Hainan Association and Temple

Today was my first day in Penang, Malaysia. I actually started my visit to Malaysia over the weekend but I’ll have to write more about that exciting weekend in another post.

I woke up much later than I usually do in Asia because the guesthouse I’m staying in has no windows. It turns out that windows in guesthouses in the center of Georgetown, in Penang, are somewhat of a rarity. I’m staying at the Banana guesthouse and besides the windows situation it’s very clean and conveniently located in the middle of the backpacker strip, complete with a travel agency, cafe and free WIFI.

For breakfast I picked up a steamed bun with vegetables in the middle. I’m not sure what they call them here but they’re called bun bao in Vietnam. I was still hungry but I didn’t want to delay my walk around Georgetown since the day was already hot and was rapidly getting even hotter. I walked down a small street called Love Lane which leads into Chinatown and I passed several other guesthouses and homes. My first stop was to the Hainan Cultural Center where I was the only soul to be found. Even the person tending the desk at the entrance was off on a break somewhere. It’s always nice when you can wander into a place, snap some photos and hear the sound of silence around you.
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The Pool at the Coral Resort, Kaibe Beach

We stayed a total of seven nights on the island of Koh Chang and four of those were at a very nice resort, the Coral Resort, located at the northern end of Kaibe Beach. This is not a huge resort or even a fancy resort like the ones a bit further North at Klong Prao Beach. But this resort had what we needed and more.

We opted for a private cabin with air-conditioning which ran us 2,000 Thai Baht ($53) a night. Identical cabins with a sea view were 2,500 but from our cabin the sea was still visible between the neighboring “sea-view cabins”. Walking about 20 meters brought us to the edge of the sea for an unobstructed view.
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The Night Lights of Saigon

On our first full day in HCMC we woke up not knowing what time it was since the room we were in at the NY Kim Phuong Hotel (complete with photos of New York in each room) had no windows. We skipped the included pho breakfast (hard to believe one can skip a yummy pho breakfast) in favor of the banh cuon at modern looking joint down the block called “Wrap & Roll”.

Vietnam Airlines has an office next door so we went in to book tickets to Phu Quoc Island. We were told that tickets are nearly sold out and we managed to get the only 2 seats available this week and nothing for a return flight. Fortunately, there’s a ferry/bus combo as an alternative should we get “stuck” on the island.

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After getting very little sleep last night we exited the bus and grabbed a coffee before being picked up by another bus on the way to Siem Reap, Cambodia. The journey lasted no less than 30 hours and we’ve just now arrived in Siem Reap. After trying some recommended hotels that were fully-booked we finally found a hotel for the next few nights. We also secured a tuk-tuk driver to take us around to Angkor Wat and other sites tomorrow and the next day. We’ve just finished our first real meal since breakfast at the guesthouse back in Laos and it was damn good!