Peninsular Malaysia!

Ok, so now that Michelle and I have finished East Malaysia, a.k.a. Borneo, and have gotten our weekend getaway, it was time to get back to work and finish off the main part of Malaysia, the Peninsular Malaysia! As we have spent a lot of time, and money, experiencing Malaysia, we both wanted to move through the main peninsula as quickly as possible. However, we still wanted to appreciate the islands here and we needed a few days of staying put in one place after constant movement around Borneo and then flying to Bangkok for the weekend. So we decided to take our first stop and savor it!
PALAU TIOMAN
We spent 3 glorious nights on Palau Tioman! We rented a chalet on the beach with a front porch and hammock and just relaxed for the next 3 days! Our first full day it was stormy all day, but this was fine with us as we just wanted to sit in our hammocks on our porch and sip cocktails anyway... Completely RELAXING! We needed a rest. We also met 4 guys from the Royal British Navy who were on leave for the weekend. They quickly befriended us and helped us drink cocktails on the porch in the rain; as if we needed help. They became our companions for the next 3 days. I am happy to say the weather the second day was gorgeous! And after a great first day 'sinking' into the relaxing environment,we were able to spend the second day swimming and enjoying the islands lack of population. There wasn't much to do, so we swam during the day, ate great island feasts with good company and drinking good wine at night. Unfortunately this heaven could not last forever as we had to move on to keep seeing the peninsula... Next stop, KL!
KUALA LUMPUR
Kuala Lumpur has been cool enough, but not as exotic as I anticipated. As we all know, expectations are a bad thing, but I think being in exotic Bangkok the weekend before also helped to minimize the 'foreign effect' of KL. However, that being said, Michelle and I of course made the best out of it :) Right away we made a new friend, Alex (New York, 25). He ended up touring around with us the whole time and being our 'bodyguard' against the Muslim men. Thanks Alex :) -Let me assure you, Mom and Grandma, before you worry to much, we did not NEED a bodyguard, it was more of a joke than anything else.
But of course, when in KL there are certain touristy objectives that need to be checked off the list. First we walked around the city, getting familiar with our surroundings. We ended up at the end of that day at the KL Tower. This place is magnificent! For 40 MYR (US$11) you can visit the observational deck. Or for another 10 MYR (US$3) you can go upstairs one more level and view the city from a table with an incredible buffet lunch! Did I mention the restaurant rotates while you sit and eat the delicious food! Oh, did we show some glutenous behavior at lunch, haha. To be fair, don't set 3 backpackers down in front of an all you can eat buffet and not expect them to take FULL advantage! They had a western buffet and a local buffet, of which I visited both. Then the third buffet was all you can eat dessert... Cakes, mouse, pastries, and loads of ice cream, Mmmmm :) Afterward, we visited their little zoo at the bottom. This was mostly full of snakes, but they also had an albino monkey and a few colorful birds. After viewing the sites from our rotating table, we visited a weekly drum circle at the National Monument.


