Abstract

The Perhentian Islands consist of two islands, but we only stayed on the big one. We spent four nights there, which was enough time for us. Our beach was very nice and never crowded, even though all accommodation seemed to be quite full. There is not much to do on the islands except relaxing, swimming, eating, diving, snorkelling and jungle walking, but people who are looking for this will certainly have a great time on this beautiful island!!

Day 28 - July 24

At midnight the bus stopped at some cheap eating place somewhere in no mans land, enabling the driver to get something to eat and the passengers to stretch their legs and go to the toilet. All the long distance buses seemed to stop here. As always we were not informed on how long the stop would be, but as usual it lasted about 20 minutes. We bought a hamburger each (costing only 2 RM!) and Jan Arild thought it was one of the best burgers he had ever eaten. It was good, but a little too spicy for my taste.

When the bus ride continued I got a little sleep, but Jan Arild as usual didn`t. When we reached Kota Bahru around 0400, all the Malays got off while all the backpackers remained on. Not surprisingly, we were all heading the same place. The final stop was in Jerteh, about an hour later. Everybody got out, some apparently surprised that they were not on the jetty, but instead on an inland bus station.

We knew that the bus would stop here so we were not surprised. There were two taxis waiting for the passengers. They started demanding a very high price for taking us to the jetty, but response was minimal. After ten minutes the price seemed more reasonable (about 5 RM each), so we decided to go. We shared taxi with a guy from The Netherlands who had quit his job to travel around the world for a year. I was glad it wasn`t me!

It took about 20 minutes to get to the jetty. One ferry ticket office was already open and the guy in charge was very interested in selling tickets to us. Although we had already bought our ferry tickets in Penang, he still let us wait in his office, though.

Now it was just a question of killing time until the boat left at 09.00. We walked around the area, saw the beautiful sunrise from the pier, were stalked by a goat and longed for getting to the island. I was feeling dirty and was looking forward to taking a shower.

Our boat tickets belonged to another office called Perhentian Ferry Travel & Tours, which didn't open until 08.30. We went in there to get our tickets validated for the first boat trip. The guy in charge was very professional and helpful, even phoning ahead to make a reservation for us at Flora Bay Chalets.

We had tickets for the socalled "slow boat", which was supposed to take about 1 hour and 30 minutes to the island. However, since the boat continously broke down, the ride took a lot longer. Three times the engine stopped and while the captain tried to fix it, the boat swayed violently from side to side, making a lot of us feel quite seasick.

Luckily Flora Bay was the first stop. Our first impression was very good! The place really looked like paradise! There was a long beautiful sandy beach, lush tropical jungle and warm blue water. The water was too shallow to have a pier, so a smaller boat came out to fetch us. Apart from us, only a Dutch couple disembarked here. Apparently most of the other travellers were going to the small island.

We had decided to stay at Flora Bay Chalets since it had been recommended in some other travel diaries on the Internet. While they fixed our room we got a welcome drink, not very good, but it was still a nice gesture.

Our room (45 RM) was on the second floor of a building that looked nice from the outside. It was small with only a fan and no air-condition. The bathroom was dirty and so small that to take a shower you almost had to stand on the toilet. We were quite disappointed. I had expected something better. Maybe I was being extra critical since I was tired and felt dirty after the long journey?

I had a quick shower before we went to get something to eat in the outdoor hotel restaurant. If the room had been disappointing, the same could definitely not be said about the food, which turned out to be excellent!

After eating we went back to our room to try and catch up on our sleep. However, the room was so hot that it was actually cooler outside, and definitely not very pleasant to sleep in. We decided to ask in the reception if we could upgrade to a room with air-condition. Fortunately, there was a room available from tomorrow. However, it cost 150 RM, but we still decided to take a look at it next morning and see whether it was worth the extra money.

The rest of the day we spent on the beach. The beach was beautiful and perfect, just like a tropical paradise beach is supposed to be! While we sat there, a big lizard came crawling out of the bushes right behind us. It walked along the beach for a while before returning to the jungle. Unfortunately, I hadn't brought my camera :-(

When we were tired of sitting in the sun, we relaxed on our balcony. Later we also delivered our dirty laundry for washing. In the evening we had chicken curry (5 RM!) in the restaurant and banana split for dessert. We ended the day with an evening walk on the beach and sitting in the dark on our veranda watching all the salamanders climbing on our ceiling.

Unfortunately, we didn`t sleep well that night, despite being very tired. The room was so warm that it was almost unbearable, and it also sounded like our neighbours were trying to kill someone. In the morning we were both ready for a room with air-condition, no matter what the cost!

