Jungle of Taman Negara

Our last night in D'Rock ended up being quite interesting and scary! At 4 am our "pet" lizzard tried to come through our door. It scratched it and eventually what felt like ages climbed to the roof. I was shitting myself! Our bed was right in front of the door and the noise was so loud we really thought it was gonna come through the door!! We were afraid to move and I already had a plan to throw my phone at it since i didnt have anything else!! I was so scared!!! All night we could here it somewhere on the roof and I was shitting myself that it's gonna find some hole to crawl into our room like the little ones.. I did not sleep. At all. We had to have a mission to get out from our room cause we were scared it's gonna be waiting us outside.. We could even see the marks on the door and how it had climbed up from the door!! :O

Well the journey to one of the world's oldest jungles started early and was exhausting. We took the taxi boats from the shore and swapped into this bigger boat to harbour. Our first driver was crazy and Steve got to enjoy this mans crazy driving from the front seat. We stopped at several places but the minibus still wasnt comfy at all. Jumping on the back seat, sun boiling on me and my throat hurting like fuck, Steve on the front seat with no leg room.. Eventually around 6 pm we got dropped off in the middle of nothing. We checked that hotel with the others on the minibus but all of us decided to continue walking closer to the "center". Walking around what felt like ages we eventually ended up to this hostel called Dakili with nice old lady running the place. We paid 50 ringgits for our room with fan. Breakfast and wifi included.

Our breakfast Place. Spot the chicken! :D

Where we stayed in

On that night we went to the "center" of Taman Negara which was literally a 50 metre long street with three places to eat. The next morning we were up early and headed to the park head quarters across the river (30 seconds). We paid our camera fee 5 ringgits each and entrance to the park 1 each. Then we headed to the Canopy walk up in the trees.

The trek was easy as we walked on these wooden things the whole way. At one point there were men sitting around in the jungle and asking for our camera permissions papers. If you don't have it you can be fined for 10 000 ringgits and sentenced to three years in prison! The canopy was nice (cost us 5 ringgits each) but quite scary, as the highest point was around at 40 meters! The walk itself was around 2 kilometers. On the way back to our place we stopped to eat at these floating restaurants on the river.

Steve spotted this poisonous snake !

Then we got back, had a nice rest and showers. At 6 pm it was a night market time. It was only held once a week and it gives local people chance to buy toys for kids etc. It was nice to taste a bit different local foods and sweet things. Almost straight after it was night safari time with 4x4 jeep. We paid 70 together for 2 hours. It was terrible. We got 90 minutes and saw a cat, a snake and a bird!

My throat situation (glands) got worse and worse every day. :( After a night of sweating we woke up for breakfast and no one was there.. The whole day was so weird, we didn't really see that many people anywhere. Chost town. In the Morning we went to this local clinic to get some medicine for my throat. The place was some kind of maternity clinic and I was terrified they thought that I was pregnant. After some hassle and registering myself to their clinic I got to see this doctor who actually to our surprise talked english. I paid 23 ringgits to register to the clinic, the doctor's appointment and three different medicines.

Since I didn't feel great at all I stayed at the hotel and Steve left for a hike by himself. Three ours later I got my sweaty man back. Then we had a social media afternoon updating pictures and talking to people via Skype. We were sweating so much even tho we just sat in the shadow!! We tried to track down the owner to pay one more night. Since we couldnt find her we went down to the floating restaurants to eat and chose a different one this time and it turned out the be a really bad decision, it was the worst food we had eaten on the whole trip. Also to top off the bad experience we were the only ones there when we were drowned out by a tour group meeting.. Akward silence while we sat and ate.. We got back to our room and eventually found the woman. We had to tell her what we had paid since she couldnt remember. :D Then we collected the laundry which we had given her the previous day. It still smelled so bad and Steve wasn't too bothered but I was. We got the money back from her eventually. Then after all the hassle it was food time at the village again but we ended up watching badminton Malaysia - South Korea. Final meal at this fly, bug, cat infested place..

Two nights in  Taman Negara had now come to an end and a new day with a new destination was ahead of us.

Notices:

• when people shake hands they touch their heart after (Taman Negara)
• Steve was still too tall everywhere
• Some young kids want to work with tourists cause it gives these "jungle kids" opportunity to learn from the "other world" as one young lad told us.

Perhentian, Pulau Kecil

The next day after the Skycab ride we were picked up from our hotel / hostel / motel at 4.30 pm. We paid 366 ringgits together from a ferry ticket to Kuala Perlis, a bus ticket from there to Kuala Besut and a return ferry ticket from there to Perhentian (the word is malaysian and means a place to stop.). The first ferry from Langkawi took an hour and we had the worst seats ever on the very front of the boat.

The bus journey was supposed to take 8 hours from 8 pm to 4 am. Not too bad, right? Well, we ended up arriving at 7 am and missing the first ferry. After sorting out a new ticket for the boat at 9.30 am we went to eat breakfast with this German girl who we met. The last "ferry" or boat took 30 minutes to Pulau Kecil were we had decided to stay at. The boat dropped us of around 50 metres from the shore and we had to take these tiny taxi boats for 2 ringgits each to the beach.

