Malaysia - Langkawi Island

Penang, Malaysia 24.12.2014

We decided to spend in Langkawi ten days. At first it was really nice but after a couple of days the tourist stuff started to be annoying. Also the weather was challenging because it was raining every day.

Langkawi is a quite big island but it has not so many things to do and see. It's promoted as a heaven of 99 islands but it's so expensive to visit even the closest one that if you are not sailing by your own yacht (that we unfortunately left home) you stay only on the main island. We rented a moped for two days and drove all around the island to see main attraction; The Black Sand Beach, 7 Wells, waterfalls, Underwater World, Craft Complex, Hot springs, Kuah city, Kok Beach, Cable car. The distances are long and the majority of places are hard to find. The Black Sand beach did not have black sand but only a huge cement factory next to it. We walked past the 7 Wells because we didn't understand that it was it and ended up on a jungle trail that after 45min of hiking informed us that it was some Extreme Challenge route. Monica did it in flip flops. The waterfall next to the wells was nice. 

The hot springs were unbelievable. There was not any heat from land but only some terrible ponds where water got warm by standing still. They were full of dirt and it would have cost 200RM/50e per hour! We skipped. The craft complex was closed on both days even it's high season. Kuah city was mainly hotels, shopping malls and construction work. We skipped also the Cable car because of the bad weather and actually we hiked up the mountain already earlier so we saw the view..hah. Kok Beach was nice but the security signs of the luxury hotel next to it was a little scary.

In the end we droved almost 100km per day. The underwater world was the biggest disappointment. It costed RM40/10e and included unhappy pinguins and nobody seemed to care about the animals. Tourist took photos of the animals with flash even the signs clearly forbid that. Many also knocked and hit the glasses of fished etc and nobody seemed to care. It was just sad. The exhibitions was build so that after every sections there was some shop. Or popcorn selling point. And everything was so dirty.

The best thing we saw on our drive was a shark on sale in a little fish shop in the middle of the island. And many monkeys.

A good thing in Langkawi were the little malay cafees that are delicious. Also the beach was nice but the waters are full of jellyfish. It's difficult to swim without getting burn. Langkawi is also promoted for it's tax free prices but they compensate with taking tourist prices. Now that we are in Georgetown in Penang the prices are almost the same. Actually textiles are cheaper.

We took advantage of the fact that we can't do anything and relaxed reading, running every morning and eating well. We got a nice routine. We also had time to book this nice hotel for Christmas in Penang.

Merry Christmas everybody! Here Christmas is seen mainly commercially and as our taxi driver said on the first day: "You can go to a shopping mall at Christmas and shop all day!". Not.

Happily we are here together :)

Thailand - Koh Mook Island

Langkawi, Malaysia 14.12.2014

The train journey from Bangkok started almost in a two hour delay. Still we were on the train ready which meant that instead of 15 hours it would be a 17 hours trip. We were in the third class of the train and happily it didn't get too packed. You have in third class only a sitting place on a hard bench. There was no air conditioning but all the windows were open and on the roof of each vagon were three fans. At first it was really hot but in the night a bit cold. Lot of insects flew inside from the open windows. We were prepared with our own snacks but also on the train there were granmas and others selling lot of food and drinks. We managed to get a few hours of sleep and arrived to Trang in the morning. After breakfast we headed to the travel agency of the brother of our nice waitress and decided to leave right away to an island called Koh Mook.

The first impression was amazing and continued to be after the ten days we stayed there. We spent the first four nights in a bungalow we booked from the travel agency and the other five in a cheaper place we booked on the island. Both were really nice and close to the beach. The island is quite small but it has the touristic beach side and a fisherman village on the other. The village was really traditional and most people are muslims. But it was a lot cheaper than the other side so some morning we ran there to get fruits for breakfast. Mainly we spent our days on the beach and snorkeling and reading in our hammocks. The island is really quite and relaxed - not really a party place. Still, it is popular for island hopping and visitors for a day.

The main attraction is the Emerald cave. It's a cave that is almost 90 meters long and opens to a secret beach inside. Pirates used to use the beach to hide their treasures. We went there by kayak that we rent for one day. We kayaked the whole island around which was about 10km.

The island is full of nice restaurants but our favorite was a family who had one called Hilltop. The mother was so funny and cooked herself everything. Portions were huge and delicious.

