Hello everybody or 'Helo' as they say here..... Yeah the same we know :o)

It was a 9 hour trip down from Hat Yai, Thailand to here Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Once again the bus broke down but only for 15 minutes so it wasn't that bad. We had a 24 Seater VIP coach so it was very comfy and loads of leg room... George was in his element!

Well they say the Thai people are some of the friendliest people in the world. We say the Malay's are far friendlier. Yes the Thai's are nice but most of them do only want one thing, your money. You can strike up a conversation with a Malay person and it won't end up in us handing money over, lovely! Don't get us wrong, we loved Thailand to bits but are really enjoying our first experience of Malaysia.

We have picked a great location to stay. There are two main sections of the city centre, China town and the Golden Triangle area. We're slap bang in the middle of both of them so we're really pleased. The Malay's say and so does Lonely Planet that its easier to bus or taxi everywhere as most of the sites are too far to walk. You must be kidding; we walk everywhere and its fine so not sure what they're on about. The Manager of our Hotel even said you can't walk to the Petronas Towers as it's very hard to navigate the streets and too far to walk. We reckon the Malay's don't walk anywhere cos it only took us 30 minutes and was very easy to find.

We arrived here from Thailand very late so we did nothing the first night we got here. The next day we headed straight for the Petronas Towers, one of the main reasons for coming here. Once we arrived it was breath taking. They're apparently the world’s tallest 'Twin' towers now. The photos, once again don't do it justice. They're a lot taller in real life. Also they're a piece of art. Absolutely beautiful to look at, for a man-made structure anyway! We went inside to go up to the Sky Bridge which is free, nice one! It was a 6 hour wait and very limited tickets so luckily for us there was a huge and gorgeous shopping mall. So we had some lunch and did some very serious 'window' shopping. It was really good seeing as we had come from Ko Phangan just a few days before which are just beaches and villages, completely the opposite from here. So it was just nice to be back in a major city. It came to our time to go up to the Sky Bridge. It's very well done with a very large screen presentation first. Then you’re taken up a fast lift to the 41st floor (the Towers are 88-floors high). It was a really clear day so great views were to be had and yes, the people looked like little ants from up there :o) It was a great day and a great start to Malaysia.

The next day we decided to go to the Kuala Lumpur Tower. It stands at over 200 metres high and you are allowed to go the top, just! They were higher views than from the Petronas Towers and also here you can look a whole 360 around the city. The telescopes are free of charge which was good. You can see in the photos we took of the Hard Rock Cafe how good they were. Which we also decided to go to afterwards for a nice fat lunch, very bloody yummy! But the best news of all is that today, George got over his fear of heights. So we were very proud, ahh! Also today we managed to squeeze in a trip on the Sky Train which was cool.

The following day we packed in a lot. We went into the heart of China Town and to a street market. There was also a really cool pet shop full of puppies and kittens, so sweet. We then headed back to the shopping mall under the Petronas Towers where there is a Discovery Centre. For a few quid you get to go into a load of themed rooms full of interactive stuff. It was really good fun with lots of things to do. Some were meant for kids but we didn't care, it was fun :o) The 'Speed' section was the best with lots of things that test your reactions, strengths and weak points. The heart beat machine, where an actual drum beats to the sound of your heart was really cool and quite strange at the same time. It was interesting to do a load of interactive stuff that involved a lot of jumping, throwing etc and then go back onto the heart drum machine and see how it was so much faster. We couldn't get it to flat-line though! One thing was really weird. It was a mind game where you strap these metal pads to you head and by the power of your mind, try to move this small ball into your opponents goal. Darren of course won as always, yay! We're still not sure though if it was for real but very good either way. After all the fun including the weird mind stuff, we went outside to look at the Petronas Towers at night. Stunning was the word and we just sat there for a while and just stared at them and appreciated what man can achieve in just 5 years.

Next day we headed the other way from the city centre, into a large Lake Park with lots of museums and greenery and smaller parks inside. We were going to do some museums today but we spent so long at this Butterfly Park that we ran out of time. The Butterfly Park was done very well though and was really pleasant to just stroll around in. Very pretty and yes we do know we're old before our time. But who cares, it was very nice :o) We had a nice ice-cream lunch in the bird zoo before walking around and watching the wild monkeys (no caged ones here) just running around, making a right mess of the public bins and then running off with they're prizes. The baby ones were well cute :o) Later on in the evening we went to Planet Hollywood for dinner. It was very nice but do have to say that the one in 'Downtown Disney' in Florida beats it hands down, sorry!

At the weekend we went back, again to the shopping mall at the Petronas Towers to 'Aquaria' which is of course is a large indoor aquarium. It was very well done again but could have been a bit bigger as we done it in an hour and a half. Did a bit more window shopping as it's very lovely here before heading back to our hotel. In the evening we went back to the main street market in China town which was full copy everything and a lot of fun. Managed to get a few things, sometimes at a quarter of the original asking price. After nearly 3 months in South East Asia we're bloody good at haggling now :o) We also went to Times Square the following day which is a massive shopping complex and believe it or not had a rollercoaster running straight through the middle of it. We prefer the mall at the bottom of the Petronas Towers as Times Square is no where near as nice and is far too big.

That’s it..... Tomorrow we leave here for Penang. We will be staying in the main city, Georgetown. We've already brought the Lonely Planet book for New Zealand as it was a good deal. Because of how much more expensive New Zealand is compared to anywhere in South East Asia, we might be staying here in Malaysia for an extra week and losing a week in New Zealand to save on cash as we want to (after reading about it and speaking to other travelers we've met) hire a campervan and tour the South Island properly. People say it's the best thing to do and your view is where ever you park up. But at the moment we'll enjoy Malaysia.

We'll update soon,

Lots of love Darren and Gemma xxx xxx (and George xxx)