Langkawi - Part 2

As mentioned in "Langkawi - Part 1" not all our time was spent around the hotel. We also went on some sight-seeing trips.

Elk's Street's day usually began with some fruit in the hotel room as a light breakfast, followed by some time in the pool. Around 10.00 a.m. the sun was sufficiently high that the pool was no longer in the shade, so it was time to move on. Breakfast was normally across the road at the Cactus open-air restaurant. This was for reasons of cost. The hotel operated with western price levels and by crossing the road, food prices dropped by three-quarters. The Cactus food was ok, but slow, slow, slow!

We ended up booking all our trips through the same tour operator, Tour Link Holidays Sdn Bhd, who provided a good, reliable service. We didn't really take any of the ready-made packages but negotiated trips to those sights we wanted to see. Since our group was large enough to need its own minibus, this was no problem. The only disappointment was the restaurant Yunic Tan, the boss, recommended - not good enough for our Penang-based experts! (Penang is the home of the world's best Malaysian food and every Penangite is a food expert.) Yunic's own restaurant, Xin An Vegetarian Café, where we stopped on our way to the ferry back to the mainland, was, however, very good. The vegetarian in our group was pleased and the food was good enough that the meat eaters had nothing to complain about either.

Our first trip was to the Langkawi Cable Car. We set off rather late, so when we got there, the queues were very long. Our driver didn't have any of his mates in the queue, so we just had to wait and stand in line. Kuan got the task of queueing while the rest of us took a look around the "Oriental Village".

In my eyes, this had the architectural flair of Sainsbury's but I'm not one for shopping. There was a building with a geological exhibition, which was quite interesting, a bored-looking, tethered eagle was there to have its photo taken with tourists, and the village was set around a village pond. Feeding the fish helped keep the children occupied while Kuan was queueing.

Thomas, Henry and Jia-Yen feeding the fishes.

The cable cars.

It was quite windy so the ride was more exciting than some people anticipated!

Jia-Qi enjoying the ride.

The group at the Top Station (Jia-Yen, Thomas, Hwei-Ming, Po-Po, Kuan, Jia-Qi, Henry). Note the wind-swept hairstyles.

Having got down safely, we had ice-creams before getting back into the minivan. The next stop was a craft centre. The children got to try their hand at batik painting. They were sufficiently enthusiastic to be there long enough to complete the painting. I decided we'd buy the work, so now we have a nice souvenir. The wax outline was done by the experts and the children filled in the spaces between the lines.

Henry getting instruction and starting off the project.


Thomas and Jia-Yen continuing the work.

Jia-Yen was a natural talent at batik artwork and she was allowed to work on a large painting destined for sale.

Jia-Yen hard at work.

After the Craft Centre we headed to Kuah for an early dinner.

The next day's trip was labelled a mangrove riverboat cruise with eagle feeding and a visit to a bat's cave. The minivan dropped us off at Tanjung Rhu, where we picked up the riverboat.

For readers wishing to splash out and looking for a quiet place to relax, the Tanjung Rhu Resort comes highly recommended. Unfortunately, like The Datai and The Andaman, the other top-class hotels on Langkawi, it's out of Elk's Street's reach. But on an earlier visit the Chairman did get fish and chips from The Andaman - but that's another story.

Speeding down the river.

Once in the right place, the boatman revved his engine to attract the attention of the eagles, a sort of dinner bell, and then he threw some chicken bits overboard. The eagles swooped down to pick them off the surface of the water; a very impressive sight. Getting a photo was quite a challenge, the eagles are fast and my old digital camera very slow. Below, one eagle that got caught.

A "Lang" from Langkawi.

We then continued onward through the mangrove to the bat cave. The bats were hanging from the roof of the cave having their afternoon naps. After a visit to another cave, we were taken to a small fish farm, where the brave could have their thumbs sucked by a stingray, before exiting the mangrove and taking the sea route back to Tanjung Rhu.

A typical mangrove forest.


A mangrove monkey.


The exit from the bat cave; best attempted before high water.

Our stay in Langkawi was very short, only 3 nights, so there was no more time for further trips. There are many other things to do.

The next day, the minivan came to take us to the ferry terminal and our journey back to the mainland.

Group portrait in front of the vegetarian restaurant. (Thomas, Hwei-Ming, Henry, Yunic (tour guide), Kuan, Jia-Qi, Po-Po, Jia-Yen)

The symbol of Langkawi is the eagle and here to finish this report is a photo of the eagle statue at Eagle Square in Kuah, taken from the ferry terminal.