Malaysian Holiday 2018 –The Last Day

22nd September 2018

Every trip must come to an end, I am catching the 3pm domestic flight from Alor Setar to KL then the 11pm flight back to Australia on the 23rd Sept.

A lot of washing to be done today which was normally no problem except that it rained and thundered so by the end of the day the washing was still damp. It is apparent that he low humidity of Australia dries washing much quicker despite the current higher temperatures here. The local laundromat beckoned…

RM4 ($1.20) for 25 minutes drying seemed reasonable to me.

Finally a small dinner at a local Thai Restaurant Rung Reang.  Prawns, Snakehead fish and Calamari.

I will miss the food. Actually I will miss food for a while; I have to lose some weight after this trip but what lovely food I have enjoyed over the last four weeks.

Cameron Highlands

18th to 21st September 2018

Drove a couple of hundred kilometres to spent a few days in the cool of the Cameron Highlands. The temperature at this altitude is lovely and cool (17’ to 21’C) after the 32’C heat of the plains.

This is my fourth visit to the Highlands so it was not an unknown quantity and as a touch of nostalgia stayed at the Heritage Hotel in Tanah Rata, the same hotel as on the first visit 12 years ago.

Because this is a tea growing area there are plenty of Indian restaurants with Tandori Chicken cooked in a kiln being a speciality. The area also grows strawberries and flowers as well as a variety of cool climate vegetables. It is interesting to see how these nurseries cling to the side of some very steep slopes with fascinating offerings such as “Self Plucking Strawberries”.

Cameron Lavender Gardens

The first visit was to the Cameron Lavender Gardens a large flower nursery and tourist attraction.

Boh Tea Factory

Another nostalgic visit; when we came 12 years ago there were visits to the actual factory where the tea was ground, dried, fermented and packaged but that doesn’t seem to be possible now. The tea rooms then were new and spacious, on this visit those same tea rooms were crowded though the tea and scones were still fine.

Plenty to do and see in the Cameron Highlands…

…and eat.

A diet is definitely on the cards when I get home.

A Few Days in Hua Hin

7th to 13th September 2018

Spent time in Hua Hin solely with the intention of relaxing; no rushing about on this trip.

The railway station is a tourist attraction in itself - there is even a royal waiting room though it doesn’t seem to have been used for a long time.

 

The hotel was supposedly 3.5 stars but personally I doubt that, there was nothing wrong with it and it’s main point was its convenient location but it wasn’t a patch on the Royal Pavilion where we stayed last time. You get what you pay for - this was much cheaper.

A lot of time was spent eating; good food especially seafood was everywhere. There was one notable restaurant which was always crowded. When we first came across it there was a queue waiting for a vacant table.

In the event we ate there several times and by coming early never had to queue. Most of their food was delicious.

They were popular (famous?) for their claypot, personally it, like the similar steamboat, left me cold – I just don’t like boiled meat; boiled fish is OK but boiled meat? Not for me! The rest of their food was fine.

Hua Hin has plenty of other restaurants.

There was food on the jetty, at the night market and just about every street in town.

A short walk from the hotel was all the usual sights and sounds of urban Thailand.

It is definitely the off season with only a few Europeans about; there are a few pommie accents but the majority seem to be German or Scandinavian. The mainstay of the tourism industry at this time of the year seems to be coach loads of China Chinese visiting for a few hours (that is my observation only it might not be the case).