The world's steepest gondola

Langakwi has a lush jungle which covers most of the island. There is a series of  incredibly steep mountain ranges throughout the island. They seem to rise in a vertical manner straight from the forest floor. Given on average  it's upwards of 29°C with anywhere between 57,% to 90% humidity we decided to take the gondola to the top rather than slug it out on hiking tracks.

The gondola is in a bit of a ticky , tacky tourist park where they can up-sell packages and 3D movies, not for us. We took the basic ticket. It's not for the fainthearted. It takes about 10 minutes in the gongola to get to the top at 708 metres.  There are amazing views of Baru Bay and the marina below and all the way beyond Langkawi's islands to Thailand.

We saw otter fishing and feasting in a natural stream. There were lush waterfalls flowing across the jungle terrain .

I have to say it was incredibly high. Not having a great heads for heights I admired the skywalk between the two mountains from terra firma😊.

Hamizan took us to a remote beach in the north west corner of  the island, Tanjung Rhu. It was simply gorgeous and the sand was  'burn your feet' hot!

Hardly anyone there and crystal clear waters, breathtaking. Long boats lined up to take you out to exotic private beaches on the islands or across to Thailand from Malaysia. I did notice a Four Seasons hotel behind big fences....they have a  primo beachfront spot...luxe travellers take note 😊

Hamizan took us to Langakwi's one black sand beach, again we were the only ones there  apart from eagles flying high  up hunting for prey.

There was also a mangrove river inlet where you can take an 'eco' kayak tour. The mangroves are enormous, like trees. We had decided not to do the mangroves tour after weighing up some of the feedback about feedng the eagles meat for the tourists to  photograph and consequently  destroying the eagles natural  hunting behaviours. We enjoyed seeing the eagles flying naturally.

A bit more Langkawi 101 from our driver, Hamizan.
90% of Langakwi's residents are Malays. Other etnic grups are Thais, Chinese and Indians. Islam is practiced by Malaysians, other religions practised are Hinduism (mainly Indians), Buddhism (mainly Chinese and Thai) and small amount of Christians, mostly Chinese. Hamizan said everyone gets along, "there are no problems".

Hamizan took us to "No. 1 authentic laksa" place where the  locals eat.

What a great spot, rustic cafe, instant coconut drink while you wait.....so fresh.

It was so hot that we seemed to go between gorgeous locations outdoors and then had the relief of Hamizan's car AC,bliss. We noticed all the street cleaners  and gardeners we're out in the full sun, working hard and in the main they looked to be Indian, a tough life.

 There are great divides between the beach front resorts and the villages.

There are lots of ramshackle  unfinished buildings, the waft of 'eau de sewer' from open drains, little shaded street cafes on the road side for the itinertant  workers that keep the hotels and streets nice and then there is the strip alongside the beach with every imaginable blow up water device...ticky tacky ick, who buys this tip filler stuff?

Did I mention that the food and cocktails were great? Perfect way to end a day of exploring.

Langkawi 101

Langkawi had no public transport so rather than navigate the island by scooters we chose to hire a driver and car with AC.  

Great decision, our driver explained a lot about the island and it's history. According to folklore Langkawi's name comes from the Malay  word 'alang'-eagle and kawi - reddish brown, hence the eagle being the bird that greets visitors that arrive in the port  Kuah, the main municiple town for all the islands.  Others say Langakwi means many islands, take your pick.

Langkawi is approx 18 miles off the coast of mainland Malaysia in the Andaman Sea. It's in an archipelago of islands and you can go island hopping if you fancy. We could have nipped across to Phuket in 2 hours today from the Kuah port.

There are about 65,000 residents on Langkawi making it the most populated island and it serves the civil and administration function for all the islands.

Apparently it  was a sleepy backwater until 1987, when the island was granted tax-free status with the intention of promoting tourism and improving the lives of the islanders. Because of Langkawi’s tax-free status, alcohol is allegedly cheaper than in the rest of Malaysia. We went into a duty-free shop in Cenang which was doing a roaring trade but we were horrified by the price of wine. Whittaker's chocolate was on sale there, go Whittaker's 😊.

Love the labelling on products here

The food here is fantastic. We have eaten our way through green papaya salad, nasi lemak, pad Thai, black pepper prawns, cactus chicken, yellow noodle stir fry and thom yum to name a few. There are so  many flavours, Thai, Malaysian, Indian, Chinese and we even found a genuine French patisserie, yum!

