Feb 3, 2005 - No Seats just Beds - No Beds just Seats?!?!?!?

Our second train journey 12hours long (2nd class seats again!!) to the Oriental Pearl of Malaysia - Penang a small island off the west coast of Malaysia.... We are a little more prepared this time as we bought anti neck breaking pillows which strap to your head - I promise a photo will follow of this fine sight!!! Well the train journeys are not getting any better Mattys behavior on the train is gradually worsing by the hour!! I thought I'd seen him grumpy at his worst on flights however trains is a whole different ball game altogether!!!...

Jan 19, 2005 - Penang, Malaysia

I have left Thailand and I am now in Malaysia. I took me about thirteen hours to get from Koh Phangan to Penang. Three hours were on a boat and the rest was in a mini bus. I am in the Georgetown area of the island. My Budget hotel is in Chinatown. It is curtainly not up to Alison's standards but, I am willing to sacrifice A/C and cleanliness for $7.00 a night. I even have my own bathroom and cold shower! Today, I have been walking all over exploring Georgetown. I have managed to beat the heat by hydrating myself in air conditioned cafe's...

Dec 12, 2004 - The looking Glass...

Left Pulua Pangkor yesterday and headed north for Puala Penang, a large island metroplis at the northern edge of Malaysia. To get there I had to take a ferry to the mainland port of Lumut, then get on a bus for 3 hours to arrive in the port city of Butterworth and then take another ferry to Penang and the city of Georgetown. In Lumut, after buying my bus ticket I had a lovely interaction with some food vendors. One of them was a young guy who I found out was 21 and worked as a computer technician on the nearby Naval station. It was a bit...

Nov 30, 2004 - Georgetown Penang

I left the white sand beaches of Langkawi and took a ferry over to Penang. I met a couple of really interesting guys who are essentially professional travellers, one of whom has been to over 80 countries! Something to aim for I suppose. The 3 of us stayed at a guesthouse which was a converted colonial building and has loads of character, great pillars at the entrance and high ceilings. We spent the evening shopping (the guys stocked up on DVDs and computer software while I bought some nail varnish!) and had some great dim sum in China town....

Nov 21, 2004 - Colonial Penang

(Updated by: Giles) Saying good-bye to the Cameron Highlands and travelling by coach down through some amazing hilly rainforest scenery, we arrived in the (comparatively) sweltering heat of Georgetown, Penang by mid afternoon and were conveniently dropped off at....yep, the biggest shopping centre in Penang ! After the best shepherd's pie I have tasted in a long time, an exhibition of some rather macho/camp martial arts style dancing and a fruitless search for the tourist info, we did the typical backpackers thing and hailed a taxi ! ...

Nov 15, 2004 - Georgetown (Penang)

We decided that it must be the law that every bus journey you take in Malaysia must take six hours and must be extremely uncomfortable! We arrived in Georgetown in Penang in the early afternoon of the 13th. We were immediately a little disappointed as we had expected Penang to be a small quiet traditional island and Georgetown to be a small quaint town, but instead it was another huge, busy, noisy city! After checking into our adequate hotel our first stop was Pizza Hut! The best thing about large cities is that you'll always find a...

Nov 5, 2004 - Georgetown, Penang

The journey to Penang was pretty uneventful - a couple of hours on a boat with movies and refreshments - puts the British transport system to shame!! To be honest I slept most of the way - I seem to be becoming very adept at sleeping on public transport. As we arrived at the port, I saw a couple of English guys that Irecognised from out and about in Langkawi so I plucked up the courage to say 'Hi'. We ended up sharing a cab to the area where all the hostels are and staying at the same place which was really cool as I was so apprehensive...

Oct 21, 2004 - Penang

We have now mastered the art of traveling so set off for Penang armed with a loaf of bread, cheese slices, a bag of cheese and onion crisps and some orange juice! The bus didn't stop in the 8 hours journey so we made butties on the bus and got some very strange looks of our fellow travelers, but we think they were just envious! We arrived in Penang in the afternoon and decided to head straight for the beach. We stayed in Batu Ferraghi (foreigner's rock). It was nice but it was very touristy and was full of Brits and Australians, all the...

Sep 7, 2004 - Georgetown, Penang - Malaysia

Hey Yall... I'll be short this time as I am using computer at internet cafe to let yall know that Mark and I are OK! We left Kuala Lumpur for Georgetown, Penang. It is an island off the coast of Malaysia up north close to Thailand border. The island itself was OK with its own special attraction such as Snake Temple and Penang Hill not to mention a lot of food hawkers selling Malaysia's specialities as well as Indian or Chinese. We had a great time touring around the island today. We went to Snake Temple where pit vipers gathers and stay...

Sep 6, 2004 - Penang (Malaysia)

We booked our straight through trip from Koh Phi Phi to Penang with a a travel agent near to where we were staying, as it turns out we got a really good deal. The trip started off with us getting the oat for jsut over an hour to Krabi, there we transfered with no hassle into minibus, picked a few people up in Krabi on the way and then headed off to Hat Yai, one of bthe largest towns in Thailand and very close to the malaysian bordre, as per usual Thai standrards it was straight through, that had a 1 hour stop there why they switched vans...

Mar 25, 2004 - Running for the Boarder

katrina - chris and i are in penang malaysia. we took a bus down from krabi thailand to get a 60 day thai visa. we got on a bus at 9am, standing room only. it was supposed to be air conditioned. little did we know that that simply means "cold" air blows on you from tiny little vents overhead. if you don't have a seat, you can't feel the cool air. after about 2 hours of standing with a bunch of men sweating all over us, a seat was available. thank goodness. i forgot to wear my tennis shoes and my flip flopped feet were begining to really...

Jan 24, 2004 - Hello from Tanjung Tokong

Subject: Hello from Tanjung Tokong Hello: Well as many of you know we spent the last 5 weeks in Sydney and we really loved the location. It was difficult leaving a place that suited us so well. However everything in life moves on one way or another. The waiting for and the actual flight to Kuala Lumpur (capital city of Malaysia) was long but relatively uneventful. We arrived at midnight our time and were too tired to deal with hawksters trying to get us take their taxi or to their hotel. By Malaysian standards we got ripped off but by...