Getting High In Kuala Lumpur – Family Adventures in Malaysia.

From about the age of six, I remember playing a board game called “Air Charter”, and one of my favourite and hardest to pronounce destinations in the game was Kuala Lumpur. With SARS at its height in 2003 when we were last travelling in Asia, we never made it to Malaysia. But now, forty years after I first became aware of the city, we were finally going get to spend some time in KL. And I was properly excited about it.I must say, that Kuala Lumpur hasn’t disappointed. It’s an amazing place, completely unlike anywhere else that we’ve visited in the last eight months. It’s absolutely huge. It’s ridiculously high. It’s got actual pavements and traffic regulations. And the heat and humidity are completely off the scale. We had four days in the city, and they absolutely flew by. Unlike Bangkok, getting around is super easy and cheap using the metro which efficiently links all the major destinations. We spent most of our time around the amazing Petronas Towers, 400 metres of steel and glass which were once the tallest buildings in the world. The trip to the top is pretty cool, but the KL Tower is cheaper and gives you a much better, more relaxed view of the city. We spent a cracking couple of hours atop the KL Tower, enjoying the spectacle of an afternoon monsoon rainstorm blow through the skyscrapers and surrounding mountains.

Culture-wise, we were pretty poor, preferring to spend time being “normal”, which meant eating at Subway, going to the Petronas sponsored science museum, and spending a Marvel-tastic night out at the cinema. I think that this makes KL the kids’ favourite place for a long time. We did take time out from being “normal” to visit the amazing bird gardens, have a quick glance at a very pretty Hindu temple, and go shopping in Chinatown (big shout out here to Danny, the official Rolex dealer on Jalan Petaling, love him). But we always ended back at the Petronas Towers, hiding from the humidity. We loved our time here, and if we’re ever lucky enough to get back then there’s plenty of stuff to do to easily keep us busy in and around the city for another seven days. The aquarium looks fab, the Batu Caves are meant to be amazing, and we’ve got at least another half day to spend in the science museum. And we never did make it to a roof-top restaurant for dinner. Oh, and lets not forget the Grand Prix just thirty minutes outside the city. Looking forward to it already.

Love KL. Love really tall buildings. Always lost at Air Charter.

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