Day 29 - July 25

The first thing we did was to change to a new room. Our new home on the island was a chalet called "Kiambang" and turned out to be well worth the extra money. It was big, very nice and right on the beach! We were really pleased and I liked it so much that I didn`t really want to leave it.

After getting settled in, we went to have breakfast. It was very good, as all the food we would have on the island. We then relaxed for a while in our nice cool room. I just loved the air-condition, which even had a remote control!

Today our plan was to walk through the jungle and see what the other side of the island looked like. When we found the jungle path, it turned out to be a lot narrover than we had expected. "Jungle Jan" walked first to scare away the snakes, and I followed close behind. I wasn't too comfortable about walking here in sandals and I could almost feel all the hungry and dangerous reptiles watching us :-) We walked up and down on this narrow path for about 10 minutes, until we arrived at a somewhat larger path. Here it was possible to see where we put our feet and we met some other people going in the opposite direction.

About halfway, we came across a snake. We wouldn`t have seen it if it hadn`t moved, but it obviously felt it was best to get out of the way - smart snake! Having spotted the snake, I felt we we're "in control" and the situation was not scary anymore. The snake was only a small one, but we took some pictures of it anyway. Soon other people gathered around to watch, and we eventually continued our walk. Later I tried to look the snake up in a book, but I couldn't find it so I don't know what kind of snake it was. I`m sure it was a very dangerous one, though :-)

Today was very hot and we desperately needed something to drink when we arrived at our destination. We eventually end up with a regular soft drink, as the fruit juice was so expensive here that it might even have been cheaper in Norway! They charged the ridiculous amount of 17.50 RM for one glass! I liked Flora Bay better than this beach. Although the water was deeper on this side, making it better for swimming, everything looked more exclusive and "adult"....besides the expensive fruit juice was a big minus!

There wasn't really much to stay around for, so after having finished our drinks we started walking back towards Flora Bay. The green tropical jungle was really nice to walk in, once I got used to it. Although at one point we almost got lost, thanks to "Jungle Jan's" amazing sense of direction, we eventually made it back to Flora Bay in one piece.

After this walk we relaxed and cooled down in our excellent room for a while. Jan Arild went to see whether he could come on a snorkelling tour around the island tomorrow, and was told that the tour would go ahead if at least four people signed up. So far he was the only one. Then we hit the beach for a couple of hours to relax and read some more.

Around 19.00 we went to eat dinner. It was great sitting outside being surrounded by small lights and dark, the beach being only a few metres away. We had Flora burgers with chips and fresh juice. It tasted so good and became my new favorite food. It was particularly nice to eat some bread again!

For evening exercice we walked up and down the beach a few times in the dark. A big thunderstorm then started and we sat outside on our porch and watched it. There were thunderstorms almost every night we would find out. We went to bed pretty late, around 23.00.

Day 30 - July 26

Got up at 09.00 and had Flora Bay toast for breakfast. Jan Arild learned that five people now had signed up for the snorkelling tour (cost 30 RM), and that the boat was to leave at 10.00. While Jan Arild was on tour, I spent the time on the beach reading. When he came back at 1330, he told me that the snorkelling had been really great. They had stopped at six different places around the island, seeing beautiful corals and swimming with all kinds of colourful fishes.

Jan Arild took a shower before we had a Chicken sandwich for lunch at the Flora Bay restaurant. All the different accommodation had their own restaurant, but we never really tried any of the other ones on our beach. I`m sure their food was good as well, but being so pleased with our restaurant, there was no reason to try the other places.

After cooling down in our air-conditioned room, we went down to sit on the warm beach. I had been bored with the book I was reading at the moment, so when Jan Arild was out snorkeling, I started reading his book instead (Tami Hoag - "Ashes to ashes"). It turned out to be much better, and he was nice enough to let me continue reading in it on the beach. Eventually we got tired of the beach and went to sit on our porch.

The rain started early today and we sat on the porch watching it pour down. We also enjoyed some Pringles and one of us must have accidentally dropped one potato chips on the floor. Suddenly we noticed that the chips was moving, and it turned out that a colony of tiny ants were trying to carry it! They had no problems getting it to the their home, which apparently was below the small staircase.

It was really fascinating to watch, so when they were finished we put down another chips in a different position and soon a line of ants came to fetch it! The ants on the Perhentians were certainly tidy ants! We had heard that ants can lift several times their body weight, so to give them a real challenge we put down a Mentos on the floor to see if they could move that. They worked hard, but in the end it was too heavy for them.

We ate dinner around 19.30, but had to sit under the roof this time, since the rain hadn't stopped yet. Still it was very nice. The rain stopped later in the evening, enabling us to walk up and down the beach several times to get some more exercise. A small lizard came into our room and slept behind the air-condition. It made the strangest sounds, but was very cute so we didn`t mind it.

