Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Malaysia, Asia

Today was another lengthy day of travelling, but I ended up in one of the most beautiful places in the world, so it wasn’t so bad I guess. Ana and I left Kota Bharu at about 11am and grabbed a bus to Kuala Besut where we could get a ferry to the islands. The bus ride was a pretty simple hour and fifteen minutes with just a lot of small villages on the way. It became much more apparent today that we are in a very poor country. It wasn’t as noticeable in the cities, but out here you can really see that the people just have nothing.

We got to Kuala Besut and had to search for the correct hostel office, but that wasn’t easily done. We finally found it and tried to find the local ATM. We were told to walk through a village to get to it, and I have never felt more out of place in my life. We were walking by goats and chickens on the side of the road and people just sitting outside their “houses” doing nothing. I’m not sure that anyone here actually has a job, so I’m not sure how they buy anything that they have, or what they do all day.

We found the ATM only to find out that they wouldn’t accept ANY of our cards, so we couldn’t get any more money for the islands. This wouldn’t have been such a problem except for the fact that there are no ATMs on the island and no one will take a credit card. Ana and I have only a little bit of cash and it has to last us for the next few days, so we’ll see how that goes…

We got a water taxi over to Coral Beach on the small island and it was an absolutely stunning ride. The Perhentian Islands were in our sights and we were surrounded by a bunch of other smaller islands. It was beautiful. We had to walk through half of the island (all uphill of course) to get to Tropicana Resort where we were staying. That is a very loose translation of the word resort by the way. It is not a nice hostel at all. Ana and I are staying in eight bed dorms with cement floors and bunk beds, that’s it. It’s only $5 a night though, so I suppose I can’t expect much more.

We dropped our bags off in our rooms and headed straight down to Long Beach for some much needed R&R. The water is crystal clear and it is like bath water. It’s not all that refreshing to get into but it’s nice to just be able to sit out there and be completely comfortable. It’s nice to finally not be sweating and gross all the time.

After chilling on the beach we headed back up to the hostel for a bit and then went out for dinner with a couple of Ana’s roommates. We had a great dinner down on the beach watching the sun set over Coral Beach. Not a bad way to spend an evening. Since we are so light on cash, we are taking it easy tonight and just watched an episode of the Amazing Race Australia that I missed a couple weeks ago. I love that show! Tomorrow we have a snorkel day planned. Should be fun 🙂