In Love With Malaysia

The Petronas Towers, Chinatown, The Tip of Borneo, Herman the guide, all the trips that we took were great. My initial reason for wanting to visit Borneo was to see the Orangutans, which we did on our hotel's nature reservation. The staff at our hotel, the Rasa Ria just outside Kota Kinabalu were incredible -- they could not do enough to make our trip happier but were not in anyway intrusive. The view from our hotel was breathtaking; the hotel is right on the beach with no other development in sight.

Quick Tips:

If you take the shuttle bus from Tanjung Aru or Rasa Ria hotels (Kota Kinabalu), try not to sit on the side directly behind the driver. I am of average height (5'6"-ish) and the legroom is nonexistent for me, let alone my 6' companion! The trip can take 45 minutes and the shuttle bus full, so try and get a seat as soon as you can.

Best Way To Get Around:

We found that the taxis in Kuala Lumpur and Kota Kinabalu favourable compared with Devon, England, the 25-minute ride from KK to the Rasa Ria cost approximately £10. It's expensive for the region maybe, but half what it would be here and it was so hot that we couldn't wait for the shuttle!

This hotel is amazing. It may be a 45-minute bus ride from Kota Kinabalu (AKA KK), but it is well worth it.

The welcome was incredible, we felt as if we were the only guests there that week. Our room was on the top floor -- they are not allowed to build higher than 6 floors and this also makes the hotel special as it blends into the surroundings, instead of blotting it. The view from our room was supberb – the tropical gardens, the beach and the sea, flanked on both sides by forest. No other building or development in sight.

The hotel has several restaurants. We tried the Italian one – the lasagna and red snapper are highly recommended, have the seafood pizza if you don’t mind eating tentacles. Tepi Laut is open air and has hawker style stands. The Coast bar is their flagship restaurant and would not look out of place in Hollywood. The food here was also exceptional. There is also the Lounge bar where the singing trio will let you have a go, and the kitchen staff take over one evening a week. The prices in the restaurants aren’t bad, but if you eat out every night the cost will mount up quickly. A main course each and drinks came to approximately £10 a head. We found that room service on our balcony was more cost effective, especially when we were tired and didn’t want to dress for dinner, or try and decide which restaurant to go to!

There is a 3km stretch of beach and we never saw more than 12 people on it at any one time. The Rasa Ria is very environmentally aware and therefore do not spray the beach. There were signs warning of sand flies, however they never bothered us -- we much preferred to be on the beach than at the pool. We hired a couple of jet skis and headed off round the headland and out to sea – much fun but £20 per jet ski for half an hour.

Horse riding is available throughout the day – go early in the morning or late afternoon to avoid the heat. All competencies are catered for, from those who had never been on a horse before to experienced riders.

There are activities throughout the week such as the crab catching/mangrove swamp trip. Other activities include cooking classes, water polo, volleyball, nocturnal and daytime walks through the forest, kite making classes to name but a few.

The other big attraction for this hotel is the 64-acre nature reserve that has young Orangutans living free. There are feeding platforms that are open to guests (charge payable), but as the Orangutans are free they may not come to the platforms if they find enough food that day in the forest. Luckily, we had three visitors on the day.

500 words is not enough to describe this hotel and surroundings -- I would go back in a heartbeat.

Our hotel had a revolving restaurant at the top, so for my other half's 40th we thought it would be an ideal place. I can't really remember the cost of dinner, but I think it was about £30 (approx $45?) for the both of us, including cocktails.

It was definitely an experience; the restaurant seemed to jolt for a while, then go backwards and forwards in one place. Eventually we started revolving all the way round and we had excellent nighttime views of the Petronas Towers, KL Tower, all the skyscrapers and pretty lights.

The food was good, personally I wouldn’t say outstanding, but that may have been my dish and taste buds. It’s definitely a place to go for a special occasion, though, for the views and ambience alone.

We only had two nights in Kuala Lumpur, in reality not long enough to do this city justice.

The first evening we found The Australian Bar. Not really throwing ourselves into the Asian culture, sure, but the first place with seats we came across. The reason why I mention it (apart from the good steaks and cold Coke) is because it was our introduction to the Asian service. Our waiter, Punj, was superb, could not do enough for us and was happy to teach us our first Malaysian pronunciation.

Our tour operator told us about Times Square, a new mall that had opened the day before, and as we were in the market for purchasing a camcorder we made it our first stop. The place is huge - the biggest in Asia and the second/third largest in the world? Something like that. Again, the Asian service. Sure CK wanted to sell us a camera, the store only opened the day before and was still in slight disarray, but the service was again excellent.

We made our way to the Petronas Towers for the obligatory view from the Skybridge. The towers are far more stunning in real life. Stand at the bottom and then follow the building up to the top – bet you fall over backwards. The excellent thing about this sight seeing attraction is that the tickets are free – yes free! You are given a timeslot and have to report back at the building at the given time. We had four hours to wait so we went to the shopping mall next-door and drooled at designer names such as Prada. Still out of my price range! I would recommend getting there early, friends of ours did and they only had to wait an hour or so.

The view from the sky bridge was worth the wait, now when the Malaysian Grand Prix is on the TV we can shout ‘been there!’

Chinatown was amazing, the fake watch thing done, we headed back to our hotel (The Federal Hotel).

Monsopiad Cultural Village and Train Experience is where the eighth generation grandson of the Great Monsopiad Warrior explained the history of this (now extinct) practice of headhunting. We visited the house of 42 skulls and caught the cultural show – audience participation is expected!

The cultural train ride consisted of being dropped off at Papar and travelling by train back to Tanjung Aru in Kota Kinabalu. There are no reserved seats – sit where you can. It’s a great way to meet locals and see the countryside, especially if you are shy about making your own arrangements but still wish to experience local life.

