Georgetown

The transfer between Cameron Highlands and Georgetown was another early start with pickup at 6:00am.  With only 4 of us in the minibus we had some room for a change and a chance to spread out to get some more sleep.  After only a few minutes, we gave up on trying to sleep and began to do our transport prays instead.  The minibus had no brakes and you could hear metal on metal as our driver tried to slow us whilst descending the mountains along extremely windy roads with nothing but a flimsy looking metal barrier protecting us from sheer drops! 

To add insult to injury, the aircon was on so cold that the bus was actually steamed up on the outside and they were playing the hits of the 90s covered in a lift music stylie at ear bleeding levels.  For any MI5 agents out there reading this, you may want to consider this as a new way to illicit information (couldn’t possibly use the word torture….human rights and all that!)  A shiver now goes down my spine every time I hear Untame my heart by Toni Brackston.

Penang is an island 6 hrs north of KL on the west coast not far from the Thai border.  The book described it as a mainstay on the backpacker trail with quaint Chinese buildings and a foodies delight!  As we passed over the bridge connecting the island to the mainland we saw a far more industrialised and high rise city than we expected.  As you drove through, looking at yet more malls we had to double take when seeing a large Tesco’s sign.  The sea front had tower block after tower block catering to the package holiday crowd and again there seemed very little else to do.  So not so quaint then!!  

The first day we wandered the streets looking at the mixture of Chinese, Indian and Colonial architecture and although there was a certain charm about the place, we both were wondering yet again what all the fuss was about and that the book yet again had hyped this place up. 

The second day, desperate to find something to do, we decided to take a local bus along the coast to a small fishing village and the location of Malaysia’s smallest national park.  Teluk Bahang was a 45 minute journey that passed through the major beach area and its associated massive resort hotels.  A few miles before reaching Teluk Bahang, the hotels stopped allowing the sleepy backwater fishing village some space.   On arriving we walked through the village in the general direction of the sea and found the most beautiful, idyllic beach with NO ONE around.  We walked along the beach and eventually came to the entrance of the Penang National Park and decided that a little hike into the jungle would finish the day off nicely.  We grabbed some supplies from a local shop and headed off into the park in the direction of a remote beach and a meromictic lake (contains both fresh and sea water).  The paths were well defined and signposted with different tracks to the same places.  As we had left it fairly late in the day to do this walk, we had a strict timeframe as we did not want to get stuck in the jungle after nightfall.  As we kept walking thinking the beach and lake were just round the corner, it never appeared only offering more dense jungle and steeper paths.  After 2 hours and sunset closing in we had to admit defeat and head back to the village not seeing the lake or the beach.  It’s a real shame we only found this gem on the last day as we could easily have spent a few days exploring this park and the many sights along its coast.  Finally we are starting to find our mojo in Malaysia….no thanks to the book.

With only just under 2 weeks left before our flight to Oz we decided to go all out and booked transportation to a bona fide desert Island on the east coast - the Perhentian Islands.