Untether The Dirigible! : Paradise...Theoretically

Langkawi is about as close as you can get to Thailand without using up your 15-day overland visa. It's duty-free, so the liquor prices are shockingly cheap; it's an uncrowded island, so the roads are scooter-friendly; and it's equatorial, so you surely won't get cold. Fine-sand beaches, great Indian and Chinese food, and hawkers so unobtrusive, it's like they aren't even there (before 7:00PM).

On the promise of a valid email address we were able to secure accommodation at the Rainbow Guest House, and upon expression of our desire to extend said accommodation, we were told we could have stayed until "the end of the year", if we would have liked. Technically located in a village, the guest house provided us with serene views of grazing cattle, along with regular repetitions of The Call To Prayer. Pentai Cenang, one of the premiere beaches on the island, was a mere 7-minute walk away. It wasn't until we tried this walk in "Feel's Like 41°C" heat that we realized just how long 7-minutes really was.

Excursions on the island were generally limited. We signed up for an Island Hopping tour, which took us to two different islands. Highlights of this included: witnessing a monkey steal a baby's bottle out of a backpack, dumping a bucket of fish-guts in the water for 'eagle'-feeding (pretty sure they were actually shithawks), and laughing at the tacky souvenir plates awaiting us on completion of the afternoon. Naturally, we bought one. Can anyone say "family heirloom?"

Having recovered from our last scooter adventure in Vietnam, we decided to rent a scooter for the day to see parts of the island that were outside of the 7-minute melt-zone. 30 Ringgit ($10 CAD) in rental fees and 50 cents worth of fuel later, we were on the open road! As it turns out, the island of Langkawi is deceptively diminutive. What one expected to take 30 minutes took five. Within an hour and a half, we found ourselves cooling our feet at a waterfall. A little over 45 minutes after that we found ourselves atop Gunung Raya, enjoying the relative coolness of 893m. Our little Honda Ikon didn't get low on gas until almost 100km of sightseeing, and the local (left-hand drive) traffic didn't show us falangs too much malice on the roadways.

The 8 days we spent in Langkawi were relaxing, and likely very bad for our skin. As much as we tried to love the island, it was just not the tropical paradise for us. The ultra conservative sentiments of the locals, the ever abundant jelly fish in the water and the utter lack of nightlife left us craving Hawaii's Aloha, and Thailand's friendliness.

D&L