Half Term Travel

Half Term Adventures

The view from the infinity pool at the hotel we stayed at.

Hold on folks, this is a long one.

Today's offering is a travel focused post! We're on a tropical island... 

Okay, we're on a different tropical island; Langkawi! 

What is a Langkawi?

Anyone expecting a 1980s Christopher Lee to have his hideout here?

Langkawi is fascinating - it wasn't even a thing until 1986. Okay, clearly it was a thing, but it was backwater subsistence fishing community. Prior to the middle of the 19th century it was a haven for pirates attacking ships in the Malacca Straits. The British cleared them out, as we are British and don't like pirates, unless they are ones we sanction and give us a chunk of their profits! Following that the island faded into relative obscurity. That is until 1986 when the then Prime Minister decided to turn the island into national tourist resort and voila - Langkawi as it is now! (Yeah I know, a massive oversimplification, but this is not a geopolitical or historical blog.)

Honestly, it's a bit Benidormish in places, but boy there are some really amazing things to see. The geography, flora and fauna alone make it worth visiting. 

The first thing to note is that Langkawi is in fact an archipelago of 99 different islands; some substantial, some only visible when the tides are favourable. However when we refer to Langkawi, we refer to the main island that has all the stuff on it. 

We had booked a short stay - three nights - in hotel in Pantai Cenang, not far from the airport. Not that you can be far from the airport on an island the size of Langkawi.

Apologies for the shonkily annotate map, but you gotta work with what you got - and I got a distinct lack of fine motor skills!

Flying from Penang

There are other ways to get from Penang to Langkawi, the passenger ferry from here takes about 4 hours, and there is a car ferry in Perlis, which is an option we are exploring for future visits, but for this first short foray off the island we elected to fly.

The flights cost 103 myr (Malaysian Ringit) return for all three of us - for context we went out for a birthday meal in September and that cost over 150 myr. The flights cost less than £20 return - for all of us. Yes that's right - the flights cost only slightly more than if all three of us had travelled from Whitley Bay to Newcastle and back on the Metro. 

It also took less time.

We were in the air for less than half an hour.

If it hadn't been for the usual airport procedures this would have felt a lot like a bus journey. To be fair, it still kind of did.

Now I imagine you are picturing us on an aging turboprop plane which is little more than a tin can and some ailing engines. Nope. A brand new Airbus A321 from Air Asia. 

Obligatory picture of a generic aircraft of the type we were on: credit to Airbus.com

The downside was that Air Asia changed the flight times on us at short notice, but given the price, we couldn't grumble.

Flying in covid times was, well it was not much different from flying in normal times, but my memory of flying in non-covid times is hazy at best as 'the before times' seem a long way off now. The main difference was the relentless, and I have to say, very effective use of the Malaysian MySejahtera app. This is like the NHS track and trace app only good - and legally mandated - and everyone uses it - and it cost about 1/20th of the UK test and trace spending to set up and implement. Oh, also there was a lot of temperature checks and hand santising. There is also mandatory mask wearing in public indoor spaces and crowded outdoor spaces and vaccine passports.

The flight itself was... weird. The cabin crew were in full PPE and they only just had time to do the safety briefing, tell people the fasten seatbelt sign was off, before they told people the fasten seatbelt sign was back on again and we were coming in to land. 

What I will say is that given that both Langkawi and Penang are smaller, regional airports (okay Penang is officially an international airport, but is international in the same way that Newcastle airport is i.e. there are a handful of international destinations served, but not in the same volumes as the major hubs), they are very well serviced and have fairly well developed infrastructure in their terminals. Both are not unpleasant places to transit through.

First Impressions

Okay, these are actually second impressions as we didn't arrive until after 7pm and it was dark.

First thing we noted was Langkawi is much more what we expected of a tropical island. That's not to say Penang doesn't have its moments, but it is a major trade and industrial hub - the area is often referred to as the silicon valley of Malaysia, meaning that there is a chaotic clatter of development impinging on the island's tropical character. This is not the case with Langkawi as it relies on the natural characteristics for its income. So I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it had a very different character. 