The following day we went to Batu Caves. These are limestone caves about an hour north of the city. It is a sacred area for Hindu's and as such many make a pilgramage there every year from all over the world. We climbed 275 steps to make it to the top where a temple lay and the cheeky monkeys played around. In the picture to the left, the steps are on the left of the big, gold Hindi statue.
Finally on our third day we visited the infamous Petronas Towers. Not as exciting as you would think seeing as you are about half as high up as you were in the KL Tower 2 days before. However, to visit and go to the double decker bridge of the Petronas Towers is actually free. But first you have to watch a marketing video on how wonderful Petronas is as a company, which stunk. The twin towers themselves were cool, but not as cool as the KL tower. Being twice as high up and having the buffet might have had something to do with that :) After the twin towers, Michelle and I went to a proper mall and did some window shopping. Man, did it feel good to try on real clothes again! Its been ages since I have worn good clothes in decent condition. Of course our budgets, and the fact that whatever we travel with is bound to get ruined, didn't allow us to buy anything- but we still had fun pretending :)
CAMERON HIGHLANDS
Next stop were the highlands... THANK GOD! It is so hot in every day of my life here. It is a heat like no other, being almost on the equator. You almost suffocate sometimes, you even sweat profusely out of every pore as you do nothing but sleep. God forbid you sleep under a sheet because of the heat, but yet you have to find a way because otherwise your body becomes an all you can eat buffet for the mosquitoes. So needless to say, Michelle and I were quite grateful and ready to move on and up to the highlands.
The Cameron Highlands were excellent. It is a place full of cultivating Tea plantations. This is the big highlight for the region. When we got there it was rainy and cold...YAY!!! I actually got to snuggle up under a huge comforter and wear my hoody around. We got there late in the afternoon so we didn't do much then, except I went online and made a BIG decision. I'M COMING HOME! On the 4 hour bus ride from KL to the Highlands I thought about it and realized I really need to come home for a visit. I miss everyone so much and really wanted to see the growth of my nieces and nephews since I left. I also wanted to be home for my godson's baptism. So I am coming home June 4!
But back to the main story... The next day Michelle and I walked an hour or so through tea plantations and finally wound up at the tea factory. We learned how the tea leaves are plucked, rolled, fermented, heated, crushed, and finally made into a delicious cup of tea :) We ate scones and had ourselves a couple pots of tea under the cool, brisk, and beautifully overcast sky of the highlands. It was wonderful. After we left there we did a 3 hour walk back to the village. Along the way we witnessed a couple getting married in the plantation. They had only the minister and a photographer with them, it was a beautiful and serene setting. The bride was wearing Crocs as her shoes, haha! We also stopped at a honey bee farm, cactus farm, strawberry farms, and a butterfly farm. This region is filled with farms and fresh vegetables and fruit. I had the best mandarin orange anyone has ever had here. It was like heaven bursting in my mouth. All in all, there is not much to do in the highlands except relax and enjoy being out of the heat. But this is exactly what we wanted, an area to do not a whole lot in while we stopped sweating for a couple of days :)
PENANG
We didn't stay in the highlands to long, the next day we caught a bus to Penang, back to the heat. This is an island off the Northwest of Malaysia and is where a lot of travelers go while they await their the Thai visa's. The city of Georgetown sits on Penang, and is the second largest city in Malaysia. That being said, it only takes 20 minutes to walk around the entirity of the city. The water here is no good for swimming, so we mostly just walked around the city, and watched the elder local men play checkers with beer caps. This is also sadly where mine and Michelle's journey together ends. It has been a great 6 weeks and I enjoyed having company for a little while. But from here Michelle went on to Thailand, and I prepared to start making my trip home, HOME SWEET HOME! Thanks Michelle for some great memories!


More pictures can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/find.barlow/PeninsularMalaysia#

Weekend Getaway in Bangkok!!

Now you may be thinking, why does Barlow need a weekend getaway? Well the answer is simple really. Backpacking is tiring, and much harder work than you would anticipate. You are constantly on the move, every night or every other, in a new place. You never get to sleep in a real bed, more like futon mats on bunk beds with sunken holes where your behind falls, worn in by the many backpackers preceding you. You constantly are meeting new people and usually bonding and sharing travel stories over several drinks. Then you are up early in the morning, fighting the hangover, to do a tour of that town/city/island, and the next day you are up early to catch the bus/boat to the next place of interest. It is exhausting!!! Tons of fun, but absolutely exhausting. In any case, my friend Michelle, whom I met and traveled with in Borneo, decided to come with me to Bangkok for this weekend getaway.

We were enticed to go to Bangkok for 2 reasons. First, and most important, was that a favorite band of ours was playing a free outdoor gig there on Sunday night. The second reason was that we both have been wanting to get a little taste of Thailand forever and knew we could get that, the band and much needed R&R time in a real home because I am lucking enough to have a cousin who lives there, Will Heuser (who by the way, was an excellent host, THANK YOU WILL!). The flight tickets from Malaysia were cheap so we thought, why not?
This band we went to see is called Ozomatli. They are an awesome band from L.A. full of life and the mixed cultures that represent America. They
play a funkadelic rap beat with Latino rhythm and even some Indian undertones. They are 7 members with lots of bongos and horns on stage. They can make anyone want to pick their feet up and start groovin! This free concert was put on because the US State Department has sponsored these guys to represent America, and our many mixed cultures, around the world. They have played across Africa, India, and now South East Asia! The US Ambassador in Thailand was even there. Not only moving and groovin with the crowd, but he actually got up and played his trombone with the band for a few songs! The band said it was better than playing with Bill Clinton, which they have also done. Haha :) It was a terrific night. We stayed out all night and met loads of new friends from all over. We finished the night off on Koah San Road, a backpackers heaven in Bangkok!

