Tag: Shopping

Kuala Lumpur Highlights

We spent five days and nights in Kuala Lumpur and were wowed by its mix of styles and cultures. From huge modern skyscrapers to old-school street markets, Malaysia’s biggest city has it all. It’s also big, busy, and very hot, so we learned to go out early in the morning or in the evening, not mid-day. Our Kuala Lumpur highlights include cool neighborhoods, amazing food, and impressive sights.

Kuala Lumpur highlights, Central Market
We loved Kuala Lumpur’s Central Market

About Kuala Lumpur

Located in the western-central part of Peninsular Malaysia, KL is 40km from the west coast and strait of Malacca. From the south, it’s over 300km from Puteri Harbour and took us a few hours on the train. I mentioned the heat, and we went in late June, the dry season. Temperatures ranged around 32C/90F during the day, and the sun is hot and the streets don’t have shade. I missed Cairns!

Malaysia’s largest city, Kuala Lumpur is quite small compared to Tokyo or Jakarta. With a population of just over 2.1 million people, the city is smaller even than Toronto. It’s also considerably cheaper than Tokyo or Toronto. With a culturally diverse population, there’s also lots to see, do, and eat.

giant rotis at TGs Bistro in Kuala Lumpur
We didn’t try, but everyone was taking photos of the giant rotis at TGs Bistro

Intro to Kuala Lumpur

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A Week in Ua Pou Marquesas

As often happens in our sailing lives, plans changed when we visited our second Marquesan island. We thought we’d stay for a few days but we were having so much fun we spent a week in Ua Pou!

About Ua Pou

Ua Pou (pronounced Wah Poe) is another mountainous Marquesan island. We were told the name means “two pillars” for the twin peaks rising above the other mountains, dominating the island’s landscape. Located south of Nuku Hiva in the northern Marquesas, we made it our second stop in French Polynesia.

Week in Ua Pou map Marquesas
Ua Pou and The Marquesas Islands map

The third largest Marquesan island with 5 towns and over 2,000 people, Ua Pou covers over 40 square miles.

The defining pillars of Ua Pou
The defining pillars of Ua Pou

We happily anchored in the main port of Hakahau, with stunning views of the mountains and near the conveniences of town.

Culture

One of the highlights of our week in Ua Pou was culture day. The islanders took advantage of shutdowns for a Catholic holiday and had a big cultural celebration.

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Provisioning During Covid-19 Curfew

After spending 3 weeks in a remote anchorage, and not visiting a supermarket in almost 4 weeks, the crew of Sava needed supplies. Our intrepid captain Brian summoned up his skills from a past life as a restaurateur and found a wholesaler to stock our anchorage. We are becoming experts at provisioning during Covid-19 curfew.

Straight to the Source

Brian’s idea was brilliant because the wholesaler has scant customers right now. The hotels, resorts and restaurants that are their regular businesses are all shuttered. We cruisers stepped in to fill the void, and our pantries, fridges and freezers and bars. This was a good provisioning.

Google Docs FTW

The wonders of technology, and Brian’s skills, made this provisioning pretty pain free. The wholesaler sent us 4 lists of products and prices, we made them available to our 7 buddy boats, and people spent a day creating their orders.

We used shared google docs folder so we could see each other’s orders, which was really helpful because many of the supplies were only available in bulk. But what’s 15 lbs of bacon or pork loin between 7 boats?

Bacon anyone?
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