Our cultural trip started by the place we stayed in – East Indies. It is an amazingly renovated peranakan house divided into extremely spacious rooms. They made the place to feel as if it was your house with a lovely courtyard for relaxing and a shared kitchen. We rented a 2 bedroom apartment which had a big living room which was very convenient.

Very close to our hotel was the Peranakan House Museum which was very cool to see. They have free guided tours where they explain about the nyonias and babas and other customs. The jewelry, clothes and furniture are amazing to see. Very nice place.

We walked around all over George Town so we saw different temples, little shop house streets and mosques all over the place. The nicest area to find little cafes and restaurants and street art is around Armenian Street where the famous wall paintings are. They are quite nice to see but you need to keep your eyes open to see the more secluded of them.

The most impressive temple of all was Khoo Kongsi because of its size and details. It was very interesting to see the European and Chinese influence merging with Malay culture in the constructions.

Food wise, you can literally find anything you like here. The highlights for us were:

– Kapitan: indian with great tandoori and naans
– Tek Sen: glazed por belly is to die for!

– China House: very nice set up with 3 types of restaurants, boutique and art gallery in a shop house. The desert table is incredible!

In sum, Penang is an easy, full of life, nice place to go for a weekend with friends. Our friends definitely made the different in our weekend

Diving:

The course started in Singapore with study of the theory, theory test and pool session. Sunny Cove was the diving school of choice for us and they were incredibly friendly, efficient and flexible. We took what it is called a Referral course with them so we could go focus on the open water dives in Redang. In Redang we were taught by an experience PADI instructor and a PADI master (one of the only 10 in the country) throughout 4 dives: 2 off-shore dives where we learned most of the necessary skills and 2 boat dives where we reached 18m depth. It was a super cool experience and I am glad we did it but at times some of the things we had to do seem a little silly. The little voice in my head was saying “why would you put yourself through this much risk”- having to remove your mask 15m under water and swim for a few meters was certainly on the top of the list of things I would never do in my life. But hey it was worth it and we were able to really enjoy seeing lots and lots of fish, coral and even a couple of sting rays.

The journey:

Part of the adventure was the journey there. We decided to go by bus because the flights had very inconvenient times. We booked everything through easibook.com but on the way there we travelled with Kosortium and on the way back with Transnational. The total journey is between 9,5hrs and 12hrs as we came to found out on the way back. Kosortium has very nice buses with large comfortable seats so the journey up was totally harmless. We took off from Beach Road and got dropped off directly at Merang Jetty in 9,5hrs. Awesome! At the jetty we hired seats on a speed boat with a company called Nurung which was the only one that had a boat living at that time – it was much cheaper than the boat organized by the hotel and it was totally fine. The boat journey took 35mins to a small pier where we were greeted by the hotel van that takes you on a 5min ride until the resort. 10:30am we were already sitting by the amazing beach!

The return was not as smooth. Transnational bus departs from Kuala Terranganu’s bus terminal so we had to take a taxi from Merang Jetty (45mins), wait for a few hours around the terminal and take the bus at 9pm. The bus was almost full and it was a conventional bus with small seats. The worst part is that this service takes you to Singapore on the local highway and crosses over through Woodlands which added a good 3hrs on to the journey time. Next time we will sacrifice a few hours on the beach to leave early and catch the flight.

The Taaras Resort

The decision was driven by the dive centre but we were not disappointed. Despite the average reviews on TripAdvisor, we thoroughly enjoyed it. The highlight is definitely the beach which is private to the hotel – white sand with blue calm sea. The best so far in SE Asia. We stayed at a Garden Suite – very comfortable, clean, beautiful suite in a bungalow 10m from the sand. The staff was very friendly, breakfast was good and spa was good. What else can you ask for?

Food

We had huge amounts of food at breakfast to survive all the diving effort and late afternoon we tried food at the Bistro and at the Beach Bar. Both were quite ok and prices were standard hotel prices. The last night we decided to venture the outside world and go to Aima Grill Fish literally by the hotel gates. It is a family owned shack that serves fresh fish and a mean calamari portion. Very very nice for people that are not looking for an atmosphere but good food a lower price.

Returnability: I would definitely go back but the distance is something that gets on the way

Recommendability: 10

We started our trip in great style with a couple of days by the beach at the Shangri-la Rasa Ria. The hotel was very nice but we were not completely blown away by the beach. The plus side is that they own a orangutan rescue centre where we were able to see a infant orangutan that was on rehab – really nice to see an organization like that.

Anyway, let’s get into what really matters. The climb is set up to be done in 2 days in one night so and I will describe them to you here.