While we were there we also hit up the weekend markets and did plenty of shopping! The wardrobe I packed over 18 months ago finally got a little updated :) We also did the other famous things that Koah San Road is famous for, I got an electric blue dread lock (just one guys, in the back of my hair, no one freak out yet), and Michelle got herself a lovely tattoo!
We had an absolute freaking brilliant and A-mazing time there! And I have to say another big thanks to Will for making our stay sooo comfortable. It was awesome being inside the home of family. To walk in and see my grandmother's picture right away made me really appreciate being there and amongst family again. I miss you guys heaps!


More pictures can be seen at http://picasaweb.google.com/find.barlow/BangkokWeekendGetaway# .

Borneo Adventures Continue!

Borneo is a wonderful place! The people are absolutely incredible and helpful. After three weeks of traveling around there I have learned a little bit of Malay, seen some incredible sites and wildlife and made some great life long friends. After leaving Kutching and Bako National Park, my journey continued to the interior of Borneo with 3 others, Michelle and Alena whom were with me in Bako, and a new friend Leo (Swiss) who traveled with us. We are all traveling alone and left Kutching together because we were going in the same direction. However, as the trip continued we ended up staying together the whole time. We never planned to, and some of us even kept saying, "Well, I will probably leave the group when we get to so-and-so", but it never happened, haha, I love traveling! This 3 week exploration together marks the longest I have traveled with one single person since I left home, let alone 3 people. This was true not only for myself, but for each of my other traveling friends as well. Leo did leave us girls in Kota Kinabalu for Indonesia about 5 days before us 3 girls finished with Borneo, but other than that, staying together for this length of time was a record for each of us! This is the four of us arriving in Brunei (Michelle, Leo, Alena, Me).
SARAWAK
Our adventures through the state of Sarawak had started in Kutching and Bako National Park. Then the four of took an 8 hour boat ride one day that went up the coast and into the jungle. This turned out to not be the best of ideas. Once we got into the little town of Kepit in the jungle we realized it had nothing to offer, except an awesome sunset. We were going to go from there further into the jungle, but once there realized we couldn't because it was dry season and the river was all dried up. This of course means there is no boat transportation and therefore no public transport to travelers :( Well what could we do, except turn around and go back to the coast and beach. But this did give us a chance to use their wonderful toilet system as you can see to the left. And if you look close enough you will realize it is hole on the boat's floor that you squat over and pee directly into the river! REFRESHING!! I think not.
So the next day, after taking a 4 hour boat ride back out of the jungle and a 3 hour bus ride up the coast, we finally found ourselves sitting on the beach and watching a beautiful sunset at Similajau National Park. We stayed there for 2 days as it was so peaceful and not crowded at all with other tourists. In fact, there were only 2 other tourists, a couple from the Netherlands. While we were there we charted a boat with the Dutch couple for a night cruise in crocodile infested waters through the jungle to see what we could find! We saw some amazing things. Lots of crocodiles, from babies only half a meter long, to mama's who were 4 or 5 meters long. We saw and owl or two and another interesting bird. This bird builds the nest with the female in it. The nest then gets closed around her beak, so that only her beak is protruding from within the nest. Then the male goes off and hunts and feeds her from the outside. If something awful should happen to the male, the other males in the area will take over his responsibility so that the female continues to be fed while she protects the nest and eggs. How clever!
