Its all about the food

All the Penang guidebooks say Penang is a foodie's heaven and they are absolutely right! We've just come back from dinner and we are completely stuffed on less than £3 each! We had chicken and spicy satay sticks, chinese vegetable soup, duck with rice and more soup (which we had ask whether it was finger bowl or soup..... very thin, but quite tasty).

We have tended to eat in for lunch for most days and always have a plate of fruit including mangosteen, paw paw & limes, nachies (like satsumas), bananas, grapes and mango and sometimes some really nice cheddar and biscuits too!



We've also discovered the delights of iced coffee which they make really thick and lovely here, sometimes we have a mocha and sometimes just ordinary, which is anything but ordinary!

Tomorrow evening we are pushing the boat out and having an "all you can eat and drink" buffet for £10 a person.

We have done some other stuff apart from eating - today we caught the free shuttle bus that goes around Georgetown and stopped off at the Quay and the Marina. We went in and out of all the shoe shops looking for some suitable shoes for swimming in for when we go to the island - Koh Siboya - next week. We found some but they were too big for me and too small for David! We did buy a head torch though which is also recommended for the island.... have you seen the pics of where we are going? If you haven't then take a look www.thai-west.com.

Now about to watch Wall-E - so "that's all folks".........

Sun, Sea and Swimming

Made it to the beach......Kathy's Bar at Batu Ferringi on the North of the Island. Spent 4 hours swimming, eating and refreshing. Kathy's Bar is owned by Kathy from Kent who's partner is Sam from Sri Lanka and the staff are Sri Lankan too. And we ate...yes you've guessed it...Sri Lankan chicken curry...yumm. Had a nice late afternoon and early evening there swimming in the warm sea and watching the sun go down while chatting to Kathy. Kathy sends her regards to Alan, Freda and Sue. We seemed to be the only ones swimming; apparently we were very brave considering the jelly fish...we only learned about them afterwards! Still we didn't meet any and they didn't seem to mind us sharing.

Mr Oooi took us there and back by taxi and also assisted us in buying our coach tickets to the Cameron Highlands on Monday. Wow its a tough life out here!

(You can enlarge pictures on the blog by double clicking them and you can read previous entries in the archive...just scroll down on the right of the page.)

Take care all. Love from D&A.

Red Garden Night Market

Just got back from the cheapest meal you can imagine..... £2.00 each and for that we had a big bowl of noodle soup with some veg and unidentified meat in, some claypot noodles also with unidentified bits in, plus some bbq pork and rice and 10 sticks of chicken satay. On top of that the bottle of beer we had was £2.50 each!! Amazing!

Kek Lok Si - Temple of Supreme Bliss

Our morning of culture started at 0900. Mr Oui collected us by taxi and we fought through the traffic to Kek Lok Si - The Temple of Supreme Bliss. Clear blue skies and a 2 hr walk around this magnificent Buddhist Temple. Very colourful as you can see from the pictures, including the two budding buddhist beauties in their shorts! The Temple is huge, Malaysia's largest Temple complex, and there are wonderful views from the top across Penang Island. The picture of the Pagoda of Rama VI is the star attraction and we climbed to the top via a spiral staircase.

From Temple to market to collect fruit for lunch - grapes, water melon and mangosteen (look those up on the internet!). Now relaxing before tackling Chinatown tonight and, no doubt, some local Chinese food. Bye for now.

Guerney Drive

Today's highlight or should I say culture shock was going from where we are staying in Georgetown, the scruffy end of Penang to Guerney Drive and Guerny Plaza, which is a little further round the coast of the island to the north. We caught a local bus (jammed packed full of local people, not a westerner in sight) and driven rather erratically by a chain smoking bus driver to Guerney Plaza which was an enormous mall of I think 4 or 5 floors of shops including Laura Ashley, Next and other familiar names. I bought a swimming costume, some nail varnish and nail varnish remover (as I can't find a nail salon I have to do my toes myself) and David bought a local sim card.

We then set off down Guerney Drive as it got dark to find something to eat and ended up in the Seafood Market where nothing was priced on the menu but was all according to "market price" which could have meant anything they thought they could get away with. We ended up with 2 mantis prawns - one cooked with more ginger and garlic than I have ever seen on a plate and the other one with bbq sauce which we didn't notice until we'd finished the prawn and commented on the lack of bbq flavour - duh!

We decided to walk back to Popus Lane which took just over an hour, so we felt we'd managed to walk off the meal ok and are now enjoying a couple of G&Ts as a nightcap!

Tomorrow we have an early start with a trip to the Kek Lok Si Temple with Mr Oui - the taxi driver Alan used when he was living here.

Penang Day 2 - Sightseeing

After breakfasting on toast and jam our first mission was to find a supermarket that would sell some gin, tonic, wine, beer and ...oh yes some more food.... as well as an ATM to pay for it. Well laden, we decided to take a trishaw (a rickshaw driven by a bicycle) home as it was getting hot and the bags were heavy. It cost a couple of pounds! After lunching on roast chicken, bread and water melon we took a siesta to avoid the afternoon heat. Refreshed we set of on foot for our heritage walk. Through Chinatown (all closed down post New year celebrations), through Little India, and onto Fort Cornwallis (see pic). This was built by Captain Francis Light in 1786 after he 'discovered' Penang. Good old British...slightly incongruous to hear 'Rule Britannia' blasting out in the middle of Malaysia but.....! From the Fort we walked past various historical buildings until we reached the Eastern and Oriental Hotel (were we booked in for their Sunday Buffet - a table on the veranda overlooking the sea). Worn out after 2 hrs trailing we succumbed to a jug of Tiger beer. Dinner was at a recommended Hawker stall in the street - Nasi Kandar, a mixed Malaysian curry - for the princely sum of £2 each..yum! Back in our apartment now...large G&T and relaxing in the evening as you take lunch. 8.45 pm here...1245 pm with you. Catch you tomorrow. D&A.

