March 5 – Porto Malai, Langkawi Island, Malaysia. I forgot to mention last night's entertainment. The performer was Bobby Brooks Wilson, son of Jackie Wilson. If you don't remember the name, Google it and you will remember some of his songs. He died in his late 40s but his songs spent a lot of time on the Billboard charts. Bobby is a good entertainer. He sang some songs from the Motown Era. Not necessarily Motown songs but hits from the time when Motown was popular. He has a good voice and can mimic the voices of some stars of the era, Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Little Richard and Elvis. He also dances like Jackie Wilson. If you don't remember Jackie, it's a lot like James Brown's moves. An enjoyable show, I hope he's on again before he disembarks.
It's our first time in this port but there's really not much to say about the history. Langkawi is a small island given over to rice and tourism. Today we are going to take in some of the natural beauty of the island.
The island is very green and it's hot and humid. As we drove from the port to Pantai Kok (Kok Beach) we passed miles of lush forest and beach vistas. Our driver bravely drove the bus down a sandy track to get us close to the beach. Many of the passengers on the Rotterdam are mobility impaired and dropping us off at the parking area would have necessitated a much longer stay than time would allow.
Kok Beach has very fine white sand and is lined with palm trees and native forest so shade is readily available. It's a wide beach and long and at this time of day, about 9am is totally deserted. It's in a cove with a string of barrier islands guarding the open end that prevent much of the effects of the sea from coming in. Today the 'waves' were breaking at about 2 inches about a foot from the dry line and you really couldn't see the swell. No rip tides here. It would be a great family beach as the water is calm and the bottom drops off very slowly. Surfers are out of luck which, as it works out, an advantage for everyone but the surfers. Our escort from the ship is Sui, the Tai Chi instructor. I haven't been attending the class but I should be. She's also a good amateur photographer. I know because she took our picture on the beach and it's very well composed.
Our next stop was at the base of Machincang Mountain, the highest peak on the island. The local tourism board wanted to find a way to get people up it to enjoy the view. After considering roads and trams they decided on a cable car. Since it seemed important that the tourists survive the trip they consulted with designers from all over Scandinavia, Switzerland and Germany and finally picked a Swiss firm for the project.
From the parking lot you have to cross a suspension footbridge to enter the property. I used to walk a fairly long bridge of this type to get to my last year of high school in Stroudsburg. It was about three times longer than this one. Suspension footbridges must have been a new experience for most of the people as they did exactly the wrong thing while crossing. The stepped forward placing their feet wide apart. This isn't a bad idea on a swaying ship but on a suspension bridge it starts the bridge swaying. When six or seven people are doing this it can really get going. It's best to step forward keeping your feet as close to the centerline of the bridge as possible while keeping your body upright as though you were balancing a book on your head. Swaying from side to side will also start the bridge in motion. The heel in, toes out walk of a ballerina would be perfect. On this entire trip the ship has not moved as much as that short suspension bridge did. Thankfully it wasn't any longer because that would have given it the ability to sway even farther.
Then next two bridges were rigid. One was a flat bridge and the other curved but not as much as a Chinese Moon Bridge. After crossing the bridges you enter a small shopping complex with stores, food booths and cafés. They had some large oscillating fans in the center of the plaza with misters attached and around the center pillar they had three self-contained air conditioners that had oscillating vents. The fans had a pretty good reach but the A/C was only effective to about 2 feet. Still, their hearts were in the right place.
The cable car has a continuous motion system. The 6-person cars swing into the lower station where the people coming down get the first 90˚ to get out and the people going up have the second 90˚ to get in. They have a grid system painted on the floor that facilitates the process. Each row of the grid has 6 boxes. When you reach the front of the line they ask the next six people to walk down the row and fill the spaces. If there's an odd number they have a line for singles that fills the gap. If there are 2 empty blocks and the next party is larger than that they can split up. If they don't want they send an employee down the line asking for a couple. They open the gate into the single line and you go to the grid. Each time a car is filled the line moves up one row. When you are finally in the front row as the car swings by your box you step onboard. Very simple, but I've never seen the grid system used. It allows them time to find filler people for the last row rather than having to hurry or leave a space unused.
Apparently this is not a busy day because the Disneyland system was not in use. You entered and walked around it to join the line on the final switchback.
The ride up was interesting. D and I rode with a couple, their daughter and one of the couple's parents. They were from Beijing. The daughter and the father spoke English enough to communicate. The daughter translated for mom and grandpa. They all liked the fact that we were from Texas. Years ago when I was asked where I was from I always answered the USA. Sadly I don't really want to be associated with much of what our national government has become so now I say Texas. Since I've been responding with Texas, I notice that the responses are much more positive and sometimes even enthusiastic. I can't say I got much of that when I said USA. People want to talk about Texas and their ideas of what it is. Due to TV, movies and the medial they often have a much distorted view of the state. Not negative, just distorted. We laugh together when discussing the reality verses the perception. It's great fun. No one ever wanted to do that when I said USA.
The system's cars are nicely designed. They have large windows that make it easy to look down. Some of the cars have a glass floor but for some reason they weren't using them today. They just let them go by unfilled. I would have loved to have one. We rode over small villages, rice paddies and dense forest (most of us would call it a jungle) but technically it's not. For a while the ride is fairly horizontal, but after the first tower you really start to climb. Part way up the vertical climb we entered the clouds. Apparently the view is not going to be so good at the top.
When we arrived at the top station the view was not very good. We have an hour so I decided to sit around up there to see what would happen. In a bit the clouds started lifting a bit and I was able to get some pictures but just as fast as it lifted it dropped down again. Well, a few is better than none.
D went down the mountain before I did because she wanted to shop. On the way she rode with 5 people from Kazakhstan. At first they didn't seem too happy to have an unknown person in the car but after she said she was from Texas it was smiles and pictures all around. This is the great part of travel. Meeting the locals and also people from all over who are also traveling. I rode down with a man from the Ukraine and another Chinese couple that either didn't speak English or didn't want to. We did smile and not however. The Ukrainian and I spoke a bit about the current turmoil over there. I'm afraid that if Vlad Putin showed his face in the not Russian area of the Ukraine he wouldn't be well received to say the least.
For some reason they had whitewashed the buildings and palms along part of the centers exterior just across the first bridge. It looked like winter comes to Hawaii. It was actually quite a pleasing look. Maybe it was aimed at making you feel cooler.
Our last stop was at the Rice Garden. The homage to Malaysia's oldest industry has demonstration paddies and a museum that shows you the traditional ways of planting, harvesting and processing rice. We rested on a shady patio and had a cup of tea again under the watchful eyes of oscillating fans. I have to admit that walking on the raised perimeter of the rice paddies gave me a slightly uncomfortable feeling. I was glad I wasn't on point.
It was a very enjoyable day but the cool interior of the ship was very welcoming on our return.
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