reallyjillytravels

  Tuesday, May 16, 2023, Port Klang, Malaysia The port building in Port Klang was quite a ways from the ship and temperatures seemed to be getting hot as we traveled east. Thoughtfully they had a nice golf cart waiting to take us to the port building. Like most ports, we had to go through the port building to get to our tour bus or the free shuttle. Not wanting to spend 3 hours on a bus to get to Kuala Lumpur (and 3 hours back) from Port Klang, we elected to go to Putrajaya, the administrative and judicial capital of Malaysia (Kamala Lumpur is still the legislative capital). Thirty-eight percent of Putrajaya city is green space, hence the moniker “the intelligent garden city.”  Our first stop was the Tama Botani garden. We enjoyed an interpretive center with boxed displays of butterflies and various bugs. We asked where to see the monkeys but they did not appear that day. Though having some colorful flowers, some monuments, and a lake, it was large and lovely in its own way...

Wednesday, May 17, 2023, Singapore Despite having no natural resources, the city-state of Singapore has the third highest GDP per capita in the world. They also have the world’s busiest cargo seaport. And one of the world’s most stable economies with no foreign debt. It’s also a very expensive place to visit! We had breakfast on the ship with Don and Katherine Winter, who had been to Singapore before. We made plans to sightsee with them and met up on Deck 5 to get off the ship once Singapore officials had given the OK, which was after our arrival at 1 pm. After hearing from Don about how efficient they were, we were surprised by a 45-minute long delay going through customs.  The ship was berthed under a gondola that went to a theme park across the way, and we briefly discussed going there. Instead, we took a 20-minute ride share to the famous Marina Bay Sands Hotel. This is the hotel with three high towers holding up a swimming pool platform on top. We gawked at the hotel for awhil...

  Monday, May 15, Penang, Malaysia We had a tour to Penang Hill. For the funicular up to the top of the hill, we had to wear masks. It was hot. And humid. The gardens at the top were absolutely gorgeous. We had a good view of the city, but it was foggy. We were on the lookout for monkeys and managed to see a black Dusky Monkey in the tree tops off the side of the hill using binoculars. Our next stop was Kek Lok Si, an elaborate temple complex. A more descriptive title they use is Temple of 10,000 Buddha’s. There was an enormous rock in a waterway which somehow got there and helped divert floodwater. We took a shorter funicular up, others walked the steps. We both arrived at the top about the same time. Then we started our tour of this large complex. At one point it started to pour rain. My dress was pretty much soaked through, but it was thin and dried equally fast once the rain stopped. During free time we climbed the tallest temple for some good views and more statues. The co...

NOTE: I’m publishing without photos due to the current difficulty downloading them. Will add later.  Saturday, May 13 2023, Phuket,Thailand (day 1) Our first day in Phuket we opted for a tour to the Kinnaree Elephant Camp. This turned out to be an elephant preserve, and the stars of the show were a mama and baby (born in captivity!) splashing in a large pool. The baby was especially having fun. Handlers were there intermittently squirting and scrubbing them. Not as impressive as the river elephants in Sri Lanka, but great to see the unfettered animals. There were others there tethered and tasked with carrying tourists around on a contraption on their backs. Our guide did not endorse paying extra to ride an elephant.  It was another sweltering day in paradise. Many of the places we are visiting are concerned about climate change. It’s extremely hot for the locals and the animals. Not just the tourists.  We were able to feed elephants bananas, and even help make food f...

Friday, May 12, 2023, Langkawi, Indonesia The ship arrived at 10 a.m. We had plans to get the first tender to shore and join 2 other couples to get a taxi and take a cable car up the mountain to the Skybridge. Things went well despite everyone jammed in the stairwells trying to get off the ship. All six of us made the first tender. Then we found out there was a fourth couple joining us and they hadn’t make the first tender. They didn’t make the second one either. We waited in the sweltering heat finding shade in the hotel’s open area. The taxi drivers mostly wanted to take people on tours. Once we had all our people together, we agreed to have a driver with a van take us to the cable car, then another place. There was quite a bit of back and forth about which to do first. The taxi driver wanted to do the mangroves first. We all wanted the mountain first to beat the tour buses. We had him pull over while we discussed it. He was stubborn. We finally prevailed and finally arrived at the c...

Thursday, May 11, 2023, Sabang, Indonesia Sabang is on Weh Island, a small island near the much larger Indonesian island of Sumatra. We most likely went there because it was available to replace one of our other destinations, Mayanmar (Burma), which was cancelled due to civil unrest. Weh Island was first written about by Ptolemy in 301 BC and was mentioned as “Golden Island.” Sabang is the northernmost and westernmost city in Indonesia. They have a monument at the zero point and sell lots of tee shirts. Really a town, Sabang has by far the smallest population of any city in Indonesia—about 43,000 people. Not many cruise ships visit this port. However, they had put together a makeshift market with awnings at the dock and it was full of shoppers - guests and crew from the ship. A large part of the island population came to see us arrive, even taking their children out of school to come. Most arrived on motorcycles, which is their main mode of transportation. At times we saw 3-4 family me...

Tuesday, May 9, 2023, Port Blair, India In some ways, this is one of the weirdest places we’ve been yet. On an island far east of India but still considered part of India, it seemed like a hybrid of different places. The traffic was lively with horn honking by taxis, motorcycles & tuk-tuks. Random dogs, goats, and cows wandered or lay around. Regularly the power would go out for a few minutes for no discernible reason. Customs officers were much stricter than other Indian cities. We had to sign special customs forms. People on the ship who were born in China could not come ashore. Anyone born in Pakistan or who had been to Pakistan could not come ashore. Extra forms were required, too. The ship was in port by the time we woke up at 7 am. We didn’t have a tour lined up, but there was a shuttle from port to downtown starting at 9 am. In the customs building, we were greeted by Indian women who sprinkled rose petals on us and put an orange dot on my forehead. We picked up a map and we...

  Friday, May 5, 2023, Colombo, Sri Lanka We didn’t arrive in Colombo until 2:00 p.m. and it took awhile for the local officials to clear us to get off the ship. We had decided against a tour our first day in Colombo. Instead, we were planning to take the free shuttle from the ship to a shopping mall downtown and wander from there. I stopped at the visitor booth to pick up a map, and surmised the man staffing the booth didn’t have much to offer regarding information. Charlie was chatting with one of the officials on the dock. Vendor shops at the pier looked interesting, but we were anxious to see the town in the daylight. Oceania officials said the shuttle bus would run from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. Charlie chatting up a port official There were taxi drivers hanging out on the pier. We’d heard the local taxi union was strong. One of the drivers said the shuttle bus wouldn’t start until 5 p.m. I assured them it was 3 p.m., not 5 p.m. There were shuttle buses parked on the pier. I spotted a...

Thursday May 4, 2023, Kochi (formerly Cochin), India We got in to port about 8 am. We had a tour scheduled but decided at the last minute to wing it instead. The ship was docked on Willingdon Island and we were thinking of taking a ferry to the Fort Kochi & Mattancherry area. I’d been told the area was very small. We got a map from the tourist info center, and they showed us where we were on the map and told me it would be a 20-minute walk to the ferry. That gave me pause—the scale of the map meant the area was much larger than I’d envisioned. It was about 90 degrees and with the humidity it felt even hotter.  There were a lot of tuk-tuk drivers trying to help us figure out what we wanted to do. A taxi driver named Rise (pronounced Ree-say) approached us and said he had a taxi with A/C and would take us where we wanted to go. Charlie offered $20 for 4 hours and he was ok with that (we found out why later). Charlie asked if it was possible that we could see a elephant, and R...