Today we got our first real glimpse of Malaysia as it was dark when we arrived last night. We took a trip to the main town on Langkawi this morning called Kuah where we got some photos of the Eagle statue and took a walk around the local "theme park" which was more park than theme park- we did spot a big lizard though- the first of our many wildlife encounters during the day!!
After a visit to the local shopping centre (for the air conditioning obviously) we travelled to the cable car station close to the hotel which is the boarding point for the steepest cable car in the world! It's fair to say Ania wasn't the most keen and I (Jason) didn't really blame her so I went alone in the cable car while Ania waited down below. About 10 seconds into the journey I remembered my fear of heights and so spent the next 10 minutes trying to pretend that I wasn't actually travelling 2000 feet into the air! When I reached the top I was able to walk across the Langkawi Sky Bridge which extends between two of the mountain peaks. After a swift walk across the bridge and then back (again thanks to my fear of heights) and an encounter with a few monkeys along the way I made my way back down to Ania who was waiting below.
We made our way back to the hotel and stopped off at the shop for some snacks. We then got the shuttle buggy back to the cabin only to find a few monkeys waiting for us outside who were particularly interested in our bag of snacks! The buggy driver shooed the monkeys away while we ran to our door and once inside we made sure the door was properly locked!
After a short rest back in our cabin (and some monkey watching from our window) we then went along to the beach where we met a tour guide for free hour long mangrove forest tour provided by the hotel. The mangrove trees grow in the wetlands just behind the beach and it was interesting to find out a bit more about the local habitat. We even had a visit from a few more monkeys (shy leaf macaques to be exact).
After another wash and shower in our cabin we discovered that we now had a lizard residing in our bathroom and as it stands we think 'Lizzie' is currently living behind our bathroom mirror!
To finish the day we went to the Chinese/Japanese restaurant in the hotel for tea and had probably the best meal we've had all trip! We then sat down in the bar to listen to a rather dodgy pianist before making our way back to the cabin for the night (and another appearance from Lizzie)!