Day1: we were picked up by Amazing Borneo at 7am and reached the start of the trek at about 9:30am after a quit sinuous journey. Upon arrival our guide/ porter (Indie – inspired by Indiana Jones) was assigned to us. The little guy had huge legs and was able to carry our entire luggage up. We didn’t have much but we made sure to have warm clothes for the next day, lots of water and medicine for anything that could happen. We set off at about 10:30 – me with my newest best friends “walking sticks”. I swear they were the best thing I carried to that trip! I don’t think I would have been able to make those horrible steps up and down without them. Yeah you heard well – steps! Lots of them! Nobody warns you but I will. If you think you are going to experience a long steep path you are wrong. You will be faced with the most amount of steps of your life. Small wooden ones, large clay ones and ridiculously big rocks. The terrain really changes over the climb but one thing you can bet on: there will be steps. Moving on. The first stage is a 6km climb to the accommodation and we did it in 5hours. The accommodation is very simple: no showers, shared rooms, bunk beds, mess hall and only cold water. All of that is (kind of) forgotten given the amazing view. The accommodation is located just above the clouds so the sunset was truly spectacular but we were very lucky with the clear weather. At 6pm we had dinner and by 7.30pm everyone is in bed getting ready for the next day. Ps.: at that point I almost decided not to go the day after – it was cold (yeah, it does get cold even though it is in SE Asia), my body was completely exhausted and I was afraid of the climb in the darkness.

Day2: 1:30am wake up! Everything is pitch black and we set off at 2:15am with the help of our head torches. The climb starts with a lot of small wooden steps but soon we reached the ‘danger zone’ which is a part where you climb holding a rope because there is a massive cliff right next to you. Needless to say that it was the scariest part of all. It is only a 2.8km climb but it took us almost 4hrs to get to the summit. 4 hours of pure fear and exhaustion with no silver lining because you can’t freaking see anything yet. It is was as much of a physical challenge as it was a mental one. I wouldn’t have done it if it wasn’t for Abraham encouraging me ALL the way. We finally made it to the summit just before the sun rise. Oh what a view! Unbelievable to think that we got to 4,095m on foot. It was very cold up there so all the clothes that we removed because of the heat of the exercise were totally needed to be able to enjoy the view for a few minutes. That’s because that’s all we had before starting our descend.

At 7:30am we were at the beginning of the small via ferrata. This was an add-on to the adventure (because it wasn’t enough) – it is a steel cable aided rock descend. That was quite fun! We got to cross a cliff stepping on cables only! UHU! If you are in rush to go down then don’t do the via ferrata. It took us 2,5hrs to descend 600m.

After that we got back to the accommodation where we had breakfast and relaxed a little. At 12pm we happily started the 6km descend that we thought it was going to be easy. Hell no! Those steps made the journey down just as slow and tricky as the climb. It was not anymore about the cardio effort but let me just say that the joints were crying! By 6pm we were on the bus that took us back to the hotel.

We stayed in a TH hotel very close to the airport to catch our flight the next morning. The hotel was not nice at all but it had a bed and a shower which is all we needed. Our legs were completed dead but we had a very nice feeling of accomplishment to bring back home.

Now reflecting back we are very pleased to have done it. The feeling of achievement is incredible. At the moment you don’t really have enough time or energy to appreciate it fully but it was amazing!

The first destination was actually Kuala Lumpur which we spent a couple of days at. The main purpose of our visit was to spend the weekend with friends that live there – Mara and Roger (Lud’s parents). It was a great family weekend. We were able to spend a lovely time with them and also discover a little bit of KL. Our first impression is that it is a very green city with a strong cultural background both Chinese and Muslim. This mixture jumps to the eyes in the city centre where the old Muslim market is crammed next to China town. Like a lot of the big cities in Asia, it also has a massive shopping focus and a touch of megalomania that is illustrated by the Petronas towers. If you are passing by on your way to any of the other wonders of Malaysia sure stop over but for us it was more important to see our friends than the city itself.

Now, on to the big one! Mount Kinabalu! This 4,095m mountain is situated in Borneo in East Malaysia which is actually a territory within a mostly Indonesian island south east from Singapore. Borneo is a natural haven with lots of attractions – wild life, diving, trekking and hiking. We went to Kota Kinabalu with one mission only: climb Mount Kinabalu and WE DID IT! It was possibly the most difficult thing I have ever done but it was totally worth it. We also had a chance to visit the orangutang reserve which was actually part of the hotel we were staying at – Shangri-la Rasa Ria. That was also quite nice to see.

Next stop was Pulau Redang. An absolute last minute decision to use our Easter break to do our PADI certification. What a pleasant surprise! We wanted to enjoy the under water wonders of SE Asia so we needed to get certified as open water divers. There are several options of places but Redang seemed to be the one that united diving with a nice holiday. It did indeed. We had an amazing time and it is so far the best beach holiday we had in the region. Totally worth it!

Our most recent destination was Penang. We went to this island looking for local food and culture and that’s what we found. It was by far not the best place we had been in Malaysia but certainly an interesting place to get to know the Peranakan culture a little better.

Certainly this list of destinations in Malaysia will grow. We already have our eyes on Sipadan, Cameron Highlands, Batu Batu and Langkawi. For now, click to read the details of each of the locations.