Malaysia: Langkawi's Gondola Ride, Skybridge & Beach

Today we spent the day in Langkawi, Malaysia.  We got ready for the day and departed the ship as soon as we could.  As we were walking out, we bumped into Randy and Alesha Jones and their family.  We asked them what the were doing today, and they said they were going up to the skywalk and then the beach.  Sine our plans were the same, we decided we would share a taxi together.  We got off the bus and were swarmed by taxi driver.  Every single person we walked by tried to convince us to go with them.  We found a guy who was trying to get us to hire him for the day and he would take us anywhere we wanted and wait for us, then bring us back before the ship departed.  I really wanted to go to the beach and Kevin wanted to make it a short day, so I pushed for the all day taxi.  If we were with another family, and they wanted to go to the beach, then it was more likely Kevin would agree.  I'm so slick!  Lol.  So we hired the driver.

Our first stop was the Oriental Village were the Skycab Gondola's were located.  We walked through the village to the gondolas.  We bought our tickets for a private glass bottom gondola on Klook, so we redeemed our tickets and walked right in.  The wait was a little longer, only because the glass bottom gondolas were only one every twenty or so.  The Jones were in front of us, so they got the first glass bottom and we waited a while longer for the next one.

We got on and enjoyed the view.  The Langkawi Skycab is the tallest gondola in the world, with the steepest grade.  The kids had so much fun looking out the window and seeing the mountains and the ocean.

We got to the top of the mountain and got off our gondola.  There are two options to get to the skywalk, the first is a tram that takes you down the mountain to the bridge, and the second is stairs.  The line to the tram was long, so we decided to walk the stairs.  It was a short and beautiful hike down 346 stairs.  Little A and M&M counted every stair, it was a great way to distract them from the climb down.

We got to the skybridge and walked around.  Poor Kevin is quite uncomfortable with heights, so we had to do a lot of convincing to get him out on the bridge.  The view was so incredible.  The mountains and the ocean and all around was just so pretty.  There were a few places on the bridge were the ground was glass, so you could see all the way down.  Kevin and Little A avoided those spots.  We got to the end of the bridge and heard the yells and screams of monkeys, so for the mental health of Little A, we decided to turn around about 10 feet until we reached the end and the monkeys.   There were signs everywhere saying don't feed the monkeys.

As we were making our way to the other side of the bridge, we saw Alesha and asked her to take a family picture for us.  She knew Kevin didn't like heights, so she kept telling us to back up and she took a long time.  Kevin was gripping my hand so hard, and when he finally realized what Alesha was doing, he laughs and yells, I hate you Alesha.  We all laugh, and she takes a picture.  After the picture, Kevin and Little A makes a bee line to the end of the bridge back to the stairs.

We made our way back to the top where the gondolas are waiting to take us back down the mountain.  All the kids are pretty tired, so we get them all some popsicles to re-charge their batteries and get back in the gondola.

It's past lunch time, and all the kids are beginning to loose it, so we stay in the Oriental Village to grab some lunch.  Our kids found a Subway, so we keep it on the boring, non-adventurous American side and just got them that. The Jones are more adventurous and ate at the large food court.

We get back in the Taxi and are on our way to the beach.  Langkawi beaches are supposed to be top ten in the world, so I am excited to get to a clean beach.  The beach has great white sand and the waves are perfect for the kids.  We rented a chair, dumped our stuff and all got in the water.  The kids alternated from swimming in the ocean and playing in the sand.

The kids enjoyed finding little crabs and starfish in the sand.  The sand was super hot, but as long as it was wet, it wasn't burning them.  Luckily the Jones' brought sand toys, so the kids had plenty to play with.

After being at the beach about an hour, Little Monster is so excited to see Rhett running down the beach towards him.  The Rust and Schwartz's ended up picking the same beach we were at!  All the kids are so excited to see friends.  Going places with friends make it a million times better with kids.

All of us adults have a great time too.  We all talk and swim in the ocean.  It was so nice to spend a few hours in the hot sun at a beautiful beach with great friends.

