Day 84 – Singapore to Kuala Lumpur.

6.30 alarm as I needed to be up and out to find a taxi to take me to the Golden Mile Complex as this is where my bus was leaving from at 8am. Everything went according to plan, the taxi only took about 10minutes and cost me a couple of quid, bargain. Before I arrived here everyone said Singapore is expensive and yeah my accommodation was the same price as what I was paying in Australasia but everything else is relatively cheap well compared to what I’ve been spending on a daily basis over the last couple of months.

The bus was double decker and I was on the bottom, they gave you a reclining chair with massaging facility as well as a plug socket, tv, films, water, was a pretty sweet set up! 

Within in 40minutes of leaving we were at border control where you got a stamp in your passport and then back on the bus. We then went across the bridge where on the other side you had to queue up again, another stamp and stare you down, walked around a corner put your bags through a machine and that’s it. Done, back on the bus and Hello Malaysia! Way easier than I thought it was going to be and stress free! Win win situation.

There were only two drop off points, one was at the airport and the other was in the city. I had no idea where I was but obviously I could see a McDonalds so I went and got a drink and sat in there to use their wifi to find out exactly where I was. The nearest train station was a 10minute walk and it wasn’t on the line I wanted anyway, so I decided to write down the exact address of where I’m staying and jump in a taxi. He dropped me right outside and the location is amazing. Sunshine Bedz (yes with a Z…) is a 2 minute walk to the train station, right above Mcdonalds, Starbucks and any other chain you can think of which also means I have 3 different massive shopping centres right on my doorstep!

After settling in I made my way over to the Pavilion shopping centre to have a look around, after an hour or so I turned to leave and it was raining! I remembered I walked past a Daiso, it’s a Japanese pound land, so I went back there and bought myself a cheap umbrella. If it was just a little bit of rain I wouldn’t have minded but it was pretty mental! I also thought that if it rains at the F1 tomorrow I could use it there too.

I rarely post things on Facebook but when I’m travelling it’s a good thing to do because as well as updating people at home, you discover other people you’ve met are in the same places as you. Like in Singapore, 2 of the guys I met on the Kiwi Experience bus are in KL for the F1 so I went over to Chinatown to meet them for dinner. Luckily it had mostly stopped raining by then and it was really good to catch up with them. We also have to live our lives before mobile phones and hope that the time and place you agree works. I was 15minutes late because of the train and luckily I managed to find them! We went to one of the many restaurants along the strip to have some noodles and beer.

Day 35 – Taupo Rain & Spa Thermal Park.

Yesterday I went to the tourist information centre and grabbed some leaflets on what to do in Taupo. One of them I saw was for a market that is held on the green on a Saturday morning and as that is only over the road from where I’m staying I thought I’d check it out. As I got closer I noticed it wasn’t on because Lynyrd Skynyrd, 10CC and some other bands were having a mini festival.

I decided just to walk around some more and pop into Pak and Save for a few things; Timtams and stuff… the necessities. When I came out there was a slight drizzle in the air so I grabbed a pie for lunch (Butter chicken, bloody lovely!) and made my way to the library to do some research for other places I’ll be visiting. Chrissy told me yesterday she’s going to join me for the last 5 weeks I’m away, so Vietnam to Thailand, which I’m very excited about now!! Another reason I wanted to create a rough plan so I can tell her my ideas and whether there are any other places or things she wants to see and do.

The lake above is called Lake Taupo and is the largest lake in Australasia, it is 616 square kilometres and you could fit the whole of Singapore into it!

I walked out the library to go and meet some of the girls and it was absolutely hammering it down! I feel your pain back in the UK. We didn’t end up doing a lot just chilling in reception, watching one of their Bungy videos.

It cleared up quite a bit and the sun came out and one of them said she was going to the hot pools in the Spa Thermal Park which is about a 40min walk from our hostel so I decided to join her, as I wanted to go and see them anyway!

They were really cool and it’s surprising how hot the water actually is. We chilled in the hot spring for about 45mins and at one point it started to chuck it down. It was a weird sensation as the rain was cold hitting you but the water was super warm, it created this weird steam mist making it really hard to see. Within 5minutes the rain had stopped and the view cleared up.

We made our way back to the hostel and I was excited to have my leftover curry! Unfortunately for me it wasn’t that simple. The microwave rotated your food and the light was hot but it didn’t actually heat up your food, I tried to grill the naan so it was warm and that didn’t work either… I then thought there is only one thing but to bung it in a pan and heat it that way. The gas has to be lit using a match or something but all of those in the kitchen were broken, so I had to find someone with a lighter to do it for me, you wouldn’t think reheating something could be so hard?! Bits were hot, bits were cold but it was alright.

Finally I was ready to meet everyone else, we hung around in the girls room for a bit watching some sky dive videos as 3 of them got to do it yesterday and then we went to check out the Element bar that is linked to our hostel.