From Lion Dancing to Penang

We left our room and headed for reception to check out of the hotel and were greeted with this lion and his mate dancing for the guests and as part of the New Year celebrations.....he danced to loud drumming and we were given gold chocolate coins for luck - it was lovely to see and we were pleased that we didn't miss it. Several hours later we finally made it to No.8 Poplus Lane, Georgetown, Penang where we are staying for the next seven days. Alan and Pat Jones met us at the house and after a guided tour of the appliances and a review of the map, they handed over the keys and left us to it. Almost immediately we set off to find a supermarket for coffee, milk and bread so that we'd have something for the morning and to find somewhere to eat. Alan and Pat said we'd be lucky to find anywhere open due to the Chinese celebrations, but there were quite a few places and we chose to have a Kerala Indian curry served on banana leaves!! Back to the house, which is comfortable, large and air conditioned with free wireless internet access and a nice table to play Up Words on, so we are very content!

Happy New Year!

The Year of the Ox has arrived! Millions of people in Chinatown last night. Hundreds and hundreds of stalls in the Night Market. Amanda bought 1 pair flip flops and 1 cushion cover for $4 (just over £2). Tried the Hawkwer Food ( grab a seat at a table in the street then go and collect your food and drink from a great variety of food and drink stalls). We shared a table with 3 germans and a nice Asian family. Had 20 satay sticks (mix of pork,chicken and mutton) and rice between us..yum! Great atmosphere.

This afternoon we fly to Penang for a week's stay. It will be nice to get out of the hotel into a place of our own. Hope to have internet access to keep the blog going. Take care all. D&A.

Orchids A Go Go

After a hearty breakfast we set off this morning to find the Singapore Botanical Gardens - turned out they were just a hop and skip from Traders which was handy as we then spent nearly 3 hours walking around them.....very enjoyable - took lots of pics of flowers..... orchids mainly as well as birds, butterflies and a squirrel! Off to Newton's Food Centre for lunch which on arrival looked closed, but there were about half a dozen of the 50 stalls open and we feasted on enormous prawns and fried rice.... funny how everything seems to be centred around the meals eaten! Not sure if there were only a few stalls open because its Chinese New Year's Eve today or if it was because it was lunchtime. Back to Traders for a laze and a swim in the pool. Tonight we are braving Chinatown which promises to be heaving with celebrating Chinese who will be cheering in the Year of the Ox. Should be fun.

Two Singapore Slings Please!

Well we finally made it! After a 12.5 hour flight with Singapore airlines we finally staggered out into 31*C in Singapore. Actually the flight wasn't too bad...the food was good....leg-room better than most...but still felt like sardines and got little sleep. We got booked into the hotel at 4 pm (0800hrs UK time) and after a quick freshener we set out to explore the city. We decided to walk to Raffels, about an hour along Orchard Road (Singapore's equivalent of Oxford Street but more modern) and arrived dripping and ready for our first Singapore Slings in the Long Bar where they were originally created. As the saying goes: 'if you've not been to Raffles, you've not been to Singapore'. The Sling is a rather nice cocktail and only cost around £15 each in Raffles (ho hum). We decide one was enough (one each that is as you can see in the pic!) and, suitably rested, set off for some sea-food at the Quays (resisting the temptation to take a rickshaw). Dinner by the river, some lovely king prawns cooked Malaysian style and sea-food rice finished us off. Too tired to do anything else we took a taxi back to the hotel. Early night then tonight. Tomorrow we will probably have a dip in the hotel pool then set off to the famous botanical gardens. To-morrow night is the Chinese New Year's Eve so we reckon all the action will be in Chinatown where we'll head for dinner.
Well a good first day for us. Hope its not too cold back in the UK :)
Have fun and take care. Love from us both. D&A.

Ready to Go!

Flight leaves Heathrow at 1815 hours today. Twelve hour flight with Singapore airlines
We're on our way!

Catastrophe - Laptop Stolen!

Poor Amanda had her laptop stolen from the hotel conference room in Glasgow on Friday. She was pretty upset as you can imagine. We are now seeking compensation from the hotel. Do we like Glasgow? Well apart from that disaster we had a good time. Did a nice Treasure Trail in the West End (see pic) and then had a lovely evening and overnight stay with friends - Dawn, Simon, Lucy and their cats. Just what we needed after the laptop loss - many thanks again both. We then called in on Mum in North Wales before returning on Monday.

So while the Glasgow police are throwing all their resources behind finding Amanda's laptop, our preparations for the holiday continue apace (albeit we lost some of the preparatory work....hope the thief is working on our packing list!).

Take care all.

Preparation for the holiday

Well, we have our vaccinations and innoculations already done since we went to Kenya & South Africa. We have booked some of the accommodation that we need, but still need to find somewhere in the Cameron Highlands and Bangkok. We have our tickets and passports checked and ready and our car is booked into chez Dorothy and Dave Hall's driveway!

All we need to do now is pack, cancel the veg delivery and Elizabeth, our cleaner and anticipate!!

Thai-West view from our bungalow



Bangkok----------------------------------------------Kuala Lumpur
---------------------------------- ---Singapore



Penang




Cameron Highlands