Beard's on Tour: 2011

Bonjour,

So this is our last little blog post from our South East Asian adventure. We are now in Singapore
and we fly home tomorrow. We have had a fantastic time on our adventures but we are defo looking forward to getting home and seeing everyone.. Our next little adventure starts inJanuary. Tokyo, Australia, New Zealand and USA West Coast..

This is what we have been getting upto for the last week.

Saturday November 26

Our last day in Krabi.. We didn't do a great deal.. We walked into the main town bit at Aonang Beach to get some sovenuirs and stuff.. In the afternoon we picked up our washing and chilled out in the afternoon at the hotel..

In the evening we went out for dinner at a local reggae bar!!! It didn't look much but the food was lovely Lee had green curry.. definately worth the wait..

Sunday November 27

We were up and out of the hotel for 7am as we had a long travel day ahead of us.. by lunchtime we were at the border and went for a slap up lunch.. kfc... where we think we had chicken.. you never can really tell over here but at least we weren't ill!!!

Then we swapped vans and crossed over the border... It took us about an hour to get through as we needed to get the outwards stamp out of Thailand and then inwards to allow us into Malaysia..

Once we were over the border it was a 2 and a half hours drive to Penang.. It actually should have been 3.5 hours but we were driving with Michael Schumacher.. No exaggeration to say this bloke drove like a complete bellend.. talking on his phone etc and we had a near miss with another car... All that fun aside we got to the hotel about 7.30pm (1 hour time change in front as well)..

Hotel was great and our room was absolutely massive with a sea view as well... oooohhhhhhhh..... We just ate in the hotel... food was so so.. the serving of dinner by the ladyboys (one looked like coco the clown) was more interesting...

Unfortunately there was a sport channel showing footy in the hotel room so Lee had to stay up until 2am watching the games (of course he didn't want to).. also found out on news that Gary Speed (Wales manager) had killed himself.. very sad!!

Monday November 28

Today we were going on a day tour of Penang with a local guide called Eddie... First stop was the
top of Penang Hill which we needed to get a bus too.. then we got a fast Funucular train up to the top of the hill.. the top was 830m high and offered panoraic views over Georgetown.. there was quite a bit of haze up at the top but we managed to get some decent pictures.. We also went to a temple up the top
as well...

Next we went to a traditional fishing village to get some pics and then onto a very nice temple which we got a couple of great pics of (see below).. We went to little India for lunch... and then afterwards went to the Penang museum to learn a bit about the history..

After a bit of chilling at the hotel we went to a place called Red Garden for dinner which is basically a big out door food court that a mixture of westerners and locals go to.. the food and beer was cheap and we got back to the hotel just before the thunderstorms kicked off.

Tuesday November 29

Today we were leaving Penang and heading towards Cameron Highlands.. We met our new tour guide Paul at the hotel.. he was going to be with us for the next 3 days.. First impressions of Paul were he was a very wiry characater with lots and lots of energy and very twitchy.. My first impressions (Lee) where that he was on something.. (more of which later)..

It was a fairly long drive to the Cameron Highlands and we didn't get there until lunchtime.. To be honest there wasn't actually that much to do there and it seemed that it was just a convenient place to stop on the way to KL.. Add to that the fact that the weather was shite and we just decided to hang around the hotel for the rest of the day..

Wednesday November 30

Up and out for 8.30am for the drive towards KL.. Really small bus for the drive today so we were all like sardines in the morning we stopped at a local aboriginal village and waterfall to stretch our legs and take some pictures and then we got to the petrol station!!!

We pulled up at about 12pm to refuel at the Diesel pump.. Whilst the driver is paying Paul starts the van and after 5 seconds it conks out.. Driver tries to start the van and nothing.. HE HAD PUT DIESEL IN A PETROL.. div... Abridged version 2 hours later after we've had a crap lunch by the side of the road and Lee has dropped a suitcase on his toe we set off again for KL..