Day 31 - July 27

This was the last whole day on the island, which was fine by me. The Perhentians were certainly close to paradise, but it does get boring after a while with nothing to do except relaxing on the beach. We were definitely ready for some action again, so tomorrow we had decided on travelling to Kuala Lumpur!

Almost two hours were spent on the beach, which is about the maximum time I can manage anyway. I was desperate to get a tan before we left, but I soon understood it was a lost cause and gave up. We had one last swim before we showering and sitting down on our porch to read some more.

For lunch we had the very good Flora Burgers with chips and fresh juice. The juice here was very good, but still it was nothing like the Cathay juice. After lunch we relaxed some more and walked up and down the beach a few times. We performed some more ant experiments, and suddenly the clock turned 19.30 and it was time for a new Flora Burger.

The evenings actually became my favorite time of the day. Sitting on the porch, watching the rain fall, listening to the thunder and seeing the lightning completely light up the sky, making plans for the next couple of days, or just beeing silent....it was wonderful!

Jan Arild ran through the rain to the restaurant and bought some chocolates and Pringles, enabling us to end the evening with a feast in our room. Finally we went to bed around 22.30.

Day 32 - July 28

We woke up around 09.30 but decided to relax in our room and on the porch as long as possible. We watched a large group of new guys arrive. They were being really loud and we didn`t think they looked very sympathetic at all.

A little before 12.00 we checked out and got ourselves some breakfast. Yesterday we had asked them to arrange boat transport to the mainland for us. After the terrible trip with the slow boat, we decided to pay 20 RM extra to go back on the fast boat, which was no problem.

To say goodbye to Flora Bay we walked up and down the beach a few times and took some last pictures of this tropical paradise. Internet was, compared to other places in Malaysia, rather expencive on the island, so we only allowed ourselves a short while online.

The boat was supposed to pick us up around 16.00, so all we could do was wait. We sat for a while in the reception/ restaurant area, reading and updating our journals. We had our last Flora burger before the boat arrived at 16.15.

The boat ride was very pleasant and only took about 40 minutes, definitely much better than the horrible slow boat! On reaching the jetty, we quickly disembarked and walked up to the ferry office where we had our boat ticket validated a few days earlier. We had no idea on how to travel to Kuala Lumpur from here, but we assumed it was a common destination and so there had to exist some sort of public transportation.

We spoke with the same guy and once again he was very helpful. He made reservations for us on the bus to K.L. and got us a taxi to the bus station in Kuala Besut, all without charging us anything.

The fixed rate for a taxi to Kota Bahru was 24 RM, which is nothing for a one hour drive. Our taxi and driver looked very original, almost antic. The car was a very old yellow Mercedes, and the driver was an old man who went well with the car. I was a bit concerned that the car wasn`t up for the trip, but it would eventually get us to Kota Bahruin time. The driver talked to himself in Malay and played strange music throughout the journey. Every time we passed some people he would stick his whole arm out the window and wave like a maniac. I can't believe he actually knew all these people, because it must have been hundreds. Maybe he was just very polite....

Because of the heat all the car windows were open, so when it suddenly started raining they had to be closed. Instead of stopping the car for a minute, he leaned over the very wide front seat to close the window on his opposite side, giving very little attention to the driving. I thought for a minute that he made closing the window a little more exciting than it really had to be.

Of even more concern was that the window sweeper didn't work, so it didn't take long before it was almost impossible to see anything through the front window. However, to improve the sight he took out a towel and started wiping the window from the inside! We were now really starting to question the guy's sanity, because, after all, the rain was coming from the outside! Fortunately, the sweeper suddenly started moving. The driver almost jumped for joy when this happened, turned around and said something to us in Malay, which probably was something like "Look, they're working - first time in ten years - it's a miracle".

But to be fair, he did his job and got us to the bus station on time. We arrived around 18.20 and since the bus didn't leave until 20.00, there was lots of time to collect the tickets (28 RM each), buy some food and drinks for the trip and call home.

When the clock turned 20.00, the station was full of buses, but unfortunately our bus was nowhere to be seen. There were no signs with any destinations on, the usual system was that they gave you the licence plate number and then you had to check all the buses yourself. I was getting nervous, because it would be very annoying if the bus left without us. We ran around and checked all the buses several times, but finally when all the other buses had left, and we didn't quite know what to do, our bus came into the station and we were again very happy! Jan Arild made sure our baggage was loaded under the bus and I secured seats inside for us. This bus was also nice, but not as luxurious as the previous one, not that it mattered much anyway.

The bus trip was uneventful. We made two stops at eating places in the middle of nowhere, first time at 24.00 and the next at 04.00. I didn`t sleep much and Jan Arild didn`t sleep at all as usual.