A Big Adventure

(this happened on 30th December 2010 in Langkawi, Malaysia)

Eagle at the Mangrove Swap Langkawi, Malaysia

We walked off the ship at about 10:00am. The taxi’s lined up on the port only seemed willing to take us on a tour of the Island, so the two of us wanting a one way trip to Kaur were ignored.

So we set off to walk out of the port a short five minute walk, at the port gate were more taxi’s lined up. We were charged Rm28 (£5) for the journey.

Kaur failed to entrance us, it’s nothing special, so after a short walk we gave up and got a taxi to take us on a tour! (I guess the taxi’s at the port had a point).

Our driver first headed to the mangrove swamp.

I have seen mangrove swap before so i was not expecting much, we were dropped at the car park and paid for a one hour trip a whopping Rm250 (£50). We were put in  boat with a very knowledgable and friendly young guy who knew for sure that he had a great job.

He whisked us over the water in this beautiful area (don’t think swamp, think beautiful waterway) to an area where the Eagles feed, (Langkawi is famous for them) there were ten or more eagles flying around so it was quite stunning, although apparently the birds that come here are doing so because they know they get fed by the boats and are eating chicken skins that have been thrown from the boats over many years and so they have become lazy about hunting and apparently they are suffering from heart issues due to the fatty diet. Very sad, but they did look stunning flying free and swooping down to feed.

Our boat man showed us the old charcoal works, now closed as it would appear they realise that the mangrove is important to the island as a barrier against tsunami’s and also of course as a great draw for tourists.

Malaysia seems to be waking up to the possibilities that tourism brings.

We were also taken to see a floating fish farm, Sofia was not too sure about getting out of the boat onto the floating deck so stayed put. We then went for a further tour in the water heading out past a small island and some beautiful looking beaches. It was an expensive tour but next time we would stump up the money for a longer tour.

The taxi driver then promised us a beautiful water fall and took us to a place called Hutan Lipur Durian Perangin quite simply a disgrace that only Malaysia seems able to consider suitable to show people. If broken down unusable paths and bridges and plain and simple disgusting toilets are what are suitable for tourists on whats supposed to be the most upmarket Malaysian holiday Island. If you want to read more about Hutan Lipur check out this old post            http://worldtravelgapyear.com/travel/malaysia-travel/malaysia-needs-a-tourism-guru

Back to the taxi and we asked the driver to take us to a place we could do some shopping and then onto a nice beach.

I guess he misunderstood and took us to a tourist shop called Atma Alam Batik Art Village, actually this was a lucky break as unlike so many tourist shops around the world, this one was full of quality products with very few pieces of tat.

It was very interesting and completely changed our feelings about the seeming lack of culture in Malaysia, there was some stunning pieces there that we would have liked to buy.

After that we headed to the beach at Puntai Cepang a very nice swoosh of pure white powder with lots of life all around it. A lovely place that looks well worth a longer visit.

Time was moving on so with a afternoon thunderstorm starting we headed back to the ship.