Our Trip to the Tip of Borneo – This was the best trip. We had the same guide as a previous tour, Herman, and we were the only ones on this trip.

The tour started at Kota Belud with the largest market in Sabah, excellent for picking up local bargains such as pottery, saris, wooden face masks, etc.

Herman drove to the Tip of Borneo, along roads that were full of wandering dogs and children. At one point the tarmac ran out (no junction or turn-off – the tarmac just ran out) and we were on a dirt track. I guess that this is just like John O’Groats or Land’s End in England, but far more spectacular – the South China Sea on the left and the Sulu Sea on the right with the Philippines straight ahead. We were amazed with the amount of wildlife in the rock pools and the sandstone formation that made natural footfalls down. Catch this trip before it becomes commercialized and the sandstone formations ruined.

For lunch we were the freak show entertainment at a local market restaurant but wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Next we wondered through a genuine lived in Longhouse. This felt slightly intrusive, however Herman explained that it is as much of a treat for the locals to meet us – cries of Orang-Wateh! Orang-Wateh! ringing in our ears (White Man! White Man!), we headed to the Gong making village.

I guess the reason we enjoyed this trip so much is because there were no hoards of tourists, just the two of us and Herman. We were treated as guests and shown around, rather than herded and told. The villages spring up round one main industry – for example, the gong-making village, the kite-making village, the knife-making village, the longhouse village, etc. From what we could gather from Herman, the villagers encourage tourists and record them in a book. They then receive benefits according to how many tourists have visited. This also ensures a warm and friendly welcome.

This trip is definitely recommended for the amount of land covered and the closeness to the local people.

Herman (again – hooray!) said he had heard of a Rafflesia in flower and would we like to see it – not on the itinerary, but all five of us on this trip readily agreed. The Rafflesia (named after Raffles of the hotel fame) is the largest flowering plant in the world, growing up to 1 metre across, but only flowers for 5 days. They are quite rare and we were lucky to see one.

We then progressed to the canopy walk at Poring Hot Springs. This is not for the faint hearted – it’s a long way up and the board (just one plank wide) does wobble from side to side a bit. Definitely worth doing, though. We gave the springs a miss – it would have taken too long for a pool (bath) to fill for us as we had diverted to see the Rafflesia. Instead, we enjoyed a long cold drink at the bar and made friends with the local feline community.

In the afternoon we visited the Mountain Garden, where there are wonderful specimens of rare and beautiful orchids and pitchers plants among others. This is the closest we came to Mount Kinabalu. We did seriously consider the climb as it is one of the most accessible mountains in the world, however time just flies when you are on the holiday of a lifetime. It would be foolhardy for a normal person to attempt the climb in 1 day and 2 days out of the holiday would have meant missing something else. One thing impressed on us by Herman, though, is that if you do climb it, make sure you take notice of all the safety and preparation information – tragic and unnecessary fatalities to climbers have been known on the mountain.

We thought that it would be a shame to pass up the chance of having a go at diving in the South China Sea, so we booked ourselves on an excursion for a ‘try dive’.

We were ferried to Mamutik Island, just off Kota Kinabalu and Lisa, our guide, took us and two others through the basics before we kitted up. Even though the other couple were Japanese, the briefing was in English. A word of warning – the wetsuits are Asian size and only come in small and medium!!

After more theory in the water and Lisa was satisfied that we could complete the necessary basic safety actions, we went diving! I was amazed at how quickly we went from complete and utter novices, to breathing underwater and in the middle of a coral reef with tropical fishes swimming around – including Clowns!! We are now totally hooked on diving.

A basic but delicious lunch was provided, after which we went snorkeling. We had hoped to be able to purchase more diving sessions; however, there was a shortage of qualified staff, i.e., only Lisa, and she had another class in the afternoon. Snorkeling was just as amazing, we didn’t have to pay for the hire of the equipment and the fish were bountiful.

If you have never dived before this is the best introduction you could have. Dependent on weather.

This trip appealed to us because we wanted to see proboscis monkeys and fireflies. It was also a 2-hour drive south of Kota Kinabalu, so it gave us another opportunity to see more of the countryside. When we arrived we were presented with coffee and cakes. You could stand your spoon up in the coffee, it was so thick, and I thought I liked my Nescafe strong! Accompanied by evaporated milk, it was an introduction to the Malaysian version of white coffee. The battered, deep-fried bananas were wonderful.

A couple travelling independently joined our boat and we set off to look for monkeys. All the wildlife is just that – wild, so a young lad sat at on the bow of the boat and yelled every time he saw a troop of monkeys – usually way before we did. There were about three other boats out at the same time as us, with more tourists on board, so we swapped information on where monkeys had been seen. We were very impressed by the number of proboscis and long-tailed monkeys, apparently some trips don’t see that many.

Unfortunately the tide was too high to see crocodiles on this trip.

When dusk fell, the fireflies began to sparkle – an incredible natural phenomenon that was highlighted by the total blackness due to the absence of light pollution (and a moon). Well worth the trip just for this spectacle.

Dinner was served when we returned to base, a wonderful concoction of local fair.

Wear long trousers/sleeves on this trip and take insect repellent. It was also quite cool when driving back – another top would have been nice. This is the only time I was cold in Malaysia and was a novelty in itself!

There are two excursion-organising companies based in the Rasa Ria Resort; we used Exotic Borneo for the majority of ours. The trips can be expensive (approximately £30 onwards); however, the guides are incredibly knowledgeable, from explaining water butts on the housing association flats to the smallest orchid in the world (found on Mount Kinabalu) and the packages are very well run. The small 7-seater mini buses are totally air-conditioned and comfortable.