After a much needed 2 days relaxing on the beach we were on the move again to yet another national park called Niah Caves. Here there are caves that were inhabited during the stone age! Remains of humans have been found here from the stone age and for this reason it is a huge and protected archaeological site. Some of the caves even still have paintings on the walls telling stories from the days of the stone age.
Towards the back of the park there is an Iban Longhouse. Now what is a longhouse you may ask? The Iban people are the original tribesman inhabiting Borneo. Their
'tribes' live in what they call longhouses. They are huge long wooden houses with tons of rooms in them. Each family gets one room and the center is the common area for all the families. Everyone knows everyone and goes to and fro in each others houses as they wish. Privacy is not a concept they understand. It is actually wonderful to see. The community is so strong and everyone cares about and for everyone.
We stumbled on this longhouse kind of by accident. I mean it was on the map, but we thought it would be an old, outdated place, kind of a museum, with no one actually living there. We were way wrong! When the girls and I first came upon it, it was an absolute amazing site. People bathing in the river, doing their laundry while they bathed, and school children running along. We were able to actually stay here one night with these people. We stayed in a woman named Cecilia's (Christian name of course) house. She has no children and lives with her brother. She cooked us a fantastic local meal for dinner and served the best tea I have ever drunken. We also met the local chicken fighting champion and shared some rice wine. We slept in the communal area on mattes on the floor and tried our best to not get eaten by the mosquitoes who were loving the fresh blood. The next morning we hiked an hour out of the jungle where the longhouse is and made our way to Miri, the jumping point for Brunei!
BRUNEI
Brunei is such a small little country, wedged between the Malaysian states of Sarawak and Sabah. Brunei has only 380,000 people, but a rich oil reserve, making it a much more financially secure country. It is also a complete Muslim country, therefore alcohol is illegal. It was for the most part very similar to the rest of Borneo though. The food and accommodation was more expensive, so we only passed through for a night on our way to Sabah. It was nice to have a proper coffee and cakes here though. There was also a Dairy Queen, where you know I seized the opportunity to have a blizzard! Ahhh, a little taste of home sweet home :)
SABAH
Sabah is such an excellent place. It really is. All though, it has been built up more for tourists than Sarawak and can therefore be a bit more expensive to do some of the touristy objectives. To be fair, they blatantly take advantage of the tourists. We left Brunei and traveled by boat to
Paula Labuan, which is a duty free island, and looks more enticing in the magazines than in real life. As it is so close to Brunei, there are only oil rigs around the island :( We left there on the first boat the next morning and went to Kota Kinabalu (KK), the main city in Sabah, and all of Borneo for that matter. It is a really nice city with a town atmosphere. It sits on the water and there are many islands you can go to for cheap day trips not far from the coast. We did this the next day and spent the day snorkeling. It was our last group trip as Leo was leaving us the next day for Indonesia and us girls were continuing on out of the city. Good-bye Leo, its been fun!

