Langkawi, Malaysia – An Interesting Journey…..

13th February, 2019

Well, here we are on the island of Langkawi, which, for the unitiated is officially known as Langkawi, the Jewel of Kedah (Malay: Langkawi Permata Kedah) and is a district and an archipelago of 99 islands (+ 5 small islands visible only at low tide) in the Andaman Sea some 30 km off the mainland coast of northwestern Malaysia. The islands are a part of the state of Kedah, which is adjacent to the Thai border. On 15 July 2008, Sultan Abdul Halim of Kedah consented to the change of name to Langkawi Permata Kedah in conjunction with his golden jubilee celebration. By far the largest of the islands is the eponymous Langkawi Island (Pulau Langkawi), with a population of some 64,792; the only other inhabited island being nearby Tuba Island. The island is about 90% Malay and has been transformed in recent years (not always successfully) by tourism.

Langkawi was historically home to seafarers, such as the orang laut or sea people originally from the southern part of the Malay Peninsula, as well as pirates and fishermen. It had been thought to be cursed for a couple of centuries – according to local legend, in the late 18th century, a woman named Mahsuri was wrongfully accused of adultery and put to death, and she placed a curse on the island that would last for seven generations. Not long after Mahsuri’s death, in 1821, the Siamese army invaded Kedah, and attacked Langkawi. In the first attack, the locals decided to burn down the granary at Padang Matsirat to starve and drive out the Siamese army. The Siamese nevertheless finally captured the island in May 1822, killed its leaders, and many of the islanders were taken as slaves, while others were forced to flee. Before the Siamese invasion, there was an estimated island population of 3–5000, and only a small proportion was left after the invasion.

The island was recaptured from Siamese rule in a campaign against the Siamese in 1837. In 1840–1841, the Sultan of Kedah, who went into exile after the Siamese attacks, was allowed to return by the Siamese, and the population of Langkawi islands recovered afterwards mainly due to settlement of immigrants from Sumatra. However, the Orang Laut who fled after the Siamese attacks did not returned. In 1909, the islands came under British rule under the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909. During the World War II, Siam took control briefly as British Malaya fell to the Japanese.

Langkawi had been a haven for pirates which affected the northern part of the Strait of Malacca. In a series of operations, between December 1945 and March 1946, the British cleared the pirates’ land base in Langkawi and Tarutao. The British continued to rule until Malaya gained its independence in 1957.

Langkawi remained as a quiet backwater until 1986, when the then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad decided to transform it into a major tourist resort, helping to plan many of the islands buildings himself. The curse placed by Mahsuri for seven generations was said to have lifted as the 7th generation descendant of Mahsuri who now lives in Phuket Province was born. The island rapidly grew as a tourist destination, and by 2012, it had received over 3 million tourists a year and has grown considerably more since then. (My thanks to Wikipedia for most of the above!)

Val and I (but most me – or is that I?) thought that it would be easier, quicker, cheaper and more fun to depart from Ko Lanta on 10th February by taking the ferry first to Ko Lipe to the south and then to Langkawi. Well it was definitely quicker than driving up to Krabi (about 2 hours), checking in 2 hours before the flight, then flying to Langkawi via Singapore taking some 8.5 hours at more than twice the price, not counting the cost of getting to Krabi. So the ferry was a good bet – we simply had to check in at 1000, ferry leaves at 1030, arrives Ko Lipe, deal with Thai and Malaysian immigration, transfer to another ferry and arrive in Langkawi at about 5.30pm, Thailand time (6.30pm Malaysia). Simples!

Well, there were a couple of things that we had not counted upon. One was that Val’s groin injury was not better. It affects her ability to lift her left leg up and down, so getting in and out of cars (and boats!) and the like is very painful. Now, I had rather assumed that we simply walk off the pier or jetty onto the boat and so on, no problem. But no, it was more like a large speed boat that was moored to a very rickety wooden pile of poles that passed for the ferry terminal. Indeed, we were worried at one point as we waited to board that it would be only a floating pile of poles with us amongst them as one of the ferries seemed to have mistaken forward for reverse and gave it a severe bump! They did at least load our luggage on for us (stowed in the front) and then it was a case of carefully trying to step down into the boat without falling over the side or face first into the boat itself.

We settled at the very back, which was good and bad. Good because we had more legroom compared to everyone else; bad because we were sat right next to 4 very loud and powerful outboard motors which made all conversation impossible and left my hearing impaired for at least an hour afterwards. Our departure time stretched to 1130 (still not sure why, but it might have been a wait for passengers from a connecting ferry), but boy did we get a move on after that even though a sardine tin would have been a roomy luxury for most of the passengers in comparison.

We arrived in Ko Lipe just under 3 hours later and it seemed that first we had to disembark onto a floating platform where you then bought tickets for a long-tail boat ride to the shore. Luckily the only cash we had was exactly the right amount of Thai Baht for this, so the luggage was lowered in and we stepped/climbed/clambered/fell in, none of which was helping Val’s strain unfortunately.

We arrived at the beach and wondered what was next in store. Apparently it was going to be a case of throwing one’s shoes/sandals onto the sand and leaping over the edge into the water, though they did find some steps for Val. Luckily one of the ferry people took some degree of pity on us, not least as we have two large suitcases, two trundles and my camera bag and a shoulder bag – none of which are designed to be dragged along a stunning, but still very sandy, beach.

Next stop was the nearby Thai immigration, which seemed to consist of a table under a thatched roof, then down to the Malaysian immigration chap in his booth and then we sat down to await our departure for the next ferry. We all assembled on the chairs laid out in rows on the sand presumably for that purpose until we were told to move to the cafe nearby as some other passengers were due for a sit down! After about an hour we were called by our pre-issued numbers, dragged the cases over the sand to a floating plastic jetty and into another long-tail boat for a short journey to our final ferry, which proved to be a little tired, but did have air-conditioned seating!

I regret there are no photos of any of the above largely because I seemed to have my hands full of luggage most of the time and my camera had necessarily had to be packed rather deeply into my decidedly weighty and rather inaccessible camera bag.

And finally, pretty much on time, we arrived in Langkawi with an easy exit off the ferry, fairly swift immigration and our pre-arranged taxi waiting to take us to our resort, Ombak Villas. Phew!! It had certainly been a bit of an adventure, which would have been much easier with less luggage and more flexible limbs and maybe a bit of warning by the ferry company as to what to expect! Unfortunately all this clambering had not improved Val’s strain, but more on that in my next post – suffice to say, we have seen another (very nice) doctor and are trying to sort it out.

Our room is, once again, large, though weirdly dark so that we have to switch on about a dozen lights (I kid you not) just to raise a glimmer. It also seems to have a strange smell (not unlike durian!) in the bathroom (which was there before we arrived!), which they seemed to have tried to deal with by no fewer than 2 air fresheners, which now seem to be competing for dominance, so it is all a bit of a heady mix in there right now. All a bit odd. I had better point out that there are more luxurious resorts and hotels available, but at a price (£200+ a night)…..

There is a separate bit of the hotel that is on stilts over the water, which looks nice and we are going to look at one of the rooms tomorrow. There is also a nice looking pool, which is just as well as you cannot swim in the sea just here due to jellyfish!

OK, more soon as we have already had a few adventures to report!