Tag: friends

Rock sport climbing in Gua Musang in Malaysia, living in the lost place camp site, and Racki’s birthday (December 2025)

From Kuala Lumpur we took a bus to Gua Musang. On the booking website, it said the bus would take five hours. A taxi driver told us that it would take seven or more hours. So we were prepared and surprised when we reached our destination in under five hours.
The climbing crag was at the entrance of a recreational area, was not that high, but looked nice. See it on thecrag.com 🥳
There were basically routes around the whole crag and right through the crag went a tunnel which was the main attraction for none climbing visitors 🙂
During our six day stay, it rained a lot. It was still rainy season so it was not a big surprise. But we climbed the front of the crag on a dry day and inside of the crag were two to three routes that were almost completely protected from the rain by the huge overhangings at the top of the crag.
We met a Malay climber couple and had good fun climbing 🧗‍♂️
This was the map of the area where the climbing crag was located 🗺️
At first we pitched up our tent on an ordinary tent pitch …
… and used the nearby pavilion to hang out and…
… cook 🏡
We had some long…
… and stinky friends 🦨
And when the rain came…
… we moved our tent in one of the huge pavilions 🎊
It was rather spacious 😅
We had a monkey family living with us in the camping area and sometimes they were running and jumping from our roof in the trees and back again 🦘
And once they stole our food 🤣
On Racki’s birthday we wanted to get some drinks and walked to the only market that sold alcohol. That one had a small Chinese temple as well and we bought some small cans of beer for 2,5 Euro each🎐
The shop owner and a customer were very nice and we had some interesting topics to talk about 😀
The guest insisted to give us a ride back to a restaurant close to our camp spot and gifted Racki a birthday cake and a rose on the way there 🍰
Racki’s birthday dinner…
… and birthday cake and beer 🎂

KLCC Aquarium in Malaysia and see you next time, Tom (December 2025)

We went back to Kuala Lumpur and spent some hours in the KLCC Aquarium 🐠
I found the sharks, …
… turtles, …
… and rays the most impressive 🤩
The interiors of the aquariums appeared sometimes a bit sterile 🛀🏽
But it was nice …
to see all these different animals 🙂
Especially the crazy looking ones like these ones sticking in the ground, …
… or this funny fellow 😄
😳
But always asking myself how it is for these animals being locked down in these small pools 🤔
These were the big insects making a lot of the loud sounds in the jungle 🔊
😄
And there were some rare dinosaurs as well 🤣
We had a last, very delicious dinner together in an Indian restaurant, …
… some last impressions of the skyscrapers, the jungle, …
… and the contrasts between old and new, …
… and then Tom had to leave and fly back to Germany. We had a great time together with a lot of discoveries and experiences 🤗

To the tropical beach on Marina and Pangkor Island in Malaysia (December 2025)

We took two busses from the Cameron Highlands to the coast.
The first one was very comfortable and the second an older line bus. The driver delivered packages as well 😁
As always, we took the cheapest apartment we could find. This one was nice and had a nice view.
No hot plate, but we managed to buy a gas canister and pot for our camping stove so that we could cook from time to time on our balcony 🍳
The view was very beautiful and several times we spotted a pretty big waran. We called her Clementine 🐊
It was beautiful at night as well. The whole apartment complex was almost abandoned for most of our time there. So we had the pool just for us 🌌
We found a nice restaurant and had very good dinners there 🥳
Tom and I had some fish 🐟
And on the small Marina Island, which seemed to be an artificial Resort Island, was this: the funtasiland!
The most neon place we have ever seen! The sand for the kids to play in was neon pink and blue as well 🤣
One day we went into the small town of Lumut. Very much deserted in the off season 😁
With nice graffiti pictures …
… and robots 🤖
In an Chinese temple we put some wishes on the wishes tree 🙏🏼
Another day we went to Pangkor Island. A customs free island where you can mostly buy sweets and fish. No alcohol or cigarettes 😁
They had a whole lot of scooters on that island. New and old 😳
A mosque in the ocean 🌊
A gang of goose that went rogue and had to get caught 🤣
And we went to this magnificent tropical beach 🏝️
It was very beautiful ❤️
Hammock, …
…
… this nice blend of jungle, sand, and ocean …
…
… and some animals to discover. There was a wild boar as well 🐗
And this nasty monkey who wanted to steal some stuff from us. But we fought him back ☮️
After some hours at that magnificent beach, we started our way back to civilization ✨
At first, the jungle trails was like the ones we already took before 😀
But the trail developed into a very rough one. The photo doesn’t do it justice. The path was marked by small pieces of barrier tape wrapped around trees. But sometimes big trees had fallen covering the tape and blocking the trail. So we spent a lot of time searching for markings, going around the fallen trees, breaking our way through the plants who had taken over the path, and sliding down muddy slopes. It was adventurous and in the end it took us almost three hours to walk almost three kilometers!
Here is our tour on Komoot 🌿
But we made it in time so that we could head to the last ferry going back to Marina Island 🥳
On our way to the ferry we came across another nice beach ⛱️
And at home we treated Racki’s and Tom’s wounds from leeches. For some reason the leeches did not suck on me. Maybe the mosquitos already had taken all my blood 😳
And in the jungle there were all the saw, and blade cutter noises 🤯🤪