9/30/12 - Langkawi

Boom.  2 posts in one day.  Can you believe it?

It was time for a short little vacation.  Work, school, finding a place to live and then putting it in order necessitated it.  Luckily we're never more than an hour flight away from a tropical island here.  Thursday morning we hopped an Air Asia flight from Penang to Langkawi and were literally sitting on the beach about 90 minutes after they closed the plane door in Penang.  My knees were practically in the seat in front of me and some of the people on the plane made sounds like we were on a roller coaster when we hit turbulence (whoaa, whoaa, whoooaaa) but that just added to the entertainment.

We stayed at the Berjaya resort so we could get our own little cabin to stay in out in the jungle.  Literally.  The balcony door in our room had a sign (a little tough to read, but you get the idea) reminding you to lock it before leaving so the monkeys couldn't get in.  We remembered to do that, but guess who we saw on our way to the beach?

We had every intention of doing some exploring, there is a cable car to the top of a small mountain/large hill and a sky bridge up there, waterfalls, shopping and other beaches, but in the end the beach that was a 5 minute walk from our room was just too tempting.  Plus, after this trip we're fairly confident we'll be back.  Digging your toes into the sand with a reasonably priced drink is just too difficult to pass up.

Surprisingly a lot of different wildlife spottings on the trip (not counting the cows walking down the side of the road on the way back to the airport).    Some interesting looking birds, monkeys of course, crabs of all colors, a sea otter and then what appeared to be two flying squirrels.  It was dark and we couldn't see that well, but what else jumps from tree to tree and claims to be looking for Boris and Natasha?

Heading home couldn't have been easier - at least logistically.  We were back in Singapore a few hours later and laughing about how it had taken us 24 hours to get to Phuket a few years ago.  Made the work (school and accounting) a little easier on Sunday knowing that a trip like that can now be crammed into a weekend instead of needing 2 days (front and back end of the trip) to get there.