really interesting specimens there, including the leaf insect, which I have only ever seen before on TV and is truly remarkable! I also found the time tunnel interesting, reading about the missing millionaire who was never found, jim Cameron, he went for a walk one day and just never returned. A huge man hunt was set up and went on for months as there was a big reward. There are a lot of theories surrounding this tale, one is that of a dying man who on his death bed confessed to his family, that he ran down a white man on the road by accident, and buried the body in an unmarked grave, but before he could say where it was, he took his last breath and died. We were pretty tired after a busy day so we all just chilled out and waited for the rain to stop so we could walk into town and get dinner. We had booked the early bus to Kuala Lumper as there was nothing more we really wanted to see here now and we packed our stuff so we were ready to leave at 8.30am.
We were soon back in the hot sunshine as we arrived in Kuala Lumper! It is so humid and muggy here. However after the rain we are not complaining. We check into our hostel Suzie's Place, which turns out to be a let down! We booked a double room and a dorm for 1. The booking was messed up somehow and they did not have our room available! I was not happy as I did not want to be in a dorm! I agreed in the end only to be confronted with a room that was big enough for 4 and there was 6 crammed in there, with no room even to put our bags and stuff. It was a nightmare! Eventually they did upgrade us to a room and charged us the same price for the night, even the rooms were tiny!! I should bloody well think so too! Then they messed up the cost, then they lost my laundry, eventually to be found mixed into 2 other peoples bags! Aghhhh!!
Aside from the accommodation, KL is a beautiful city. Shame on us, we headed straight to Nando's for some western style food as we were craving it by now. After that we just strolled around getting our bearings. We were right near China town at the end of Petaling Street where the market is.
There is a great atmosphere around at the moment as everyone is getting ready for the chinese New Year on the 23rd January! We will be celebrating the year of the Dragon while we are in Borneo! It is the water dragon which only comes around every 60 years so it is a bit special :) Apparently this is my year to find love and step up my career!! Not sure about that one but we shall see! The rain must have followed us here and as we were on our way back it started to pour down! We took shelter for a while and then braved the storm and headed back!
The next day we prepare for more sightseeing, we catch the metro into KLCC shopping centre where we have lunch and visit the Petronas Towers, KL's famous landmark building consisting of twin towers joined by a skywalk viewing platform, where you can gaze across the city and get your bearings. However the best place for a view was the KL Tower, which we decided to go up, and have afternoon tea in the revolving restaurant. This consisted of a buffet meal with a 360 view of the city which took 2 hours to do a full circle!
On our last day in KL we split up as Nicola wanted a new camera and jeans, and Carmel and I wanted to see the Batu caves. We caught the bus, and after about 45 minutes and then getting thrown off because they decided they were not going any further, so we had to board another bus and finally arrived. It was worth the trip though and we enjoyed a nice view of the city and had fun with the monkeys roaming around everywhere, even though they were so brave and naughty and even attacked a little boy, although he was harassing it! We then headed to the KL Park and botanical gardens and finished our day in Merdeka Square.
An early night was called for as we had an early flight the next morning to Kota Kinabalu, next stop Borneo!!!
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