KUALA LUMPUR
After almost an hour dragging suitcases we book into our 29th floor apartment complete with everything (including Sara's must-have for this stop, a washing machine. Me? I'd have demanded an in-room bar. I got a washing machine). The cost for the room was an astounding £30 a night. Anywhere else it would be £300. Rooftop infinity pool, gardens, bar, Accommodation is SO cheap in KL. The drinks at the bar were more than the room! Then off to 'Food Street' for ......... food. KL is a really lively town, very green, very safe, very friendly. Love it.
The Cameron Highlands were lovely, cool, lush jungles, cloud forests, friendly people. Now it was time to drive south to Kuala Lumpor. Once again we have no TnG toll card so we are forced to go the pretty way. What an excellent stroke of luck as this turns out to be 150 miles on B roads down through the spine of central Malaysia.
The first 80 miles were on a stunning winding road through mile after mile of pristine jungle with view after view after view to enjoy, then as we descended it became plantations, then rose again into the Genting Highlands and more outstanding scenery before crashing into Kuala Lumpor.
145 miles and we hardly saw another car. 200 yards into Kl and we were bumper to bumper surrounded by lunatic moped riders. Another mile and despite having made Google Maps promise to avoid tolls we hit our second toll. Pull same trick, park, run across five lanes of traffic, beg nice man, get through.
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Dump the hire car downtown and check the map, its 1.5 miles to our hotel so call a cab? No. Sara decides we should walk it, lugging our bags as we go. Reason - we have spent 5 hours sitting in a car and need the exercise. Despite it being 32 degrees and humid. No matter my protestations, off we hump. Hell of a change from the Highlands, I miss 'The Roffen' already.
Up early - to do some washing in our in-room washing machine, obviously. Then off to do the 'Tour of the Towers'.
Today is the KL Tower, from where we got to view the other towers. Above is Sara sitting on a glass floored box sticking out the side of the tower and behind her you can see The Petronas Towers. Below you can see in one photo three of the top twenty of the worlds tallest buildings, including the second tallest, The Merdeka. The tallest is the Berj Khalifa. Next is the 19th, The Exchange 106, and then the 20th, The Petronas Twin Towers (up those tomorrow!). The Malays certainly do love a tall building. The picture was even taken from the 7th tallest tower in the world, the KL Tower. All that in just a few city blocks. And among all this tallness comes the unavoidable fact that most Malaysians are really quite small. Almost without a doubt unconnected, but it makes you think. Or not, as the case may be. Have I been travelling too much already?
After all that high level excitement we did more heights by climbing onto the top deck of a Big Bus Tour of the 'Nightlights of KL' before walking home at the end of another 6-7 miles tabbing in 31 degrees and high humidity.
Oh, and we sampled a DURIAN, the only fruit that is banned in hotels, planes and enclosed spaces because its smell is described thus - 'smelly gym clothes, rotting meat or raw sewage'. But if you can overcome the urge to throw up and actually jam the splodgy, mushy seed into your gob it actually tastes of lovely creamy custard. The problem that both of us found was that our brains having locked onto the smell of a Durian, even one that had not been split open, we developed a Pavlovian response. Sadly our brains recalled raw sewage, not creamy custard, so every time we even got a whiff of a Durian we had to combat the urge to hurl. As the bloody things were everywhere this was a bit of a drawback to returning to 'Food Street'.
The next day was going up the Petronas Twin Towers to add to our box ticking of tall places in KL. It has to be said that the amazing curved design, the stainless steel cladding, the surrounding parkland, combine to make the towers probably the most beautiful structure of this kind in the world.
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Then on for an excellent Chinese meal where my pint of draught lager was served in a round clay pot and drunk from a saucer. Or were they simply taking the piss?
We walked around 8 miles a day in what is such a safe city. Narrow alleys at night, dingy side-streets, never felt any concern. No visible police, Very impressive town and lovely people. Great food and lots to see. But it's time to move on........
