100 Island Dressing Langkawi April 11th 2012

Lake for swimming

100 Island Flirt..

Ok, so I could spend all day on the beach and just, well, just nothing, or I can go and see something of the Island. For about 30 RM there is a cable car ride among the mountain peaks, taxi there is about 26 RM. For 25 RM there is a boat ride to some close by islands, 3-4 hours of skimming across the sea.  There are around 100 Islands making up Langkawi providing some stunningly scenic backdrops, and a quick flirt with some of them sounds like fun.

Tourists Garbage.

A round up of victims starts at 2 pm and by 2.15 the mini-van pulls up to a quayside the next village along the coastline. Looks quite posh around here! Yachts moored, smart hillside lodges and a rather expensive looking hotel all situated among some nice forested hillsides. So, emerald green hills with a turquoise sea makes for some rather exotic photos. A about a dozen of us on this boat, I'm the only western tourist though. The crew handout some well worn life jackets and off we go. It's a fast boat, I mean really fast, have to hold on tightly as it bumps across the sea to The first Island.

Heading up along a well maintained path, through some rather dense forest. Monkeys, butterflies and bugs are all present on this Eco Island - some kind of preservation project. Down the other side and there is a lake. A bluey green with pontoons hooked up for folks to jump off. The monkeys are unsurprisingly quite tame given the hoards of tourists that must feed them tit bits on a daily basis. It's actually quite good fun watching them swing,  miss their branch and fall into the water - they seem to be good swimmers!

Eagle

Bumping away to the next island - next time I'll bring a cushion! About 20 eagles are circling a handful of tourist boats, diving into the sea occasionally. Interesting to watch for about 10 minutes then it's off to the next Island.

A white sandy beach, shallow turquoise waters and palms make this a truly exotic stop off. 1 hour here for swimming and other antics like riding on a banana boat or parasailing. No monkeys, but I do spot a hornbill parrot, some colourful butterflies and plenty of corals along the shoreline. Oh, and plenty of mosquitoes, all quite ready to bite at any opportunity.

An interesting 3 hour flirt with some of Langkawi's islands, all tourist traps of course, but still a good opportunity to see nature, when time is constrained to a couple of days. Back to base then, about 15 minutes of more rough riding on the ocean. Back to Rainbow lodge for eats since its convenient and not overpriced by Langkawi standards, and has free Wifi too.