Malaysia: Georgetown's Kek Lok Si Temple & Penang Street Art

On day 3 of the cruise, we ported in Penang Malaysia, and stole an opportunity to enjoy a moment with just the adults. As any parent can attest, a moment where you can steal away without crying, mandatory requests every hour for snacks, sudden bathroom emergencies and meltdowns, is worth it's weight in gold, and this experience was just that. We teamed our small day trip here with Mica Foster, who just retired from the Navy, the Rusts, and the Schwartz's.

We started our day by securing our driver, and started our day first at the Kek Lok Si Temple in Air Itam, Penang. This is the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia.

As we arrived I didn't fully appreciate before the 7 story Pagoda of Rama VI (which is translated at the Pagoda of 10,000 Buddhas). Now to be honest, we didn't see 10,000 Buddhas, but we did see the most breath taking grounds of beautiful flowers, accenting colors, and deep red lantern lined walk ways. The walls were carefully carved with Buddhist writings, which I don't know what they mean, but it seemed to me to simply be a carving machine stuck on repeat.

Now of note, you see also in Asia that there is always as blend of cultures, since most of these countries undergo transitions of rule from a certain flavor of one ruling body to another. The large seven story pagoda of Ban Po Thar (the really large edifice in the back) is actually a combination of both a octagonal base with Chinese influence, with a middle tier of Thai influenced design, and then a Burmese crown on the top (the spiral dome). It's supposed to be a representation of the blend of both Mahayana and Theraveda Buddhism.

As you tour Asia it's easy to see that most of the religious edifices are found are usually on mountain tops, which in Christianity is common as well in scripture. As we left the grounds and pagoda we went up the small mountain on a tram (thankful for that) and then went to what I completely missed in our planning, the 120 foot tall Bronze statue of Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy, surrounded by a 200 foot tall pavilion.

The literal translation of Kek Lok Is is the "Heavenly Temple" or the "Pure Land Temple" or the "Temple of Supreme Bliss." I translate it simply as the Temple of Heather. This temple has been around since 1905, the location was originally chosen because it faced the sea, and is built on what was called them the "crane mountain." The area was beautiful, and helped up appreciate that no matter where we go mankind tries to reach to their maker for connection. Glad to know how easy that process can be through prayer and modern revelation.

At this point we needed to get back to grab the kids, so the the guys in the group went back to retrieve the young ones while Heather and the girls did one last stop, the Penang Street Art!

PENANG STREET ART

In 2012 Penang's municipal council hired London-trained Lithuanian artist Ernest Zacharevic to breath new life into the Chinese shop-houses around the inner city of Penang. He took on the task, focusing primarily on the 4 most popular streets of Jalan Penang, Muntri Street, Weld Quay, and Lebuh Leith streets.

The city art was incredible, highlighting beautiful little shops, lined by unique art of real motorcycles and bikes that are attached to the walls lined by paintings.

Heather, Holly and Corianne loved finding the art around the streets.  Some of their favorites were the kids on the bike, where Heather got swept away.  They also loved the motorcycle.  It was so neat, because the motorcycle was in the wall.

Heather was able to have lunch with the local wall art children and all the girls enjoyed playing on a swings with kids. The art was beautiful and very realistic.

After a afternoon of fun, all the ladies felt extremely guilty that they had left their husbands to take care of the kids (right...) and then came back to the ship to enjoy the rest of the afternoon in the pool and hot tub with the families.

We then ended the night by getting together for a late dinner with our peeps on the cruise, the Rusts, Jones, Schwartz, Strommer, and Mica, another stolen moment without kids. It was an amazing day!

-Kevin

Malaysia: Kuala Lumpur's Batu Caves and Templar Park

Batu Caves:
After the Blue Mosque we ended up going to the Batu Caves. Previously my surgical assistant went here with his girlfriend, and when Heather and I saw the huge gigantic golden Hindu God we just had to go.

