Langkawi, Malaysia

March 16, 2024 - Today we docked in Langkawi, the second of three ports in Malaysia. We arrived late, as the local authorities diverted us - the equivalent of being made to circle when coming in for a flight landing. (For those watching on cruise mapper, that is why you saw the loop that Dennis said made it seem we sailed over land). We were afraid this would become another missed port — but luckily it was just a delay.

Once docked, we had quite a long walk on the pier to get to the buses - which was fine for us but difficult for many of our fellow travelers. And once there, we had a great tour - Discovering the Ecosystem of the Mangroves We had a wonderful guide who met us at the dock and gave us great commentary on the 30 minute bus ride (??) to the Kilm Geoforest Park, a UNESCO world heritage site. Our tour guide, Patrick who was a native of the Island was so very passionate about protecting their envirenment and not over developing the Island. We exited our bus and spilt our group into two to board our 16 person river boats. Our first stop was at a cave, where we saw lots of bats and monkeys - and where even we had to crouch to walk through parts of the cave. Luckily it was low tide and not the rainy season or the caves would have been inaccessible. Our second stop was at a fish farm, where the locals talked about the fish in the area both what they catch/eat from the sea as well as what they raise in the fish farm. there were about 3 of these fish farm “platforms”, but at least one is no longer operational as it is thought the owner of that, as well as a few of the boats that are now sunk in the river, died during the pandemic. A sad reminder of people never heard from again in these small islands after the pandemic. Our final stop, we stayed on the boats, but idled in the middle of an eagle sanctuary - where there we dozens of eagles flying overhead. It was spectacular. Not something you could capture via camera, unless you had a really great lens. At some point we put our phone cameras down and just enjoyed and took pictures with our minds. Patrick told us how important the mangroves are to the ecosystem on all these Islands, as it protects them from ocean storms. We had an easy ride back to the pier, and took our time with the walk back to the ship as it was quite hot. There was one hotel along the pier, which had an infinity pool next to the pier into the harbor. We later learned from Tarriro, on of our favorite wine stewards, that he and some fellow crew members took advantage of the short free time they had and for $10 dollars were given access to the infinity pool , a towel and a drink. So a great day for us and a great day for some of the crew as well — who deserve every break they get.