It's been a long long time

Krabi Island

Krabi is a little island off Thailand. The nice thing about this island is, it is much more quiet compare to islands like Phuket or Bali.

At the same time, Krabi has a lot of little islands which are pretty famous, like the Phi Phi Island, James Bond island, Hong Island etc. Unfortunately a lot of these islands have been polluted by tourists. Though the sea is very blue, there are so much rubbish on the shore, which is a pity.

Food is not as good as Bangkok or Chiangmai, but most of the people there are pretty nice and kind.

The one thing I like about Krabi is the fact that it is still pretty quiet in most of the places, and the reserve nature park call Hong Island. Hong Island is different from the other islands because they don't allow speed boats to dock on the area where the swimmers are. The water is so clean and clear that fishes swim around us, all the time. The fishes have been so properly fed, that they are not afraid of human at all. And because there are no restaurants in the island at all, this island is not polluted with rubbish yet.. in fact it is so quiet that it made one feel like you are away in a deserted island.

I love the feeling of being able to swim with the fishes and in a totally deserted island. It made you want to appreciate nature more. Hopefully even in future this island will be preserved the way it is.

Update!!

I have been so lazy these days. So I'm making up my mind to ensure that I try to update this blog. I don't think I'll be able to update all the previous places that I've been to, but hopefully I'll be able to update on the future places that I'll be visiting. Or at least the recent places that I've been to. ^^

St. Moritz

St. Moritz, one of the little town in Switzerland I like the best. It could be because, it was the first place and first time I saw snow. After leaving Lugano, we drove to St. Moritz. 

In Switzerland, there are a lot of mountain passes that you have to cross in order to reach another place. It means that we are crossing from one mountain to another. As we were on the pass leading to St Moritz, there were already a tiny weeny bit of snow. But it was so little, it melted immediately as soon as we touched it. When we reached there, the weather was very cold (it is always very very cold the day before it snow, but less cold once it started snowing). When we went for dinner, the waiter told us that it might snow the next day, but we only believe him half heartedly because we were at the another place before that, where the locals said it would snow, but it didn't happen. 

The next morning, it did snow but again very little, and for a short period only. We were pretty disappointed and was hoping that it will snow again. The following morning, Christine woke me up at 7am in the morning. I asked her why she woke me so early, and she told me she had  a surprise for me. 

We were staying in an apartment facing a big lake in St Moritz, and across the lake, we could see the mountain with lots and lots of pine trees. I opened the curtains and was so happy and shocked to see everything in white. It had snowed the night before and was still snowing. It was such a pretty sight, I can only described the scenery as something out of a Christmas postcard. 

We quickly changed and walked in the snow to a bakery nearby. Somehow, freshly baked croissant tasted so much better when the weather was cold. It snowed for 3 whole days. Although there were nothing much we could do during that time, I definitely had the best time then. 

Lugano & Milan

The next place we drove to was Lugano, a city very near to Milan, Italy. The people over there behaved more like an Italian, and drove like an Italian (just like how we are here in Malaysia) too. In other parts of Switzerland, the Swiss were more patient but not in Lugano. We rented a small house there and stayed for a week. I remembered it was one of the most expensive place we stayed, probably because it was near to Italy. 

In Lugano, we visited a nice  church, a chocolate factory and a miniature park. It was the first time I saw how chocolate were made, and we got to taste chocolates for free there. You can actually eat as much as you wanted to. The miniature park was fun too, because everything there were miniatures, even the trains, churches and everything else. 

 

We also took a train to Milan, Italy. It was a very very crowded place. I have never visited a city where there were sooooo many people. We were advised by the Italians that there was a lot of pickpockets there, and were supposed to be careful. I still remember on that day, the train drivers were to have a demonstration, and we were so worried that we will not be able to travel back to Lugano, but fortunately nothing happened. Milan was a beautiful city, but it is definitely a place where I don't think I would want to go back a 2nd time. 

