Langkawi

We are on the Malaysian island of Langkawi this week for the Chinese New Year holiday, five of us.  Caleb is not with us as he is taking part in a Concordia athletic council service trip.  We are managing to have fun without him, although we feel his absence!

This notice is posted on the balcony door in our hotel room.  We arrived here in the dark the first night. Knowing that there are monkeys here in abundance, I woke the girls the next morning by encouraging them to look out the windows to try to spot a monkey.  To my surprise and their delight, there was one waiting on the balcony railing when they opened the curtain.  He was the happy recipient of part of the contents of the fruit bowl in our room!

Flying squirrels have been another fun wildlife discovery here.  They are not the acrobats the monkeys are, but their unusual body shape and statue-like posture is interesting.

 Jungle path to the beach

 This little crab is about half the size of my pinky toenail, but he busily rolls up little balls of sand to create a tunnel for himself.  As the tide goes out, the beach is slowly covered with thousands of the sand balls created by these busy workers.

We all enjoyed kayaking around a close little neighboring island.  Madelyn and I make a pretty good team.  I do admit to allowing her to paddle while I rested just a little!

The girls have loved this slide!  There are quite a few families here this week, and they've made friends with a number of other kids.  The goal has been to discover which body position allows for the fastest sliding!

The view from our room.  We are in a little bay called Datai Bay.  I bet you can find it on Google Earth, Dad.  :-)

 This is the Island of the Pregnant Maiden.  Can you see her, lying here on her back, looking up at the sky?  We saw this island on a boat trip, and went inland a little ways to a beautiful fresh water lake in the middle of the island.

 Here we are docked on the Island of the Pregnant Maiden.

We all enjoyed swimming in this fresh water lake.  It was very deep, but a comfortable temperature and such a scenic view all around!  Incidentally, Gwen learned to dive off the dock here for the first time.

 Later on during the boat ride we went to an area where these majestic eagles, who closely resemble American Bald Eagles, gather to fish.  The tour boat drivers throw chicken skin into the water to draw these birds, who are supposedly lazy hunters and are happy to eat it.  We loved watching them soar and dive!

 Our little sand cake creation.  :-)

 Tarzan Seth

 One of our many monkey friends, enjoying a breakfast orange provided by the girls.  :-)