Malaysian Madness

Well we made it in a day from Ko Lanta and got there in good time to have a nice tandoori set and lassi's before we went to bed! Job done! This was our smoothest border crossing yet and resulted in our last bit of Thai haggling in Hat Yai when we bought our bus ticket to Penang which was all good fun and highly successful after they tried to rip us off massively! Last chance I guess!

Competitior for Lindley Clock Tower

Our first sight of Penang was from the car ferry and it was the first time we'd seen a skyline for a while featuring skyscrapers (well 4 or 5 anyway!)...very exciting and we were both ready for the challenges of a new country! We didn't realise how close Penang was to the epi-centre of the earthquake in Sumatra but they were really lucky and hardly got affected at all! Our first impression of Penang was loving it - it's a real multi-cultural island with people of all colours, backgrounds and religions living together quite happily! There's Chinatown and Little India, a funky modern business district and old colonial buildings representing it's colourful history and the English influence from way back in the day! On top of this, the countryside further afield is beautiful, it has the biggest buddhist temple in Malaysia and top notch beaches to match! It even has a clock tower that comes close to beating Lindley Clock Tower....but not quite!

Georgetown coastline!

The 'Oasis Hotel' where we stayed was as colourful as the rest of the island and we definitely had the noisiest room! We were met by the proprietor, sat there with his belly out drinking Californian Shiraz - oh to be a guesthouse owner eh??? Alcohol in Malaysia is expensive compared to the rest of Asia so we assumed he must be doing alright for himself! It's reduced our beer intake for a while anyway!

We had a fun time going out to the Lek Lok Si Temple - on the way there we saw a couple of accidents and a mini-van reversed into our windscreen. On the way back, the driver took a corner and the suspension went followed by a very heated discussion between the driver and an elderly passenger when the bell didn't work for him and the driver sailed past his stop!!! Highly amusing!

Lanterns!

So our first impressions of Malaysia...great people, great food and mad driving!!

Ready, aim, fire!!!!

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