Day 3: 23 August 2017, Wednesday
As my Go Genting express bus departure was only at 2:30pm, I had the morning free to roam about. After checking out of Mingle Hostel at 10am, I headed over to Mid Valley Megamall. It is located halfway between Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya so it is slightly outside of the city centre, but still quite easily accessible. From Pasar Seni station, I took the LRT to KL Sentral station (one stop, RM0.60) and changed to the KTM Seremban Line to Mid Valley station (one stop, RM1.60).
The journey wouldn’t have taken long but I was unlucky that there was a cargo train derailment at an earlier stop, causing a long delay for the KTM train at KL Sentral. I ended up waiting 50 minutes for the train. After that, the ride took about 6 minutes and I finally arrived at Mid Valley at 11:15am.
Mid Valley (click here) opened in 1999 and it is indeed a megamall, with over 430 shops. Anchor tenants include AEON, Metrojaya and Golden Screen Cinemas, in addition to the usual suspects like Padini, Zara and more. I haven’t been here for many years so it was refreshing to be back.
The first thing I saw when I entered the mall from the train station link bridge was the Rotiboy stall. It’s one of my favourite snacks and I just had to buy one (RM2.65 / S$0.85), even though I just had breakfast not long ago. It’s such a pity we don’t have Rotiboy in Singapore anymore. Can someone bring it back please?
Located right next to Mid Valley Megamall is The Gardens Mall (click here), a more premium shopping mall with more than 200 shops spread over six levels. Some of the shops at Mid Valley can also be found here but The Gardens has more luxury brands. The building is also classier and more spacious. With these two large malls conveniently located next to each other, it is worth making a trip here to spend half a day shopping and eating. I will probably do that for my next trip to KL, since I’ve grown a little bored of Pavilion already.
At about 1:30pm, I went to the Mid Valley station to take the train back to KL Sentral. I must have just missed the train because I waited about half an hour for it. This is the old KTM train line so the frequency of the trains is much lower. I eventually arrived at KL Sentral at 2:10pm, upon which, I quickly bought a McDonald’s meal and gobbled down my lunch.
The Go Genting bus terminal is located at the basement of KL Sentral station. The bus was a standard, 40-seater coach and it was fully booked. So many folks going to Genting. I was probably the youngest person on board. The bus departed at 2:30pm as scheduled and arrived at Awana Transport Hub exactly one hour later.
The Genting Highlands Premium Outlets (click here) is conveniently located at the Awana Transport Hub, so you can shop here before taking the cable car up to Genting. The premium outlet opened only recently in June 2017. It has 150 stores including the usual brands. However, the discounts are not fantastic and certainly not worth making a trip here just for it. Most of the shops are quite small and they carry a limited range of products. Don’t expect to go crazy shopping here.
At about 5:10pm, I decided I had enough so I proceeded to the main transport hub building to take the cable car, now called the Awana SkyWay. A one-way ticket costs RM8, but there is also a fancier glass floor gondola you can take for RM50. I purchased my ticket at one of the self-service kiosks. The whole process was fuss free and convenient. There weren’t many people at the time and I waited less than five minutes to get onto the cable car.
Along the way, the cable car also stopped at Chin Swee station. You can alight there to view the Chin Swee Caves Temple and hop back on again to complete the journey at no extra charge. However, I did not do so.
As the cable car neared the final SkyAvenue station, we passed by the old Genting outdoor theme park, which was in the process of being converted to a 20th Century Fox World theme park. It is currently scheduled to open in 2018. When completed, it will be the only Fox theme park in the world and it will have about 25 thrill rides modelled after its stable of films such as Ice Age, Planet of the Apes, Alien vs Predator and more.
From the looks of it, there still seems to be a lot more work to be done, so I think its opening will be delayed. It’s quite understandable actually, given the weather conditions here at Genting Highlands. When there is heavy fog, visibility is low and I suppose construction work will be halted until the fog clears.
