Beach Holiday on Langkawi Island

Max got a surprise during the recent school term break.

Max loves the beach, sand-castle, shells, sunshine… so Langkawi it is, far enough to fly & short enough for him to enjoy his first ever flying trip. My hubby and I were re-visiting Langkawi Island for the 3^rd time.

A very memorable holiday for us, since it rained on Day 2 till Day 4…even when the plane lifted into the grey skies!

On arrival, we took a taxi to the hotel. The taxi ride is RM20.00 for the 15-minutes ride to Holiday Villa in Pantain Tengah, located in south-west of the island, with neighboring hotels like Frangipani, The Lanai and Tropical Resort. 

The sprawling Holiday Villa Beach Resort & Spa has a fairly relaxed setting in lush tropical garden with each of its 258-rooms open to own private balconies. Lots of bunga raya (hibiscus) as hedges leading to the beach and along the garden path, near the pool. I noticed there were lots of heliconias too. The beach is beautiful, not crowded, with quite fine white sand. If all you want is beach-sea-sand holiday, this is a good location. There are some restaurants across the road and further up.

We dropped our bags in our room, put on our swimsuits, slather on sun-block and head out to the beach. There’s something about the sea and small rolling waves that beckon to us to play in the surf…

The sunset on Day 1 weren’t perfect but we had a great time, making footprints in the wet sand, watching it washed away by the waves and we played a game of looking for buried slippers. Max’s happy laughter and chuckles could be heard as he played with his father.

Me, I’m just contented with watching the yellow ball of sun dipping further down in the horizon, slowly making way for total darkness of the nightfall. The warm breeze as it blew from the sea brought calmness to me… bringing back memories of my childhood days growing up in a seaside town. Having settled in the big city now, I realized I missed the beach so much.

The hotel’s Mario’s Italian Restaurant serves very good white sauce pasta and lasagna. We cleaned the plates before remembering to take pictures as we were just too hungry.

The next morning, we were up early at 7am, beautiful sunshine, very excited at the thought of spending the whole day at the beach. Looking out, we were pleasantly surprised to see a pair of naughty hornbills sitting at our neighbor’s balcony, knocking on the glass door. They were only 3m away. I think I had a good shot, but I was so nervous in case they flew away before I captured them in my little Canon. (Canon Powershot A700)

 

After a leisurely breakfast in Lagenda Coffee House, we changed & headed to the beach again. Max was playing at the water’s edge and scouting for seashells with his Dad. 

I was enjoying the lazy day on the sun lounger, wrapped fashionably in my colorful Noor Arfa hand-drawn batik beach pareo. A pair of sunglasses shielding my eyes, a copy of Elle in my hands and did I mention a glass of chilled OJ on the side-table? What an idyllic holiday…! I think I only needed a hammock to complete the settings.

Some young guys were enjoying the rush of adrenalin on jet-skis, a couple of guys trying out para-sailing, a few bikini-clad bodies & hunks toasting in the hot sun, lulled by the gentle sway of palm fronds overhead, I was beginning to think it’s paradise indeed…

Till my tummy rumbled, it’s lunch-time. OK, time to feed the little prince, somehow he has forgotten all about food while he’s busy building his sand-castle.

There was a humidity in the air that signaled an on-coming storm, a look to the right, showed grey clouds hovering near the airport direction. We were reluctant to leave the beach but ended up soaked to our skin, fleeing into the hotel.

We waited for the rain to stop but it didn’t, so we took a taxi to the Underwater World, wanting to catch the penguins-feeding. We were not disappointed. We saw a performance by the seals with their trainer and one in particular showed off to his audiences, zooming in the waters. It’s amazing watching those adorable looking African penguins getting fed. We could watch them swimming, as we walked in the glass tunnel. “Surf up” Cody, the rock-hopper penguin was there, looking quite wise with his yellow eyebrow.

We saw Mr Ray (the stingray character in Finding Nemo) gliding through the waters, some huge and bored-looking groupers and spotted a white-tip shark too.

Nearing the exit a very graceful white and translucent jellyfish with their ‘lacy’ tendrils could be seen in a blue tank and a moving seaweed, on closer inspection was actually a seaweed seahorse.

We took home Mumble, (Happy Feet) a small souvenir for Max.

“Oh, there’s still a drizzle, Mom” the discouraged voice of Max could be heard. We waited and shortly the sky seemed to have let up. A short stroll through the wet street of Pantai Cenang, air still damp from the recent rain, we found a small little restaurant serving fish-n-chips, surprisingly it’s quite good. We also had a strawberry milk shake for the little one. We left after that, disappointed that we couldn’t explore the street with the many little charming shops.

Day 3, was worse, it was drizzling, raining, pouring, trickling…well, wet the whole day. There’s no point renting a car to go anywhere. There was NatGeo education time on TV, 11-pages homework, Tom-&-Jerry on TV, Brain Teasers, Discovery Channel and story-telling… and more hotel food.


I decided to pamper myself with a blissful session at Amoaras Spa...

Day 4, was not better. After breakfast, we packed our bags, giving the beach one last look of sadness,“Dad, we haven’t finished building our sand-castle!” And, left for the airport intending to hang around there till our evening flight. One part of the road to the airport was flooded with 2 feet deep waters, the padi fields around there was like one large lake.

Our 4-days stay there weren’t too bad. I guess the warm friendly smiles of people somewhat made up for the wet-days. Apparently August is not a good month to go to Langkawi, wet season. I didn’t get any tan lines to show I had a beach holiday !

So, what are we gonna do this long weekend of Hari Raya...? Maybe paint the fence & gate and just might get a good tan! :-)