What a relaxing weekend I´ve just had! On Thursday K & I spontaneously decided we needed sun, surf and relaxation so Friday evening saw us boarding an Airasia flight to Kota Bharu; we were off to one of Malaysia´s most beautiful islands Pulau Perhentian!
Kota Bharu´s claim to fame is a bustling night market – pasar malam - which unfortunately was not as spectacular as usual because the place where it’s usually held is under construction at the moment.
Whilst wandering from one hostel to the next looking for a place to stay without any unwelcome guests (bedbugs / fleas or similar) we met 2 German girls. Now 3 blond girls can attract quite a lot of attention, too bad it was negative this time. A group of pathetic guys desperately sought our attention and even resorted to throwing plastic bottles filled with cigarette butts at us! One actually followed us into the hotel, but got scared away after I complained bitterly to a very understanding receptionist (you could almost see a speech bubble appearing above his head with “just let this crazy woman speak, she’ll get over it soon, just keep smiling, I wonder what’s on TV later”).
The next day we took a taxi down to the pier and one of the little speedboats out to the Perhentian Islands. Zooming out on a very narrow, extremely shallow boat for one hour, jumping over waves with the wind making your hair stream out behind you is pretty exhilarating! We were racing along until suddenly, a huge bump jerked us forward, and the boat stopped! We’d swept over some kind of chain or rope which was attached to a nearby ship. But everything seemed to be ok, so they started the motor up again and off we went. Just as I was thinking “this is life” I felt the boat slowing, til it stopped, quite near to the little island. Hmm, everyone went, and looked back to see 2 Malay guys frantically tugging at the motor string, then when that didn’t work, they packed out their tools and proceeded to fix the motor. The trip which was supposed to last 30 minutes was prolonged by one hour (!).
Anyway, we finally arrived and spent a very relaxing 2 days pigging out with a backdrop of the deepest jungle and the clearest, bluest water imaginable. What a change from KL!