It also had far less trash strew about the place. This may be as a function of the lockdown, which only lifted on the 16th of September. Langkawi has effectively been shut down for nearly six months due to the MCO (movement control order). 

It was frankly stunning though! 

Sunrise on day one - picture taken from the balcony of our room.

And a slightly different angle.

And one more for good measure.

Not a bad way to start our trip.

We were staying at Resort World Langkawi, part of a regional chain of hotels. It seemed to be a good balance of value to amenities, which suited us for a first foray beyond the state borders of Penang.

The hotel was well situated, away from the potentially busy main drag, and had a games room, two smallish pools and several food and drink outlets. We also got a buffet breakfast - Thomas was thrilled - he loves a buffet.

Oh, quick note - here again Malaysia did that familiar/different thing. The buffet wouldn't have been out of place at the average Premier Inn, except for the fact that instead of the bacon and sausages in the hot food section there was Mee Goreng, Lontong and other local dishes - I still struggle with curry for breakfast! 

The staff were incredibly helpful and friendly - they seemed relieved to have guests again. It was interesting to hear that the hotel was not at full capacity, not because of restrictions, but because they couldn't get the staff to fully open. So many workers in the tourist industry had left the island that it had made getting ready to reopen a challenge it turns out. 

Day 1:

We had a hit list of touristy things we wanted to do:

1) Go to the Skywalk and Skycab - a geopark on a nearly 700 meter high peak, accessed by a cable car.

2) Visit the main 'town' and see the giant sea eagle statue.

3) Walk on a tropical beach and go in the sea - I actually hadn't done this yet, well not the going in the sea bit anyway.

Day 1 was the Geopark. 

For context, I'm not great with heights. I'm much better than when I was younger and I have flown, climbed and gone hill walking fairly regularly, but I'm still not entirely comfortable up a great height.

The cable car travels over 2km in length and travels over 700 vertical metres - that means it has some very steep inclines... I was not looking forward to this. 

Nicola, on the other hand, was really excited, so we got there early and got in line to get hauled up a mountain attached to a seemingly very thin cable by one spindly hook thingy. What could possibly go wrong!

Well nothing as it turns out. 

I did repeatedly have to remind my brain that attractions that regularly, or even just occasionally, plunge their clients to their doom tend not to stay open. They definitely would get some harsh reviews on TripAdvisor - This place has very good reviews and no mention of plunging is made.

I'm not convinced this picture does either the view or the incline justice.

The view from the 'middle' platform - it's actually only maybe 50-60 metres from the very highest point.

This is a view looking down at the 'Skywalk' - a suspension bridge that you can walk across if you're not already terrified enough...

Here's a shot looking straight down over the side of the suspension bridge in question.

The view is quite good though.

At the base of the Skycab and Skywalk there is what can best be described as a theme park. There are food outlets, shops, entertainments and other tourist traps of various types. The ticket did include access to a very cool attraction - a 'museum' of optical illusions. A bit like a bigger version of the Camera Obscura in Edinburgh.

It was good fun.

Thomas and Nicola having a narrow escape!

Thomas fighting a dragon.

Thomas trapped in a bubble by a renaissance nut job.

And on the way out...

A monkey engaged in some B&E action!

On the way home we stopped by the main drag in Pantai Cenang and found the main beachfront.

Okay - this is not too shabby now is it.

We went back to the hotel to chill out for a bit and relaxed in the infinity pool - another first! I've never been anywhere that has an infinity pool. We're not really infinity pool type people and we'll probably not make a habit of it, but when in Langkawi...

Another shot of the view from the pool.

We rounded the day off by accidentally ending up in the top rated restaurant on Langkawi, at least according to TripAdvisor - a fantastic Korean restaurant called Haroo. The food was brilliant and again we tried dishes we haven't encountered before. I can't speak to the authenticity of the food as far as Korean cuisine goes - I've not been to Korea - but it was very nice. The bibimbap in particular was very good and their home made Kimchi was great too.

