Day 156 – Langkawi, Malaysia

July 12th, 2019

Today, there were several places I wanted to check out on the scooter.  I dropped off some laundry at our hotel’s reception and the lady convinced me to do an island-hopping tour this afternoon.  It was only $7, and they take you to three different places by a small boat.  For that price I figured why not?  It would be a good way to see some of the other islands.  We decided to do our scooter-exploring day tomorrow and the island-hopping tour today.  We had a couple of hours before the tour and checked out Chenang Beach which was right down the street.  We also walked around some shops and grabbed some lunch.

When it was time for our tour we loaded up and went to the boat dock.  We were with two other families, one from southern Malaysia and one from France. 

Our first stop was an island that is supposed to look like the silhouette of a pregnant lady. 

It has a big fresh water lake which is apparently a big deal here as this was a real tourist attraction.  I didn’t really understand why, as it seemed like a normal lake to me. I know there is some legend about drinking the water to help you get pregnant, but I couldn’t imagine that’s why all the tourists came here.  It was definitely a tourist trap as many people were there to rent little pedal boats that were shaped like swans, kayaks and life jackets.  There were signs that said you couldn’t even swim in the lake without a lifejacket that you rent…Several people including Brendan ignored the sign but there didn’t seem to be any consequences.  I didn’t want to get in the water anyway as it didn’t look that nice, so I sat on the plastic floating dock.

 

After that our next stop was an island where there were a bunch of wild eagles.  The boat captain threw out food and you can watch the eagles (and seagulls) dive down and get the food.  It was okay but I later read that this is not good for the eagles because they are not continuing to hunt and rely on this tourist gimmick for food, and it’s disrupting their natural lifestyle.  Probably shouldn’t have supported that one but you live and learn. 

Our final stop was a nice beach on another island.  All the sand is really white and fine here. 

Again, it was a popular tourist stop and I think all these island-hopping tours go to the same places.  We did see a monkey drinking a Red Bull which was pretty funny. 

I thought someone must have left their drink unattended, but I later learned when I got my own snack, the monkeys can be really aggressive!  I opened a package of cookie things I just bought and immediately all these monkeys charged me!  They were grabbing at my jacket and I was trying to run away but they are just as quick.  There was a whole bunch of them, and I was thinking that even though they are small I would probably lose if I got in a fight with one because they have teeth and claws.  The last thing I wanted was getting scratched or bit and another terrible infection.  I got scared and ended up throwing my new thing of cookies to get them away from me.  They charged after the thrown cookies and I was safe to get back on the boat.  Brendan of course thought this whole thing was hysterical. 

I didn’t care that much for the stops we made but the island tour was worth the $7 just to go out on a boat through this beautiful collection of islands.  If you are not on a strict budget what I would recommend is renting a jet ski and cruising through the islands yourself.  There are tons of deserted sandy beaches you could explore on your own.  For $150 you can rent a jet ski for four hours and I think that would be a fun way to do it.