Reason #492 To Come Visit Us

Places like this are an hour plane ride away.

M and I took C to Redang this past weekend. We had never been to Redang before, and I'm always game for a weekend of sun, sand and being a slug, so I was ready.

Redang is a tiny island off the east coast of Malaysia. The water is crystal clear, the beaches are powdery white, and it's a haven for scuba divers, snorkelers and anyone else wanting to "get away from it all". The first day, we lounged on the beach and went on a four stop snorkeling tour around the island. The snorkeling was great, and some people in our group even saw a black fin shark. Luckily, we didn't hear about it until we were on our way back to the resort, or else we wouldn't have gotten C back in the water!

On our way back to the resort, we saw a great little deserted beach just one cove over from our resort, so on the second day we rented a four person paddle boat and (slooowly) made our way over to the other beach. A private beach, all to ourselves! We had C with us, so there was no hanky panky, but this kind of beach would have been perfect for it (if you are keen on getting sand where no sand should be). Then, since we had promised C, we went on a banana boat ride. Banana boats are the long, well, banana looking things that are pulled behind a speed boat. M and I thought that it would be a little boring, because from the beach, it didn't look like it went very fast and the driver didn't seem to get very western with it. We were wrong. The banana boat rocks. Highly recommended (with goggles).

The resort we stayed at (Berjaya Beach Resort)....eh. Five star view, 3.5 star facilities, 2 star service. Slow is one thing - I mean, you're on a beach resort - but they just really didn't have their stuff together. I'll spare you the many, many examples. Plus, they didn't walk around the beach and bring us drinks with umbrellas in them. This is an extremely important part of my beach resort experience. Thumbs down on the whole "no bringing of the umbrella drinks to my beach lounger" thing. Suffice it to say, I'm sure we will go back to Redang, because I think that most of our problems with this trip can be resolved next time by staying at a different resort.