World cruise 29

March 6 (Day 60!)

We are at Port Klang, Malaysia which serves Kuala Lumpur. We are docked in the effective middle of nowhere, a 40 minute bus ride from anywhere. Margaret's tour went to the Batu Caves (with 272 steps?) and the KL Tower (1,381 feet high). She will need to report on that.

Mine was called "Kuala Lumpur Highlights" and was supposed to also go to the observation deck of the KL Tower plus the usual other stuff and a photo stop for the Petronas Towers. I took one look at how far I would have to hike just to get to the terminal building, much less through the building and out to the bus parking area, and said "No way," out loud several times, went back to the cabin and back to sleep.

Margaret's tour also did most of the basic highlights of Kuala Lumpur as well as the Batu Caves. So she got up in the KL Tower to view the city, and got the iconic photo of the Petronas Towers you see here.

March 7

Today we are at Georgetown ... Penang, Malaysia not D.C. We spent the morning tendering from the middle of the port area as both berths had other ships in them. One was an Aida ship (a cruise line from Europe). The other was a Chinese ship that Penny identified as either the former Sagaffjord or Vistafjord. She still looks like a real ship rather than an apartment building on its side.

Around 1:00 PM it was our turn for a half day's berth at the dock. So of course we wound up with our stern closest to the terminal and the gangway as far forward as you can get to make the absolute maximum distance I would have to walk to reach the terminal building.

Since the tour I had chosen had been canceled "due to lack of participation," i had planned to at least go into the terminal and look around. I nixed that idea when returning passengers reported that there wasn't must in there. So Malaysia will have to continue to live without my footprints on its shores. I would have taken better photos, but the haze (or maybe air pollution) was so thick you really couldn't see anything of the city.

There are actually buildings back there along the horizon.