We visited KL primarily for a visa run as we will be spending over 30 days in Thailand, and on re-entry into the country the visa is renewed. We spent two days and 3 nights in KL. Our first evening was spent wondering around Chinatown, which was the area our guesthouse was in. Chinatown seemed to be primarily comprised of 2 streets intersecting through the middle (much like Chichester for all you local readers). Hundreds of stalls line either side of the streets selling everything from fresh (still smoking) smoked chestnuts, fake goods (watches, clothes, sunglasses etc), local crafts and food and drink. It was a busy, bustling place full of character with a hint of the old style charm that would have pre-dated the current 'modern/fake' goods period. After a good nights sleep we spent our first day sightseeing. We wondered about the City Museum, Freedom Park, and visited the old mosques, unfortunately the most famous mosque, Masjid Jamek was at the time closed to non Muslims. We also went to a large park called Lake Gardens where we visited a butterfly park. Wondering around KL is incredibly easy thanks the highly efficient and simple-to-use transit system they have which is comprised of a monorail and underground/overground system. In much the same vain as the London system it's comprised of around 8 lines/routes. We visited other areas of KL such as Bukit Bintang, which is the main shopping and business district. Here we found, among others, a H&M, Zara, McDonalds etc! After several hours of wondering about we visited the famous 'Petronas Towers'. The Petronas towers is comprised of two huge towers connected by a 'Skybridge', the towers are the tallest in SE Asia and rank in the worlds top 10 tallest buildings. There's a huge shipping centre at the bottom and a park at the back. We walked around the towers gazing up until our necks were stiff! It made you dizzy looking up at them! We then walked around the shopping centre which as you may imagine, was full of shops that were way above our budget! As we (and several hundred others) watched the sun set over the towers from the park behind, we were treated to a water fountain light show which happens every night after sunset. The park has a large lake full of fountains water jets and lights which shoot water synchronised to music playing from speakers throughout the park. I'll put a video up of they in another post. Our second day was spent primarily in two places, Batu Caves and The National Zoo. Batu cave is, as you would expect, a large cave which houses Hindu Temples. It's a hot and sweaty 200 step climb to the top and to be honest not much of a pay off! The views looking down over the city however were quite nice! The zoo also was a bit of a disappointment, but you can see that that the Zoological Society are currently spending a lot of money on improvements; there were building works everywhere! They are building a new elephant enclosure and a new panda enclosure as they will shortly be taking delivery of a giant panda. To be honest we didn't mid so much, there were still plenty of animals to see, plus an aquarium and a animal show. I cam imagine in a year or two it will be a top quality zoo. We are now back in Thailand and preparing to head to Koh Phi Phi tomorrow morning bright and early! Here's a photo of a elephant from KL Zoo stretching...
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