At our breakfast spot yesterday, the barista had spent four years studying at Massey in Palmie Nth, the world is a village. It is  so hot you have to keep well hydrated. Today we discovered the best Singapore slings....better than in Singapore and half the price. The cocktail mixologist was from Singapore and he was good!

We loved visiting the little back water port where the fisherman moor up and mend their nets. 

Venice of Langakwi  😊

This fisherman had a big heart, he was so tender to all the cats, one was even playing under the net he was making.

There are so many beautiful birds and butterflies here. You also see monkeys on the side of the road or swinging in trees.

Our last stop with our driver was another little fishing backwater. Our driver said it was completely destroyed by the tsunami. He said he was working in a two story hotel just beside here and they got a phone call to say a Japanese tourist that was visiting a high sky walkway which has island harbour views started shouting tsunami, tsunami. Our driver  said  there is no word like this in Malay so at first they didn't understand. Then they had to run. The entire area was destroyed. He said they were all shocked. They have since installed a warning system out at sea.

Langkawi -panas panas panas hot, hot, hot

 Ok folks general blog disclaimer😊, typing on my phone in free wifi spots and photos are all from my phone so please forgive typos and grammer and you can  click/zoom in on pics 😊.

Up early on Friday morning to get the MRT out to Changi airport for flights to KL and Langkawi. No problem getting the exit row extra leg room seats on both flights...not many locals requesting them 😊 so two excellent flights for us. We sat for a long time on the runway and it wasn't until we turned onto the main runway and I  looked back and saw all the planes stacked up behind us that I  realised just what a busy airport Changi is. 

We flew over lush green islands to land in Langkawi and the heat hit us as soon as we stepped off the plane and walked across the tarmac. 

We are staying in Pentai Tengah, a small beach settlement. It's one beach on from Cenang Beach resort which has been a resort for 15+yrs. Cenang  has all the usual jetskis and paragliding, beach bungalows etc etc. It's a bit past it's prime and I'm glad we are in Pentai Tengah, still not too over developed.....yet. We were walking along and heard crashing in the trees overhead and looked up and saw a family of monkeys larking about. We can walk to Cenang in 10 mins so we really have the best of both spots.

Our hotel is set back from the main road that runs around the island so it's very quiet, yet 5mins walk to the beach. It has only 10 individual cottages/bure,  great AC and a wonderful pool which we use throughout the day. 

The local beach is lovely and far less cluttered with water craft than Cenang. The sea temperature was 30 degrees today...  it feels like a bath. You can stay in for hours. We then go back to our hotel for a cooler swim in our pool to chill down a bit.

Today we saw three fat toucan feasting on pawpaw in a tree by our pool. There are stunning butterflies all around. The jungle is so close as the residences/hotels are on a small strip between the sea, road and then......jungle.

 It's interesting to think about how long the traditional beach shacks can last.

 Just around the corner from us there is a huge Park Royal mega hotel under construction. Just further on another  high-rise hotel apartment complex.

At our little beach there is one fairly swanky beach front hotel that has a private beach, infinity pool, swim up bar etc, etc and we have enjoyed using their facilities by just wandering in, swimming and using the beach loungers....so far so good. 

Last day in Singapore

Having checked the weather forecast and seeing that rain and thunder was forecast around midday we set out early taking the metro from Chinatown to explore the beautiful botanic gardens.

The metro is super easy to use. The train carriages are not covered in graffiti and everything is so clean and tidy.

The Botanic Gardens are divine. We stumbled upon ladies doing a fan dance, so lovely. There are over 750,000 orchid specimens here and seeing is believing, they are spectaular. Apparently these are the most visited gardens globally with over 4 million visitors annually.

I always love to visit a museum whenever possible. Singapore National Museum is in a gorgeous building that was opened by Queen Victoria. It had great exhibits, a swanky brasserie and a brief case that caught my eye.

We then planned to visit the Petronas Towers and take the lift to the sky lobby and look at Singapore from above, however it was raining and I don't think we would have seen the city view very well.  Instead we explored the Marina 1 complex which was incredible, plus it  had  great air conditioning and free Wi-Fi which we took advantage of.

The Marina Bay complex is over 400,000 square meters and is a mix of business, apartments and entertainment. It has over 350 trees and recycles rain water and has rain curtains, really incredible architecture and design. Lots of development underway in the Marina area.

By now we were getting a bit tired so jumped back on the metro to Orchard Rd to see the retail worshippers. There's a lot of wealth in this town that's for sure. We ended our day at the other end of the spectrum,   the land of designer brands.