We left on the 10th of Dec for Trang and our intention was to go straight to Langkawi. We probably pronounced the name of the pier wrong and ended up in a bus which took us to the opposide side of Thailand almost on the east coast! Once arrived we took a new bus to Satun and headed to back to the west coast. We lost a few hours and so missed the last ferry. Thankfully we had one day extra on our visas so we just stayed one night in Satun. Our hotel was extremely cheap and extremely ugly. But no insects or animals inside so we stayed there. We had a few rhum and cokes so that we could sleep easier :D We left early in the morning and took the first ferry to Langkawi. There was almost no border control for Finnish passport holders.

We hadn't booked anything beforehand so we just took a taxi to Penang Cenang where most of accomodations are situated. The taxi driver was so nice and worked for us as a tour guide through the island. He dropped us in a good spot and we found a place to stay nearby. It is high season and public holiday in Malaysia so prices are much higher than other times. It was so weird arriving in a total turistic and western style island with shopping malls, mc'donalds, starbucks etc. We ain't going to visit these but the proximity comforts after jungle life.

During the first evening we bumped to some people we met on the Trans Siberian route! A family that travelled and had partys with us for five days during Moscow-Ulan Bator. It was unbelievable and we had once again a really nice evening :)

Bangkok

Bangkok, Thailand 30.11.2014

We crossed the Thai border from Poi Pet Cambodia on the 27th of November. The journey from Siem Reap took ten hours with the bus and at the border we got a two week visa for Thailand. Everything was simple and at the border the staff was friendly. We were prepared to have to line for at least two hours but ended up waiting only about half an hour at the Cambodian border and one hour at the Thai border. The area between the two borders 'no man's land' was weird with all its casinos. Lot of beggers were situated in the area. The bus took us to Khaosan Road in Bangkok.

We booked a hostel from Bangkok in advance. We almost got it right but for the joy of walking with backpacks in a new metropole in the night time, we walked a circle for an hour. First impression was pretty bad because of the scams and taxi/tuk-tuk drivers who aren't helping at all by lying just to get you on the ride. Happily we didn't have to take any transport (or paid for anything) and succeeded on finding our way. The next day we walked in the neighborhood and made some people spotting. You truly can find everything here. Food is delicious and even just walking in the streets give you such a satisfaction with all the scentes in the air. Kaosan Road was a true turistic area as you can imagine. But easy to find souvenirs and restaurants.  We spent actually the first day searching for a city map. There are many maps in the end of roads and every time we got close to one someone would come over and ask where are we going. They didn't sell these maps themselves and tried to offer a tuk-tuk drive to the point where they say they sell maps. Of course we didn't accept the offer but we decided to walk to the spot they told. These were all private travel agencies or tourist information points as they call themselves. Finally we decided to find the Tourism Information Agency of Bangkok and found it. There we got free city maps and lot of brochures of possible activities and cities. Also infos about buses and trains. The staff spoke perfect English and was so friendly! After this visit everything started to roll.

Yesterday  we woke up early and headed to the snake farm by walking to the Central Railway Station and taking the metro. The metro is ridiculously easy and tickets are cheap. The snake farm tickets costs 200 bahts = ~5 euros and was so fun! After our snake experiences before we thought this would be a good place to try to understand snakes better. The farm is maintained by the Red Cross and is established to develop antitoxics.

There was pleanty of info about snakes, their venoms and nature. Both an outside and indoor terrario and also a perforformance about snake handling (1h). During this performance they presented some of the snakes and we got pretty scared. The freakiest was looking at two Monocled Kobras getting pissed off with each other. The second freakiest was taking a Burmanese Python on our shoulders. Totally worth the entrance fee.

Afterwards we drived around Bangkok with its skytrain and realized how big the city is. Skyscrapers continue as far as one can see. They say Bangkok begins only when you step out of Khaosan Road area. In the evening we drove aroung the center with local bus that was a really nice thing. Bus 53 works perfectly as a sightseeing bus crossing i.e. the flower market, Chinatown, the Central Railway Station, Khaosan Road etc. We went to the train station and bought tickets to Trang, the South. We chose this place after visiting the tourist office.  We hope it will be worth the 15 hour train trip in a 3rd class vagon! :D

Cambodia - Phnom Penh & Siem Reap

Siem Reap, Cambodia 23.11.2014

We left Kep Friday the 14th of November and arrived to Phnom Penh after a six hour bus drive. We came by a local bus so we had loud karaoke show on the bus that itself was an experience. Phnom Penh was busy and hectic after the countryside.

