Langkawi literally translated means “strong eagle”

 We’ve been rather busy this past week, preparing the boat, ourselves and other bits and pieces that keep cropping up for our tour inland.

    We have now got our backpacks sorted after much tooing and froing between the various luggage stores, trying to get the best price and comparing the qualities and all the features they have etc etc. Didn’t realize there was so much to consider, and despite what you read about haggling with the prices here in Asia, we have come to the conclusion that they don’t!! There are not the bargains here that used to be. Anyway, John has the big one and will also be carrying the bum bag & I’ve got two smaller ones, that I will be wearing front & back. We still can’t really agree on what to pack and I guess it will be trial and error as we go.

    We have also been to the dentist a couple of times since arriving and had a check-up, clean and polish initially and since then have both been back for some repair work. The dentist is a no-nonsense lady and believe it or not, but her name is Dr Chew (no joke!). You either have pain or you don’t, there is no middle ground. I had a filling that had to be redone and I needed three needles, after she gave them it was back out to the waiting room while another patient fills the chair, this time it was John. It’s much cheaper than Oz and we will get further work done while over here.

 Our main mode of transport whilst visiting Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand on the land has been a motorbike, which we’ve used to visit a lot of the sights as well as getting to and from the shops, traditional markets for fruit and vegies and also the service stations for fuel. This past week has been no different, and we did a fuel run, as John wanted to fill the two main tanks with diesel before hauling out so no moisture would form inside the tanks and cause a bug to grow which could contaminate the fuel. This entailed several trips to the servo with a 20L drum between John’s legs and another one on my lap between us. Must have been a sight judging by some of the looks we got. The buying of fuel is always challenging over here.  We have also seen some interesting things being carried on motorbikes  ie:  crates of chickens, piles of market produce, and not to mention Mum, Dad and 2-3 kids. What we saved in getting the fuel this way rather than at one of the fuel barges more than paid for the week’s hire of the motorbike.

Motorbike hire for 1 week was RM 100 (AU$ 33). Diesel over here is RM 1.80/L (Au$ 0.60c/L).



Chicken tonight?





or would you prefer Beef? Horns are optional

Most of our fresh fruit and vegies as well as prawns, chicken and pork (in Thailand only) as Malaysia is predominantly Muslim (say no more), has been purchased from the local traditional markets and these are amazing places to visit. For those of you not accustomed to these sort of markets the sights and smells are overwhelming and not easily forgotten. There is no fancy packaged goods in nice polystyrene trays with plastic wrap. Everything is freshly killed and you just tell them what you want and they slice it off the beast or chop up the chicken.

Plenty of vegetables at the markets – it’s just knowing how to cook some of it.

 I have a much better idea since doing a cooking course in Thailand and all the green stuff isn’t such a mystery now!

Cheers and beers (or in this case margeritas)

J and J