Malaysia - Kuala Lumpur

Malaysia - Kuala Lumpur

Day 1:

Had some breakfast in Singapore before hopping on the train to the Airport for our first Air Asia experience. Check in was easy and the flight was on time. Had our toothpaste taken off us as it was 110g. I keep forgetting how much of a threat to Aircraft safety toothpate is. Apparently Colgate is lethal at 30000 feet.

Boarded the plane and listened to the Indian family behind as they passed the mobile phone around for conversations all the way through the flight despite several warnings. Was thinking of complaining but didn't bother.

Decent enough flight arrived about five minutes late. Grabbed a bus to KL City Centre (airport is 75km outside the city). Befriended a local old guy who showed us to our train at the bus station and soon after arrived at our hotel in Little India.

Hotel Arenaa Mountbatten is an odd hotel. Very modern and a bit disco with neon lights all over the place. Room was great though - awesome shower and a kettle with coffee and stuff like that.

Wandered into Little India (grubby place) and had went to a veggie curry house. Never been a fan of veggie curries but this one was great!

Had a bit of a wander about and then just chilled out in the hotel room and watched TV (a bit of a novelty already!).

Slept really well compared to Singapore - probably because a private room actually was private.

Day 2:

Got up early and headed for the Petronos Towers which, according to the Lonely Planet, was free to go up on a first come first served basis. This was half right, but it was quite a lot to go up so we didn't bother as it was hazy any way and the view was apparently not great. The towers are damn impressive though - huge!

Wandered into an exhibition at some posh convention centre by accident, grabbed some breakfast and a coffee and then walked to the train station to go to the bird park.

It's not that easy to get around KL really as the sign posts are crap and confusing so jumped in a cab when we thought we were kind of near the park. I think we got scammed a bit but nothing major and twenty minutes later we arrived at KL Bird Park.

The park had many birds as you would expect. The highlight were walking through a part where lots of birds land on your head, shoulders, etc. You get to feed them so Claire bought some milk from the guy and had about six birds all over her. I got a parrot on each shoulder at one point. We also got to hold ducklings, baby chicks and an ostrich egg which was interesting. The duckling was sick on me so I put him/her down.

Ended up getting a taxi back to our hotel as the bus was ridiculously priced and got a shower to cool off. Headed into Chinatown and was going to eat frogs but Claire was not too impressed as they were too cute (they were still alive in a tank and you chose your frog). Went into a cafe and had some noodles instead which were pretty good.

Decided to go back to the hotel and have some drinks so grabbed a small bottle of whiskey and some coke and played some cards and just chilled out.

Day 3:

Was awoken by next door playing some god awful music so banged on the wall and it went down to a level that was almost more annoying. Banged again and it went off. Still not had two good nights sleep in a row.

Checked out of the hotel and navigated our way to Puduraya bus station which, according to Lonely Planet is where all buses go from. Got there and was told that our bus went from another bus station 10 km out of town. Got the light railway train LRT to the station and was pleased to find out a bus to Melaka was just 9 Ringgit (about two quid).

Bus was posh and comfy and we arrived into Melaka at about 3pm. Met a brazilian guy named Phillippe and some other back packers and wandered into Chinatown to find a hostel. Landed in a place called Riverside One which was great. It had lovely views of the river and was clean and friendly.

I'll write up about Melaka in a separate post as this one is going on a bit.

Summary: Kuala Lumpur is a bit of a mixed bag of tricks. Modern and clean in some areas, dirty, manic and unpleasant in others. Probably wouldn't recommend staying there unless you had a lot of money and could avoid the squalor.