We spend one day walking around all the city. We visited the Olympic village and its future plans that seemed utopistic. Huge construction works going on. We also visited the Old Market, the Central Market, the Orussey Market and the Night Market that is open only on weekends. We didn't buy so much because it must fit in our backpacks but we bought hammocks for just 2$ each. The Night Market was nice because it was in addition to a market place for clothes also a place to meet and eat together. It was full of local food vendors. We ate lot of things for just 3$. The Orussey Market was the cheapest, The Central Market the most expensive. The Old Market has lot of fruits and foods, especially the fish part is worth seeing with all its living creatures.

One day we spent on getting acknowledged with Cambodian not-so-nice part of history: the Khmer Rouge time (1975-1979). We visited the Tuol Seng prison (S21) and the Killing Fields. During these years one to three million Cambodians were killed. That's one third of the population. We saw things that we wouldn't think possible and even less so little time ago, less than 40 years ago. We wonder how it affects people nowadays because many people that are in charge for what happened are still in some good position in the hierarchy. We also wonder the responsibility of the Western countries because the legacy with imperialism and Vietnam war. There is no buildings left in the Killing Fields, just mass graves on the ground. The main attraction is the story told during the walking tour. In the middle lays the memorial stupa filled with bones and skulls of more than 9'000 people. Pretty shocking and sobering.

We left to Siem Reap on Monday the 17th. The bus drive took six hours and was quite terrible because the bad condition of the roads. And because our driver had to surpass every vehicle on the road. We stay in a hostel out of the centre and enjoy the peace of a smaller town. This is probably the most touristic city in Cambodia because of the magnificent Angkor Wat temple. We have been relaxing and getting to know the city that is quite small. A nice river goes round the center and the feeling is almost European with all its cute little bridges. The main attraction is Angkor Wat and the other temples. They were built in 900ac-1200ac when the Khmer kingdom was blossoming. We spent one day from sunrise to sunset (4am to 6pm) visiting temples and still saw just a part of them. Amazing architecture and well maintained structures. One exciting part of the mystical temples was nature taking over them. Huge trees and jungle growing on these ancient remains. We truly felt like being in an Indiana Jones adventure. Less exciting fact was the hundreads of tourists around Angkor Wat. 

Our travel plan in Asia starts to be clear. We leave to Thailand next week and head to Malaysia for christmas and new year. We travel there by land.

Cambodia - Kep / Previous Saint-Tropez of the East

Kep, Cambodia 13.11.2014

After the last writing we stayed on the island for another four days. In total we spent ten days on the island. During the last days we experienced the seafood barbeque, plankton night-swimming and enjoyed the beach life. 

We left to Sihanoukville early on Saturday the 8th. We tried to get to Kep on the same day but the bus was full, so we booked the first bus next morning. We found quickly a nice guesthouse probably because we were carrying our backpacks. There was big festivities going on in the city because of the Water Festival. Lot of Cambodian people all around the country. Sihanoukville is kind of big and really turistic. We spent there one day and we had enough of it.

The bus arrived to Kep Beach after a three hour drive. It looked really cute with a nice boulevard next to the coast. We first tried to find a hostel by walking but after 2km with backpacks at noon we had to take a tuk-tuk. The driver was really friendly and took us to a cheap and really nice place. We have been here now for five days. The next day we noticed that Kep is really small. There is practically nothing in addition to the Crab Market, national park, travel agencies and guesthouses. And distances are quite long. It's easy to move around with tuk-tuks or by renting a bike or a moped.

We tried the crabs and they were really good. Especially the ones with Kampot pepper. One day we just drove around the area with a moped. Nearly 100km. We visited the caves with bats, the salt fields, Angkaul beach and the butterfly farm. It was so fun! Just driving and looking at changing sceneries. We tried driving a moped for the first time but happily there is not so much traffic so it's kind of relaxed here. I wouldn't try it for the first time in Phnom Penh..

We have been trying to do nothing and one day we succeeded. We watched tv-Animal planet and got even more an overdose of snakes. In Finland it feels like a documentary but here it's reality show. The sunsets are amazing.

Today we visited the national park that is a 8km walk. During the day we didn't see any special animals, only beautiful butterflies and lizards. But the jungle was so wonderful with its big trees!

On the walk back we checked some of the ruined colonial French villas. They are just abandoned and nature is taking over. Some of the villas are owned by rich generals waiting to get the best price. Seems to be taking time.

Tomorrow we head back to Phnom Penh. It'a nice to go back to the city :)

Ps. Rendez-Vous with snake nr 2...