Apparently being the full diving season (which we didnt know..) we struggled to find a place to stay on this tiny beach. Apparently you cant even book a place you just need to walk in. If the island is full the taxi drivers still bring ppl in!?! Eventually last resort on Long Beach D'rock Garden we managed to get a room for 50 / night. To get there we had to walk like 130 steps (i counted..). The place and the beach were quite a disappointment. Really made for tourists (or divers and backpackers!) and so untidy! The beach wasnt long at all the the few restaurants that there were they all put their garbage pags in the water on the beach to wait for someone to pick them up by boats. Some of the people were also really unfriendly on the island. Actually most people on the shops and restaurants. The beach itself was really nice (when you walked away from all the shit).

Our days were mostly hanging on the beach (and burning..), snorkling and eating. First two nights we enjoyed the fire show in the Beach Bar. On the second night we (read me) got pissed on Orange Utan (25 prosent alcohol..).

We took a day trip for 50 each and visited the best snorkling spots! We saw turtles, all sorts of fishes and coral but no sharks! Probably one of the most annoying thing was our room with so so so many geckos! And their noise!! We also saw couple of bigger ones "daddy's" in our balcony and above our door. (I could barely go inside and never to our balcony!).

One night in front of our door we saw this MASSIVE monitor lizard and THAT was like 10 times biggers than the "daddy's" on the balcony.. We wouldnt really sleep cause we heard this geckos noises all night. The next Morning our friend gecko was in front of our door again when we came back from breakfast.. Steve tried to run after to get a picture!

Our last day was just chilling (like all the days..), we said goodbye to Annbelle who was off to Singapore. We bought our tickets to Taman Negara (80 ringgits each) for the next Morning. The boat was at 8 am and the minibus was at 10 am for seven hours...!. We would see how well we could handle all the creatures in one of the world's oldest jungles..

Notices:

• sun was Super strong in there! We both burned with sun lotion 50 on in less than an hour in the sun..
• Steve was too tall everywhere.
• Some restaurants wont sell beer but you could take your own there with you (Langkawi for example.)
• On Tuesday's some places were shut in Langkawi.

Skycab ride in Langkawi

Days in Langkawi were pretty much the same. We spent there four nights 75 ringgits a night from both of us. The beach area was really nice, lots of water sports going on in there. Not that many beach cafes there tho.The whole place or the beach at least was basically empty, no tourists what so ever. Felt like there were no tourists there! The main street offered lots of different stalls of food, restaurants and shops. Most mornings we had breakfast at this local place with roti canai. :P

One day we were so bored with the beach and so desperate for swimming pool and found this niiiice resort with even nices pool. We offered to pay for using it but they said no. :(

On the last full day we took a taxi for 30 ringgits to Seven Well waterfall. We climbed up like a million stairs only to find nothing. We went down the stairs in half way and found the actually waterfall. It was nice to go to a refressing dip in the water. After managing all the steps down we went to this local place to eat and drink nice fresh coconuts! Then we walked a 10 min walk to Skycab area which was built for tourists. Shops, play rooms for kids, built in bridges, water fun games etc. We paid the Skycab 35 ringgits and prepared ourselves for the steepest skycab ride in the world! (42 degrees!)

It was only us two in the cab and the higher it went more scarier it got. We got off at midpoint to take pictures. Amazing. The top was a shorter ride away. We paid extra 5 each for the skybridge which was a 10 minute walk away in the woods. We got really lucky since it was just about to close and we were the last ones to get in. At the entrance we had to fill in this form that if anything happens it's on our responsibility.. Scary.

On the bridge I was really scared and surprisingly Steve was okey! It was really amazing!

We also went all the way to the top with skycab to admire the views. Breath taking.

Where the sky meets the ocean <3

Langkawi

The next morning we woke up dead. I was just tired and Steve was tired because he had wanted to stay up until very late to watch the ManU game.. Of course. The previous day we had searched for places that would be open in the morning to show this boxing fight on tv. This one sports place promised to show it. So in the morning we went there with our backpacks, and it wasnt even open yet.. There were maybe five other guys who had come there too in hopes of seeing it. Next we headed to this internet cafe to try to watch it online. I was soooo pissed off and annoyed. Could not give a shit. The stream and the internet were so poor so it was pointless anyway.

After it was over (finally) we rushed to the harbour to our boat to Langkawi. It was said to take around three hours. The tickets were 68.10 ringgits each.

A bit over three hours later we arrived to the harbour of Langkawi and were met with one of the biggest queue's we had ever seen! It was huge, it kept going and going and going.. It had been the holidays so locals had come to Langkawi to spend some family time and now everyone and his dog were leaving.. We eventually survived out from the terminal and were instantly greeted by lots of taxi drivers. Our driver was the kindest (very gay!) and by far the nicest taxi driver we had come across. All the way he told us about Langkawi and his counry, basically everything we needed to know. At the end we gladly handed over the 30 ringgit and went to try to find a hostel.

He dropped us of at this place were there where cheaper hotels, motels and hostels close by. We checked out couple of places and eventually settled on the Sweet Inn. It was a simple double room clean and tidy and set us back for 300 ringgit (75 ringgit a night), not bad considering some of the other options around. We dumped our stuff and went to try to find some food. Right next to the hostel was a nice little beach side style shack which did the basic asian foods and fruit juices. We both filled our bellies and drank for 22 ringgits! Really really good food!!!!

After eating we went to have a look at the beach and the high street. We were just in time to see one of the most beeaitful sunset either one of us had ever seen! We have both seen quite a few sunsets but this was like standing in some other world! The sky felt like it was so close you could touch it. The sky was all colours and the cloud formations didnt even look real. The darkness roaming in from one side met with the fading sunlight on the other. In all explosion of color. The beach was full of people taking pictures and selfies. Unbelievable sunset.