The 3 of us went to Mount Kinabalu and spent 2 days hiking around the bottom of the mountain. We wanted to hike to the summit but it was meant to take 2 days and the price of a dorm bed (sharing one room with 200 beds!) at the top of the mountain, with NO heat (at 4000m elevation, I think not) was almost $100 US. We said no bloody way are we paying that! They certainly know how to take advantage of a monopoly over there. Two years ago before the tourism was so built up, it was only US$15! However, while we were there we found out that there were 4 passes a day given out to 'Day' hikers. You had to be interviewed to get the pass, they had to make sure you were fit enough to try it. Well, Michelle and I applied for a day pass for a week from then, what would be our last day in Borneo. Alena would leave us the night before and did not want to climb the tallest mountain in South East Asia anyway. Michelle and I were approved, so we made the decision to attempt it together on our way out of Borneo. More on how this turns out to come...

After our time at the mountain for 2 days, we went to the east coast and into the
jungle yet again. This time we were staying at Uncle Tan's Wildlife Camp for 3 days. This was an awesome, albeit smelly, adventure. I only say smelly because after 3 days hiking in the heat of the jungles of Borneo, with absolutely no way to shower, you would stink too! We slept in 3 sided huts on mattes on the ground where a white mosquito netting would fall around us to protect us at night. Totally amazing! We were taking on river cruises at all different times of the day in order to see the different wildlife that would be out at various times. For that reason we also did hikes during different times of the day. Both included night tours. And there is something UN-relaxing about putting you feet down into a foot of mud in the night and not knowing what else is down there! EEK!!! During the night river cruise a crocodile literally popped out out of the water with a snap of its jaw about 3 ft. from my face. It was scary! I do believe I almost peed myself. During the early morning hours and evening times we saw Orang Utan's up in the trees, about 50 ft. from our heads. We also saw the Proboscis Monkey (the red monkey with the long nose that looks like a man), which can only be found in Borneo. We saw tons of other grey little cheeky monkeys and tons of birds including Egrets, Eagles, and King Fishers. During the hot afternoons most of the wildlife lies low, so during these times we saw crazy tiny little insect critters and looked at different types of foliage and eatable plants. The Orang Utan's were definitely the coolest though! We watched one mama with her baby for about half an hour and never got bored :)







Next we made our way to Semporna, which is supposed to be one of the worlds major dive meccas! And it was. People come there from around the world for the scuba diving! Most people dive on a reef surround Sipidan Island, but as there are only 200 permits a day granted there and we didn't plan it 2 months in advance to secure ours, combined with the elevated cost to dive there, we stayed closer to the mainland and dove at another great spot! We had 3 fabulous dives and a great day. We then took the night bus back to the mountain. Alena continued on the night bus to KK to catch her flight to Singapore and Michelle and I disembarked at the bottom of the mountain to prepare for our attempt to climb this bloody mountain in one day!


Well I am happy to report that we did it! Far out, it was the most physically demanding and trying thing I have ever done and probably will ever do in my life, but it was well worth it! I mean, we actually lapped people on it. There were people we passed at around km4 that were Thus adding to the majesticness of it all!coming down when we went up, and when we came back down the bottom and passed km 1, we passed them again! We hauled ass, and because everyone else is at the summit for dawn and leaves shortly there after, when we reached it at 1:30pm, we had the whole place to ourselves! Thus adding to the majesticness of it all! Well us, and our fabulous local guide (which is mandatory to take), Fabian! He was great. I honestly don't think I would have made it without him. I was loosing it by km 6.5 and dead by km7.5. Just look at the picture or the left, I was dead! I just could not get my legs to lift anymore. Somehow, with our guides encouragement, I made it! The locals were quite impressed that 2 girls were able to reach the summit in only a day. The whole climb is 8.7 km's to the summit, which is at 4095.2 m high. It was glorious when we did reach the top. Totally surrounded by nothing but clouds! Did I mention that the last 1.7 km's is all a rope climb too! Man, I have never been happier to reach a goal!
We then had to try and make it back down the mountain as fast as we could in order to then catch the last bus back to KK where we were flying out of that night. We came down that mountain so fast, without stopping. Or at least the first 6 km's. By the time we reached the last 2.5 I was struggling and my knees were giving out right, left, and center. I slipped on the wet muddy rocks four times! I also thought I was going to be ill at one point. Never happened though. As fast as we tried to go, we reached the finish gate about 20 min after the last bus left!
We ended up chartering a taxi to give us a lift to the airport which was 2 hours away and we only had an hour and a half. We told the driver if he got us there on time we would pay him an extra 10MYR (about 3$US, haha). Well he flew man, I tell ya. He was flying around those mountainess hills in the dark fog. After the most physically trying day I h ave ever had, where I already believed I was going to be ill once, I found myself in this car travelling at speeds I thought not possible on windy roads like this. But in the end... WE MADE IT! With one minute of check-in left to spare! Best 10MYR I have ever spent! The driver of that cab deserves a medal! Michelle and I boarded that plane exhausted and hardly able to put one foot in front of the other. We had this night flight back the the main peninsula and then were catching another one the following day to Bangkok for the weekend. When we exited the flight, we could not come down the stairs, our knees were sooo stiff after sitting for 2 hours. We needed help. We eventually made it on our own, but I am pretty sure all the stuardists thought there was something wrong with us as we said ow, ow, ow, the whole way down the steps!

For More Pictures, go to http://picasaweb.google.com/find.barlow/Borneo