Beautiful Lake at First

If I recall correctly, I think the mountain's name was "First". I don't know why it has such a funny name, maybe it was the first mountain the Swiss discovered :)

In order to reach this mountain, we have to go by cable car. Once we were up there, we realised there were nothing much to see. But after checking out the map, we noticed that there was a lake located in the middle of the mountain, and judging from the map, it didn't look too far to walk. So, we packed some food from the nearby restaurant (thinking that we can have our picnic there) and started walking. However, after almost an hour walk, there were still no sight of the lake, except for a few cows munching grass nearby, and the fantastic smell of cow dung! We began to worry that we could have taken the wrong route. 

Fortunately, we met some people who were coming down the mountain and so we enquired from them whether there was a lake. Imagine our horror when they told us, yes, there was one but it was another 1 hour walk from where we were. Since we were neither here nor there, we decided to continue our journey (cursing and swearing at the map, of course). Finally after another 1 hour walk, we saw the lake. That was when I understood why people were willing to take the walk even though it was far. 

Look at the picture, wasn't that worth it? 

Jungfraujoch, Top of Europe

Jungfrau is the highest mountain in Europe. The technology there is so advance, that they built a railway and have a train that takes you directly up to the mountain, although the height of the mountain is 11782sq ft above sea level. Of course, advance technology doesn’t come free, so we need to pay almost RM200 per person for the less than an hour ride.

 

Due to its height, the mountain was covered with snow even though it was late summer. The weather was not extremely cold, except when the wind blew. It was the first time ever I saw snow, and the memory is still so fresh in my mind. It’s hard to forget the experience of seeing the whole world in white. We were so excited playing with the snow that we totally forgot that we should not be staying out too long, because due to the bright sun and the snowy environment (which makes you feel less hot but actually it was hot), it was very easy to get sunstroke. And before we knew it, most of us had a terrible headache from the sunstroke.

But no matter how much the head hurts; it was still worth it because it was truly a once in a lifetime experience J

 

Gorge in Switzerland (sorry, can't recall the name)

We visited this gorge (in the picture) near Grindewald during that 2002 trip. Unfortunately I could not recall the name of it .... It was the first time I went to a gorge, and it was pretty interesting. The walk up to the gorge was quite long and steep, but in the end it was worth the walk. The view was soooo fantastic and it was such an amazing sight.

 

There was an apple tree outside the entrance of the gorge. That was the 1^st time I had came across an apple tree! There were just so many “1^st time” when I was there. After we came down from the gorge, we had lunch near the waterfall, which was at the end of the gorge, enjoying the calm and serenity of Mother Nature. 

Grindewald, Switzerland

From Lurcerne, we drove straight to Grindewald, a little beautiful town in Switzerland. When we reached there it was already 3pm-4pm but it felt much longer due to jet lag. Unlike here, the Tourist Information in Europe are pretty efficient, and so we managed to book an apartment through them quickly.

 

It was an apartment house (meaning, it’s actually a house but they rented out the upper part as a guest house). In actual fact, it looked more like a little cottage for me (as shown in the picture). The view from our bedroom window was very, very pretty as it overlooked a mountain called “The Blue Mountain”. It was named after that because, due to certain lighting factor, the mountain actually looked blue in color. After checked in, we all felt very tired and decided to take a short nap (that was about 5pm). Our short nap however turned into a sleep (due to the jet lag, of course), because the next thing I knew, it was 12am J 

One funny incident there was, the hot water supply in this place was controlled, and the landlord did not informed us. As it was very cold, we used up all the hot water to wash dishes and ended up having to take a cold shower the next day. Can you imagine bathing in iced cold water in such weather? I can J

Lucerne, Switzerland

End September 2002 is a memorable year and month for me, because that was when my first trip to Europe took place. It was supposed to be end of autumn, so we were hoping to see some snows in some parts of Europe.

That was the first time I traveled out of Asia and I was very excited about it. Although so many years had past, the memories are still as fresh as it was yesterday.

After 14 hours of flight, we arrived in Zurich. It was very early in the morning, and the weather was pretty cold. Our first destination was supposed to be a little town called Grindewald. But since it was early, we decided to drive to Lucerne. Being there the first time, everything looked very nice to me. Although I was feeling tired due to jet lag, it didn’t stop me from noticing the nice flowers and the scenic mountains.

This bridge in the picture is supposed to be a famous tourist spot in Lucerne. Although it was already end of autumn, the flowers were still blooming nicely. We had a little walk around this little town and started our journey to Grindewald.