Pantai Cenang

The main attraction in Pantai Cenang, Langkawi, Malaysia, happens every day at late afternoon, and it's free. It's the sunset. Pantai Cenang has one of the most charming beaches I've ever seen. Being low season very few tourists were there: the odd couple, someone parasailing here and there, and few groups of very young Indians and Chinese tourists. You could breath extreme chillout together with the sea breeze!


Every day around 7pm the magic starts to happen. The sky starts getting on fire, meanwhile thanks to the low tide the beach becomes even wider. Small poodles of sea water add to the effect reflecting the sky like a mirror. There's so much space that even if there are quite a lot of people out to capture the spectacular sunset with all kind of cameras and tripods, you can have your 30 to 50 meters stretch of sand all for you.


Because I was Flashpacking in low season (Ramadan) and with the fact that I was looking for an accommodation for 3 weeks, I managed to bargain the price of a very nice hotel, the Langkawi Boutique Resort. Not really a resort, especially after having spent few days in the luxurious Berjaya Resort (see previous Langkawi post about it), but a lovely hotel nonetheless: huge room with balcony, lagoon style swimming pool, breakfast and wireless all day. And all this paying half of what I was paying for rent in Ireland.


The staff was exceptionally sweet. not only they offered me a very good service, but with some of them I became good friend too. When they were cooking something particular they would always send a plate to my room, and when I left they also sent me off with a huge box of end of Ramadan cookies! They also invited me to the cooking ceremony of Pulut, a sweet made of black glutinous rice, coconut milk and palm sugar. It has to cook in a giant pot on a open fire for 5 to 6 hours, and continually stirred.


People take turns, as you also need to stir the thing continuously. They took pictures of me stirring it for their magazine, then I went off and when I returned late at night they were still there stirring it!


So how did I spent those three weeks in Pantai Cenang? Well my typical day was trying to wake up in time for breakfast, looking after my blogs, lunches in little cafes often by the beach, relaxing by the swimming pool, dinner in some delicious Indian restaurant, drinks in places like Debbie's, a tropical Irish bar. It would have been the most tropical Irish Pub I've seen if only I didn't see the Tir Na Nog in Gili Trawangan, Lombok; the only where you have the sea caressing your ankles while sipping your drink.


And of course I've spent a lot of time reading the Books Travelling with me and thinking how I want this trip to end. The whole purpose of the trip was chilling, enjoying, but also find out not what I could do or what I could like to do, but what I would really love to do for a living. 8 months, 7 nations, and many books later I still don't have a conclusion, but I feel I'm really getting close to it, and the trip might end by the end of the year. So to know if and how it ends I'm afraid you'll just have to keep following McSilly's Adventures! And to make sure not to miss any post how about subscribing by RSS?

Langkawi, Some Luxury for the Flashpacker

I ended up in Langkawi, a little island (or rather on the biggest of an archipelago of 99 little islands) in Malaysia, just at the border with Thailand, following the suggestion of Kathryn, a girl I met on one of those wild nights in Singapore.


When I arrive in a new place, especially if late at night, I like to have already a place to stay. But I always end up booking the accommodation one or two days before. In Langkawi almost every hotel has a very basic website, with no instant confirmation booking form. If you're lucky they have an inquiry form and they promise to get back to you within a day. That was not good for a last minute person like me, searching for a place to stay just a day before going there. So I ended up booking 3 nights at the Berjaya Hotel resort. Very expensive for Malaysian standards, but not crazy for European ones considering what you get. 60 Euros a night for a place that looked spectacular, excellent reviews, free internet. The Flashpacker in me was satisfied.


And the place is spectacular indeed. You get your own little wooden house so far from the hotel lobby that you need to be brought back and forth in one of those golf-like carts. When I checked in the guy told me to make sure to close doors and windows well. Thefts I asked? Monkeys! And in fact my little wooden house was in the very middle of a jungle, and every time I was walking around I always bumped into monkeys, and at night huge geckos and flying squirrel flying in front of my face.


An excellent stay, but at the end I was glad I only spent 3 days there. Being a resort it caters for couples and few groups; I was becoming an attraction as a single traveller. The friendly (and inquisitive) Malay staff just couldn't get the concept of travelling on your own, so after being asked from the 10th different person where my wife was I started telling them that she's at home, cooking and waiting for me while I am on business on this island.

Moreover I discovered in my first expedition outside the resort that the rest of the island has way cheaper prices for basically everything, from postcards to bottled water (so hot here that you have 600ml instead of the classic 500ml) and of course hotel rooms. So nice to have experienced the honeymoon luxury for a bit, but after the 3 days I moved to a little beach village, Pantai Cenang. But more on this on the next chapter.