Kuala Lumpur We decided when we woke up on 1st March that we would go to Kuala Lumpur that day, so left Singapore about lunchtime. We got a bus into Malaysia which cost the equivalent of £1.20 - that's the same price as getting the bus from Welcombe Avenue to Cavendish Square!! When we arrived in Malaysia we had to find a bus to Kuala Lumpur, and got duped into getting a luxury bus as the blokes selling tickets are so intense and start trying to get your custom straight away. Because of this the bus was more expensive than we thought it would be, but had massive reclining seats that were as big as armchairs. This is something we are going to have to get used to in Asia - we were swept along so quickly we forgot to haggle! It took us 6 hours to get to Kuala Lumpur so it was dark when we arrived. Our hostel was in Chinatown which made it quite easy to find, but it was pretty minging. This taught us our second lesson in Asia. First was don't be persuaded to buy something from the first person you see, the second is to look at your room and bathroom before you pay! We actually knew about these rules but were too knackered to think properly at the time! It is fair to say that we hated Kuala Lumpur. If we could sum it up in two words they would be grubby and noisy. The paint is coming off all the buildings so they are all a grey colour, there is rubbish everywhere and homeless people asleep all over the place. It is so busy and everything moves at 100mph. Cars are constantly beeping and the mopeds ride on the pavement if there is no space on the road, and there is a huge mosque in the middle of town that has speakers to shout out the prayers. The best thing about it was the food. We ate in Chinatown both nights, and the second nights meal was our favourite. It was a sort of Chinese style fondue - you selected skewers with veg or meat on, then steamed them in the metal bucket of gas heated water on your table. Between us we had 13 skewers of food, plus 4 cokes, which came to 38RM (under £8). We have been so impressed with the cheapness of things that you may see a lot of pricing information in this blog!! Apart from looking around the markets there wasn't that much to do in KL so we only decided to stay one day. The next morning we got up really early and all along the street people were sat on the floor selling all sorts of stuff. As we have spent a lot it made us wonder how much we could make if we started selling off some of our stuff! Cherating. It took us 8 hours to get from KL to Cherating - first by tube, then coach to a place called Kuantan, then a local bus to the tiny fishing village of Cherating. The local bus was our first foray into foreign transport - it was falling to bits, packed, boiling hot, and everyone on it seemed to fall asleep! The first thing we had to do when we arrived was find somewhere to stay. We chose a little wooden hut on stilts that cost 20RM (£4) a night! In the daytime it seemed really quaint, but at night being outside gave us the fright of our life at first when all the nocturnal animals came alive and started making the strangest, loudest noises! Now we can see why Sinita screamed so much on I'm a Celebrity! Cherating is really small, just basically one street and a beach. It is really rural - you are sharing a pavement with cows, chickens, goats and stray cats! On our first night we went to one of the only eating establishments, which again was super cheap. So cheap in fact that Hickey ended up ordering 2 main meals!! The flavours of the Malaysian food was so good that we went back to the same place on our second night as well! The only full day we had there was spent on the beach. After about half an hour a bloke from Malaysia came up to us with his wife and daughter, and was so interested in how we got here, where we had been, where we were going etc. and wanted to be our friend. Bless him he wouldn't leave us alone, and kept saying things that he liked that he knew we would know - "I like Madonna, I like Michael Jackson, I like Mr Bean!" and kept complimenting us - "you are handsome, you are pretty"! He also very helpfully wrote us a list of Thai words and the Malaysian translations, but when we asked what they meant in English he said he didn't know!! It is very strange here as everyone I so happy to see you. A little boy ran up to us and gave us both a massive hug on our way to the beach - very sweet. The next day were were planning on going to the Perhentian Islands so decided to have a pretty early night, but stayed up talking to the lads in the hut opposite until about midnight! Perhentian Islands.
We left Cherating at 8:30 in the morning and were on the bus for 6hours. When we got to Jerteh a bloke was on us straight away asking if we needed a taxi to Kuala Besut, which we did. Learning from our earlier experiences we haggled with him and managed to halve the price he originally offered - well done us! The boat over the the Perhentian Islands was a small speedboat and was loads of fun - we were going so fast we were jumping off the waves left, right and centre!

Again we hadn't booked any accommodation so that was our first job. The boat dropped us at Coral Beach but the taxi driver said that Long Beach was the best beach so we headed there. It seemed a really long walk what with the heat and wearing our backpacks, but it paid off as we stayed at a wooden villa right on the beach front called Oh-la-la for 25RM a night (£5!) It has amazing views of the beach and the owner is really cool and chilled out and hippyish - he didn't take down any of our details and just told us to give him the money when we left.

On our first evening we just checked out the beach, which took about 10 minutes as it is basically a beach with all the shops and eateries along the beach front. We had a pretty early night even though there was a live band on in the bar next door followed by some awesome tunage, but we decided to be good.

The next day we were up early and headed straight to the beach for a swim after brekkie. The beach is amazing, is all white sand and bright blue sea that you can be in until you can't touch the bottom and still see all the way down to the sand. We thought we were being really good and appplying enough sunscreen, but the sun is so strong we ended up getting really burnt. Lorry in particular was really burnt and had a touch of sunstroke that evening, and could only stay in bed while Hickey was a billy-no-mates and had dinner on his own.

The food here is amazing and there are lots of places to chose from to eat. As it is a tourist destination they sell a lot of western food, but we have been sticking to the Malaysian food as the spices and flavours they use are immense. Our favourite dish was the mee hoon vegetable curry soup which we had quite a few times! Mmmmm! We have timed our visit perfectly as the tourist season hasn't quite started yet so the island is still quite quiet. Hickey went for a swim every morning and on some occasions he was the only person in the whole sea!

We were originally planning on going to Thailand for the full moon on 8th March but it would have been to much of a rush to get there, so we celebrated on Perhentian Islands instead and had a big party at our villa. We had been told all week about this drink called "Monkey Juice", a rum that everyone on the island drinks, so we decided to get involved. It said at the bar it was 20RM, which we thought was just for a glass (Malaysia is a Muslim country so the drinks are usually expensive because of the big tax on alcohol), but they hand you over the whole bottle! 5 bottles later and we were pretty drunk!

We ended up at a place called Monkey Bar where they played some really good tunes. We must have made quite an impression on the dance floor as the next day loads of people were coming up to us saying how much they loved our dancing!

The next night was supposed to be our last night, and we started with good intentions, both ordering a coke at the new bar Black Tip which was having an opening party. The bar was really cool - a wooden hut on the beach with a big dance floor, wooden seating and candles on the beach, fire poles at the entrance with fire poi and fire spitting for entertainment. Peer pressure and the good tunes proved to hard to resist - we ended up getting the rent money back off the landlord and stayed out until 4am, eventually stumbling home without our flip flops.

So we decided to stay another 2 days, and spent them chilling on the beach and eating the lush local food, making the most of the island as this really has felt like paradise. We would definitely love to return one day.