Day 2

Day two started off with a little more cloud, but brightened quickly. So Bob Ross got out and did some landscape painting.

Thomas had been after a Bob Ross Lego figure and my friend Colin very generously donated his to him. We promised a montage of Bob on his adventures so here's the very first installment. Some very happy little trees there in the background.

We set out to just have a general mooch around the island and see what there was to see. Unfortunately quite a lot of it is still a bit shut or only just opening up.

The colour balance on this one is a bit off - but in my defense I'm using a camera phone in bright sunlight and 30 degree plus heat! My phone actually warned me it was overheating shortly after taking this shot - something it's only ever done here in Malaysia.

We then went for a drive around the island. Much of the place seems, like many of the bits of Penang we've seen, kind of half finished. It's like a project that we've arrived at mid way. Maybe the entire world is like this and I didn't notice because I was living in my particular corner of it, but I get the distinct impression that here in Malaysia there is sometimes a very well thought through master plan for their developments and sometimes it is less so. Infrastructure is paradoxically more advanced and much more precarious than in the UK. They are early adopters of high tech solutions, but the roads don't always work. There are UNESCO protected geoparks, but rubbish just get dumped by the roadside. I don't get it, but then this is a country that essentially has jumped through its industrial revolutions in a much more compacted timeframe than that which occurred in Northern Europe. What took three hundred years or more there has happened in less than a third of that time over here - that's always going to throw up problems. 

Anyway we did eventually get back to Pantai Cenang and go for the beach walk and paddle in a tropical sea.

It was raining. 

And grey

And there was a breeze.

However the air temperature and the water temperature were both in the high 20s so, you know, not really a problem. The bonuses were that we didn't get incinerated by the sun and the beach wasn't busy! It was actually ideal for us.

We finished off the day with dinner in the Ali Bistro. I guess it was the equivalent of fast food, but we got roti cani, biriyani, naan bread, nasi goreng, vegetable side dishes and drinks for less than 40 myr. That was enough food for all three of us for £6.80. I know I can't keep doing that conversion as we are paid in local currency and don't get paid western wages any more, but still, that's ridiculous! The food was pretty damn good too.

Final First Impressions

Please be aware that we are making judgements based on barely scratching the surface, so there's bound to be something we missed, but on the whole we really liked the place and are planning to come back.

The best cognate for Langkawi I can think of is Mallorca - a relaxed island with a fairly touristy vibe, but some spectacular natural environments to explore. You can go waaaay upscale if you want, or stay in backpacker's hostels, and all the points in between. It's definitely worth a visit and more protracted stay would be recommended.

Back to Penang

The following day was a relatively early start as our flight was at 9.35am - it had been changed from a much more leisurely 2pm flight, but given the cost we really couldn't complain at all.

I resisted titling this section 'back home', although that was what I typed first and then caught myself. Thomas did and does refer to our house here in Permai Gardens as home. I still don't feel like this is home and I'm probably making a conscious effort not to look at it this way. I actively want to remain connected to the North East as I'm sure that this is home. I'm not closing myself off to the possibilities of international living and what the experience has to offer, I'm just sure that we have to have a plan that involves returning to 'home' a place where we have roots. 

However there was comforting familiarity to returning to Penang. The return was just as weirdly short, but just as efficient - the only minor bump being that our British vaccine certificates don't quite work properly in the Malaysian app - they show and we are clearly double vaccinated, but we can't generate a digital certificate as we weren't vaccinated here. We did have paper copies of our NHS travel certificate. This issue appears to be common across the different digital platforms used worldwide. I can only hope that at some point an international protocol is agreed so that theses certificates can become more transferable.

The roads, with their increased busyness and mad moped drivers, were familiar and the odd mix of old and new didn't strike me as quite as jarring as it initially did. Things are becoming known quantities and going on a holiday, however brief, has lifted the spirits somewhat. 

Again we are experiencing things that we would never otherwise get the chance to do and seeing the world from a different point of view - in this case from 700 metres above a tropical archipelago!

Until next time...

Love and best wishes to all.

John, Nicola and Thomas.