24th July - Penang

We planned to spend the day at Penang National Park so went to find somewhere for a filling and healthy breakfast. Somehow, I ended up with a fried roti banana which was bizarrely served with a spicy masala sauce. It started chucking it down before we'd even finished so we waited for the rain to slow a little before heading out to catch the bus.
The aircon on the bus was set to 'arctic' again and so I was grateful for the extra layers of waterproof jacket and a cardy, even thought it was still pretty cold.

We checked in at the National park entrance (so that they could come and get us if we didn't return) and decided on the walk to Turtle Beach rather than Monkey Beach. There were lots of steps climbing up and down and we were very sweaty but the walk was only an hour or so and we barely came across anyone else - just a group of 3 guys who appeared to be running and so were obviously insane. We did see a huge centipede and a few butterflies though.

Turtle beach was quite nice and was deserted but we didn't see any turtles. We didn't do much there apart from I had a nice snooze on a bench and we snacked on a healthy lunch of dried fruit, chocolate filled wafer biscuits and deep-fried masala beans.

The walk  back was equally sweaty but didn't seem as far. We were enticed into to a nearby called 'Mom's and Pop's' by a Malaysian/Indian taxi driver and enjoyed some tasty local curries as we chatted to him.
The bus back was still freezing but not too bad now that we weren't soaked with rain. We got off at a local shopping centre called Komtar to do some wire shopping so we could replace the bag of wiress we left on Koh Tao. Miraculously, we stumbled across compouter section in the middle of otherwise deserted market, and found almost everything we needed. I did break accidentally break the clips (on both sides!) of my precious bumbag and so felt rather sulky as we looked at a few andriod phones . Taking a basic phone with me was a bit of a mistake because we mostly get wifi at restaurants when we don't actually have the laptop with us.

We took the free bus back near ur guesthouse and I got into a conversation with a nice Malaysian old man. We had been chatting for a while when he told me he'd been really sick and had been to the doctors and I hope he didn't notice when I started leaning back and covering my mouth. I then became more aware that he had a line of what looked like vomit around his mouth and a slick of browny/orange in his mouth and round his teeth. After this I struggled to concentrate and was quite relieved when he got off.

It was getting late by the time we returned and so spent a practical hour or so packing and going to the ATM, ready for our early start tomorrow.