Batu Caves is tricky. It's really a limestone hill that has a series of caves and cave temples in Gombak, Selangor. Batu means "stone river," and is really a Tamil Shrine dedicated to Lord Murugan, which I guess is the 10th cave for this Lord guy (6 shines are in India, and 4 are in Malaysia). He's got some property I guess. It's supposed to be 400 million years old, and is super well known among the natives as the place they hold their Thaipusam Festival, which occurs in the Tamil month of Thai (late January/Early February).

There are 272 steps up to the top, representing your ascent up the veil of Lord Murugan. Lame, but the fun part is that there is also 272 monkeys that are willing to steal your food, jump on your bags, steal your drinks, and make your kids get prompt appointments with mental health therapists after being attacked multiple times by hissing stupid disease infested beasts that have been trained to be super aggressive in stealing whatever they can from kids. My philosophy on this tactic is simple: I believe they are a super force from Lord Murugan himself to employ a vermin army of idiot monkeys who exist to suck happiness out of your children all in a ploy to bring chaos into your family.

You had to have been here to really appreciate these moments, but bottom line, ask Little A about a monkey and watch the twitches. So I got some good batting practice in this morning as I vowed to teach them a lesson...

So what did we do next? We walked up the beautiful stairway to get attacked by monkeys again. We reached the top of the stairways with crying kids to be attacked again by monkeys. We enjoyed a random multi-colored temple surrounded by cheeky monkeys and promptly went down the stairs to only be attacked by monkeys again. Poor Little A was crying the entire walk down the stairs.

Sadly, Little A got the brunt of the pouncing vermin. The recipe was simple: she was burdened with carrying Monsters little floaty of power we were going to be using later at Templar Park, and due to the brilliant pink color, it became a magnet to cheeky monkeys. Her face says it all..."stupid monkeys."

We promptly left after the 5th attack and I shepherded my little flock out of harms way only to retreat away from Lord Murugan's jumping monkey army. Wicked Witch of the West, I have a perfect match for you...

Templar Park:
Needless to say I was a little jaded by this point, and surprise, on the schedule again was our last stop on this hot, blue shrouded, cheeky monkey attacking day, a waterfall. It required a little hike to get too, but we went to the a location in Templar park where there was some waterfalls to relax in. The bathrooms were gross as always, but the highlight was that we found some shade and trees to only once again be stalked by monkeys.

We bought some slingshots at the bottom of the hill prior to going up and sure enough you merely held them up and behold, it was their kryponite! I found my protection!

We let the kids play and Tyler and I held back under the shade. Monster was enjoying the water, but eventually got cold so I brought him out and warmed him up.

I gave the Monster a Ritz cracker, only to turn around to pack them back in the bag when I heard a blood curdling scream from him. I turned around only to find no cracker, a freaked out little Monster in the glory of a three year old breath hold, and a retreating stupid cheeky monkey making off with his uneaten ritz cracker that he stole right out of Monster's hand.  I don't even know what to say to this...but can you picture what this must have been like for Monster? Sudden steal of his precious Ritz from a furry vermin sneak attack that is his own size and out of left field? Poor dude. So I was done...

We packed up, we left and back to the safety of a monkey free cruise ship. Darn you Lord Muragan...
-Kevin

This is Heather, and I thought Templar Park was so fun.  All the kids loved playing and splashing in the waterfall.  They had a blast going directly under the waterfall.  Little Monster loved the water and he loved splashing, he especially loved splashing me.  He would laugh and then splash me again.  He thought it was so funny because I didn't have a swim suit on.

When we told the kids it was time to go, it took forever to get them out.  They were having so much fun and they really loved being in the cold water after walking around the Batu Caves.  I was so glad they loved the park and the waterfall.  Since we had the slingshot, we didn't get bugged by monkeys while in the water.  Anytime a kid would see a monkey close, they would yell a monkey warning and aim the slingshot, then the monkey would take off.  So the slingshot really was a great monkey defender.  We never even put any ammo in the sling shot.  All we would do is aim and pull the rubber band back, and the monkey would take off.  It was a little trick I learned while in Bali.