Day 1 - Feb 14 2014 - Gold Coast to Kuala Lumpur

Our flight from Gold Coast to Kuala Lumpur ended up departing around 20 minutes late, however it was a pretty decent flight overall.  Only one screaming child who managed to keep it zipped up for 3/4 of the flight.

Leaving on a jet plane

The plane was fairly empty, and we had an empty seat beside us which was nice.  Ended up landing 15 minutes early too, not bad for a 20 min late departure.  Immigration cleared, we hopped the hour long bus ride into KL city.
Once we arrived at the main bus station, we tossed up whether to just get a cab to the hotel, or find our own way.  Feeling adventurous the call was made to try the monorail, a decision that would probably be regretted later.
The first drama was finding the actual monorail, no easy task since signage isn't big over here apparently.  After a 15 minute walk, the monorail station was found, and after some more broken English discussions, we were on board the train in the right direction.  Once we arrived at our stop (Bukit Bintang) we then had to find our way to the hotel.  This was probably closer to a 20 minute walk.  With all our bags, in the muggy heat of the asian tropics.  Yeah, should have got the cab.   Anyway after stopping 3 more times for directions, we eventually found the hotel, which is nice.

A swan made of a towel.  Well two towels actually.

Comfy room, with A/C thank goodness, and older style furnishings.  It also has one of those butt spray hoses on the toilet, thinking I might give that a whirl at some stage.  When in rome....
After freshening up and reporting back home, we wandered to the next street over, Jalan Alor, which is a chaotic collection of street food restaurants.
Mainly Chinese food on offer, with plenty of charcoal grills and seafood as well, most of the atmosphere is created by walking up and down while the hawkers try to convince you to dine at their establishment. "Fried Rice!, Chicken Wing!, Beer!" are the regular catch cries, obviously they know our Western Tastes.

Dinner in Jalan Alor

Chinese new year celebrations were in full swing here, and dinner was accompanied with a couple of tallies of Tiger beer, stilt walkers, and fireworks.  All in all not a bad first day, we have retired to the hotel, however the fireworks are still going strong. Could be a long night!