We were staying in Chinatown and got into our rooms for about 3pm.. as we were quite tired we just chilled out for a couple of hours and then headed out at 5.30pm with our guides.. We had a walk around the local area and then got the Metro to the Petronas Towers (massive twin towers with a shopping centre complex between them).. we had a nice Thai meal (Lee had Roasted Duck Red Curry mmmm!!!) and got some great pics of the towers at night (see below)..

Thursday December 1

A little bit of a liein this morning which was nice and we didn't meet in the hotel foyer until 10am.. First of all we headed to the Batu Caves.. we were supposed to do this yesterday but couldn't due to theDiesel incident!!!

On the way we went into a local wedding.. literally just walked in off the street and just had a nose at what was going on.. All very surreal but apparently that is alout there!!! Can't imagine that trend catching on in the UK!!!

The caves were 270 steps up but by far the best and most interesting things we saw were the wild monkeys (lots of pics below).. they were scavengeing for food left, right and centre..

After the caves we went to the KL Telecommunication Tower observation deck which is 276m high and spent about 30 mins up there.. Afterwards some of the group were going to a wet (fish) market.. we weren't too fussed (seen them all before in Hong Kong) so we headed back towards the hotel.. lunch was a Subway and some questionable chicken!!!

In the afternoon we went shopping on the markets and bartered for a few things.. Their much more agressive in Malaysia on the markets compared to Siem Reap (Cambodia) but we got a few bargains.. We then packed up as we had to be out of the hotel day rooms by 6pm..

We just ate at the hotel as there were more thunderstorms in the local area and we didn't fancy getting soaked ahead of a overnight train.. paying the bill for dinner took a while (more so for Jane) but we got there in the end.. So we got our bags and waited in reception for PA (tour leader) and then the following happened..

"One of the group Kim came into reception and says she has just spoken to PA and he has spent the afternoon in the police station... Turns out he was with the other guide Paul at a train station and they got arrested and searched by the police and they found drugs and paraphenlia in Paul's bag so PA was arrested by association.. Certainly explains a few things about Paul'smannerisms.. absolutely shocking that someone would put the tour at risk and needless to say imagine if we were with him at the time"...

This little event certainly pissed everyone off ahead of the night train to Singapore...(the tour feedback should be interesting).. I (Lee) am writing this part of the blog on the night train.. it's 4.30am in the morning and I haven't been to sleep yet.. Hopefully we should get in at 6.30am into Singapore... Looking forward to Singapore but can't wait to leave now...

Friday December 2

Sooooo we got into Singapore about 7am, got through immigration checks and got picked up by a driver to take us to the hotel.. It was raining alot!!! Thankfully we were able to check in straight away.. after a gourmet breakfast from 7/11 we went straight to bed and slept until about 1pm..

We all met in reception about 2pm and met Tom our local guide for our city tour.. 2 things we noticed about Tom;

1) He was very happy
2) He sang out loud alot during the tour

Now given our experiences with Paul we did ask ourselves was he on something too.. Personally I think he was just high on life.. Their is a video of him singing below so you make your own mind up!!!

On the city tour we learnt a lot about the country and went to the Botanical gardens, Little India, Islamic town and down by the harbour...

In the evening we took a taxi down to the Stamford hotel area for some Hong Kong food and had a drink in the Irish pub a couple of minutes from the hotel..

Saturday December 3

A nice lay in this morning and we met PA our tour guide for a final breakfast.. We have just been on the hop on and off buses today.. nice way to see a bit of the city without walking too much!!!

We got caught in a great big thunder storm which was fun.. just gonna stick near the hotel for food and drinks tonight.. Early start tomorrow we have a cab at 7am and gonna be best part of 24 hours travelling by time we get to Gatwick..

So that's it for the Asian adventure.. Thoroughly enjoyed it but we can't wait to get home..

Lots of love

Lee and Lucy xxxx

Singapore Pics