As we left Koh Phangan a massive rain storm had just rolled in soaking us, we got on the boat and hoped it wouldn't make the ferry crossing too rocky. It wasn't and we got back onto the mainland within three hours only to be greeted by the sideways rain. We headed towards two coaches parked up near the ferry and hoped one of them was ours. Nope, our coach was 20 metres to the right of the others! Only another 60 seconds away but we still got soaked, even with coats on! 
 
This coach was just the next leg of our journey to take us to the train station, from there we were due to get a sleeper train all the way to Penang. So we got to the train station about 9pm and already knew our train wasn't due to leave until 1am so were prepared for a long wait but the next 24 hours which ensued certainly wasn't expected. 
 
We quickly realised after finding a place for some food that a lot of people were waiting for delayed trains or even worse rescheduled cancelled trains! This did not sound good and when I went and checked our train, sure enough the train was delayed until 4am! Wow... that’s pretty delayed! So we waited in a surprisingly lovely café until they chucked us out at 12 and then all we could do was sit on the platform. We waited and waited and waited, eventually the train turns up at around 5am so we thought at least we can go and sleep for a bit on the train now thank god. An hour later, after getting no sleep whatsoever as it was freezing, a guard comes around telling us we need to get off. WHAT!? Seriously, WHAT!? I was fuming... but what could you do!?
 
As it transpires the railway ahead of us was flooded so we got shoved on a bus which would take us to another station 2 hours away where we could pick up another train. This bus was very uncomfortable and had no a/c so there really was no chance of sleeping. We arrived at this new station and thankfully there was a train waiting for us right at the station, amazing! We thought we'd have to wait for hours on the platform again. So we got on and took our seats, no beds allowed at this time of day apparently. Just as we were getting comfortable and dozing off half an hour into the journey, the guard comes round again and people start getting off. At first we just thought it was a normal stop until we realised everyone was getting off! My heart sank. We were getting on ANOTHER coach.... sigh. Apparently there weren't enough people on the train to make it worth while for the train to carry on further South....despite the fact it looked pretty busy to us! 
 
The bus would take us to the Malaysian border... woohooo. Well that was one thing because our Thai visa's expired that day! We waited outside the station, in the heat of the day, waiting for our bus to turn up. Eventually it does about an hour later and by this point we were both so tired we were kind of delirious and past the point of caring. At least the coach had air conditioning even if we didn't manage to get any sleep. So after another few hours we reached the border and this is where it got silly. We got off our coach with all our luggage and got stamped out of Thailand, we then walked into no-mans land where we put our bags on a new coach and took our seats. The only thing was, this bus was a single decker and we'd just got off a double decker! Obviously there weren't enough seats for everyone! There was somehow much confusion about this and there was at least 30 mins of faffing. Once most people had piled back on it became clear two people were missing. We waited for another 10 minutes but after searching for them the bus left left anyway. Ha! Eventually we moved on for a 2 minute journey to the Malaysian passport control, got off with our bags...again, waited to get a stamp in our passport, lugged our bags into Malaysia and put them back on the bus...again! There must be an easier way than this!
 
Eventually the bus got into Butterworth which is the city next to Penang island. We caught the boat across and an hour later we finally got to go to bed after about 30 hrs of no sleep!
 
So after a well earned sleep we headed out into the heat of Penang. That first day was mostly spent on part of the heritage walk, taking in a lot of the old buildings and churches. Some were really run down but others were better, it was interesting to think of how it all must've looked many many years ago. As we were still pretty shattered from our epic journey we had an early dinner at a hawker centre (a food court) and got an early night. Its worth telling you all here that Penang is the culinary capital of Malaysia apparently so we were very excited to be here. Unfortunately my first experience was one of the worst meals I've ever had. I ended up chucking it and grabbing a subway sandwich on the way back to the hotel. 
The next 2 days were more of the same we looked around the museum and a lovely restored mansion (the guy who built it was Cheong Fatt Tze if you're interested) , saw the war memorial next to the sea and had a look around little India which was just like India except without all the rubbish and noise, eat a few nicer meals but not spectacular and generally took in the architecture around us. Overall not the best place we've been too but I think we may have expected a bit too much from Penang, or perhaps we weren't looking in the right places!