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| Tuesday, 14-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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Leaving Pangkor for Singapore
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Needless to say, as we were leaving today, the sun was shining, the sky was blue and it was looking like a beautiful day.
We caught the early ferry to Lumut where the driver was waiting to take us to Kuala Lumpur airport. This turned out to be a four hour drive, but our driver was extremely informative and told us all about everything we passed - we are now very knowledgeable about Malaysian agriculture and industry. It was a very interesting drive, through rubber, palmoil and coconut plantations, as well as huge paddy fields. Part of the route took us up into the hills, but apparently not high enough to see any tea growing. We got to KL airport very early and managed to change to an earlier flight to Singapore, which was good.
On arrival in Singapore, we were met by yet another driver who took us to the Furama Hotel in Chinatown. We dropped off our bags and set off to walk around the colonial district of the city and have our obligatory Singapore Sling at Raffles, before a meal at a riverside restaurant on Boat Quay. Singapore is a very attractive city - unbelievably clean and graffit free, though uncannily well organised with notices everywhere telling you what not to do!
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| Monday, 13-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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At Pangkor
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Early in the morning, a fishing boat turned up in the bay and cast a drag net - we watched them hauling in their catch onto the beach - there was a fascinating selection of fish, including a huge queen fish, stingrays, snappers, barracuda and lots of others that we didn't recognise. There were also quite a few jellyfish, which almost put us off swimming in the sea again!
We had some really delicious sea food in the restaurant and later joined in the karaoke session in the bar.
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| Sunday, 12-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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At Pangkor
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Mmm ... tasty
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visitors to our verandah
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sunset
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We had a tremendous thunderstorm during the night, with brilliant sheet lightening and crashing thunder. In the morning it was pouring with rain and we had to wade through a mini flood to get to breakfast. Although the rain cleared and it was hot during the day, it was mostly cloudy - we went swimming and for a paddle around the bay in a canoe. The monkeys seemed to enjoy the remains of last night's rum punch!!
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| Saturday, 11-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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We arrive in Malaysia
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View from our chalet at sunset
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chalet at pangkor
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the pool at the pangkor resort
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Shortly before 6am we were all woken up with breakfast (so that's why everyone went to bed so early) and the bunks were put away in time for our arrival at the border at Padang Besar. Everyone had to get off the train, with their luggage, and pass through customs and passport control to get into Malaysia. There was quite a long delay at Padang Besar, but we were entertained by the steady line of potential customers checking out the durian fruit which a woman was offering for sale on the platform (durian is a very large spiky fruit which has been described as 'tasting like heaven but smelling like hell') - she had to lever back a tiny section with a knife for each person, who sniffed at length then tried to bargain for a better price.
A couple of hours later the train arrived at Butterworth, where we were met by a driver who took us down the coast to Lumut to catch the ferry to Pangkor.
Kate and I were staying in a wooden chalet in a pretty garden next to the beach - as soon as we arrived the local monkeys came to investigate us (we were warned not to feed them and to take great care not to let them into our chalet as they can be very destructive).
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| Friday, 10-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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In Bangkok
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We had to get up early in time to do a bit of sightseeing before catching the train. We managed to see the Golden Budha at Wat Timitr and Wat Po before dashing back to pick up our luggage and make our way to the rail station. The train was great ... because we had sleeping bunks reserved, we got a sort of compartment to ourselves. The train staff took our order for dinner and breakfast, but also at each station people got on and walked through the carriages selling food and drink. The train was really slow, but it was interesting seeing all the villages and people working in the paddy fields as we travelled down through Thailand.
We were a little surprised that the beds were made up soon after 6pm, and even more surprised when everyone else started to pull their curtains and go to sleep! We managed to stay awake till about 8.30pm and then thought we had better switch our lights off .. however there was a lot of gigling from one of the nearby bunks where a couple were busy sending each other text messages for hours on end.
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| Thursday, 9-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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Kate and Sue arrive in Bangkok
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Flower Market
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after checking into our hotel, we went for a walk down to the river and took a river bus a couple of stops up river ... slight problem when we landed as the jetty was flooded so we had to wade through the water to get to dry land! We walked for a bit and came across the flower market, then took a tuk tuk back to the hotel for dinner before setting off in a tuk tuk to the Night market at Patpong.
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| Wednesday, 8-Oct-2003 00:00 |
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kate and sue set off for oz
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granny sue and her camera
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tonight we are setting off on our journey to australia for the wedding of a good friend. i hope to capture some of the sights we see and will be keeping a journal as we go for the benefit of friends and family back home. we will be travelling through thailand, malaysia and singapore on our way to western australia (probably accompanied on the way by some of the thousands of brits en route for the start of the rugby world cup in perth!).
daughter kate is going to stay on in australia for several more months before heading off to new zealand and the states, but i will be returning home after the wedding and a short trip to see the sights of south western australia.
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