At 5:31pm, I arrived at SkyAvenue station. The cable car ride from Awana took only about 13 minutes, so it’s pretty zippy. After I disembarked and walked through the vast new building, my jaw literally dropped as I saw how different it was from my last visit in January 2015. It was totally unrecognisable and scary at the same time! It seemed like this new wing just popped out of nowhere. There is now a new casino and a new shopping complex with so many shops and restaurants. This newly revamped Genting is more glitzy and modern, bringing it more in line with the competition in Macau and Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands.
I met up with my parents and they walked me through the new wing before we joined back to the more familiar old wing where our First World Hotel was. By the way, First World Hotel holds the Guinness World Record for the largest hotel in the world (by number of rooms), with over 7,000 rooms. Our room was at Tower 3 and it was quite basic but adequate.
After dropping my bag, we met up with my relatives for dinner at Babajia restaurant. The food was very good, except for the chicken satay, which was too dry and not tender enough.
After dinner, my parents brought me on a tour of the new wing, where I saw even more fancy new restaurants and eateries. There are so many food options here now – Tampopo Ramen, Burger & Lobster, Din Tai Fung, Eight Ounce Coffee, Gong Cha, Tokyo Secret cheese tarts, Starbucks Reserve and more. There were also many retail stores but some of them were not open yet. After a while, I was craving for something sweet so we dropped by Street Churros for some churros and coffee.
After dessert, I swung by the new Sky Casino for a look. Compared to the old Genting casinos, which are cramped and filled with cigarette smoke, the new Sky Casino is much more spacious and modern. The jackpot machines are spaced much further apart so there is literally more breathing space. The machines are also newer with very advanced visuals and fancy sound effects. Of course, it is all part of the masterplan to make the casino more comfortable and conducive for people to stay longer and gamble more. I just played a little for the fun of it before retiring for the night.
Day 4: 24 August 2017, Thursday
This morning, we walked to the old Theme Park Hotel and Resort Hotel side for nostalgic reasons. Genting holds a special place in my heart because my family used to come here quite often when I was younger. It is the nearest holiday destination to experience cool weather and escape from Singapore’s heat. Back then, we didn’t have the luxury of travelling to far flung places like Japan or Europe so Genting was our most frequented destination.
As a child, Genting was everything I could ask for. I had so much fun riding the Lao Ye Che (老爷车), a small 4-seater car that followed a fixed circuit around the lake in the outdoor park. There was no way to overtake because all the cars were in a line and the route was fixed. The cars moved slowly and you were only as fast as the car in front of you. There was an accelerator pedal you could control but there was no brake pedal, and that was the whole point of it – you were supposed to bump into the car in front of you. Well, it was very safe because the maximum speed of the car was very low so a “collision” would have resulted in just a minor jerk and nothing serious. It was low tech but oh so fun, and we would queue up for a long time just to ride it.
Another thing I remember fondly is the paddle boats in the lake. You had to manually paddle the boat using your legs in order to move it. It was a relaxing activity and no less fun than the Lao Ye Che.
As I grew older, I frequented the indoor theme park more and my favourite ride was the bumper car. The queue was always long but we would wait patiently for our turn. We never complained because we hoped that our ride would last just as long when it was eventually our turn. Yet somehow, when our turn came, our ride always seemed to end faster than the other people before us.
While waiting, we would observe which bumper car could move the fastest, and we would make a beeline for it when it was our turn. It wasn’t sufficient just to get a car – we had to get the fastest one. It was great fun, and we could never get enough of it.
The other thing I remember very clearly about Genting in the old days is that there were giant moths everywhere, and they were as big as an adult’s palm. To a small kid as I was then, they were terrifying, especially when there was a bunch of them flying about. The worst thing was, the moths were not just to be found in the general building premises, but occasionally even inside our hotel room too. Gradually over the years, the number of moths decreased and today, they are nowhere to be found. I don’t know if this is due to global warming or population control measures put in place by Genting, but I actually kinda miss the moths.
Anyway, my point is that Genting has changed a lot over the years, becoming more commercialised and much bigger in scale. Back then, simple activities like riding the Lao Ye Che or paddling a boat in the lake could keep us occupied and satisfied for hours. I miss the old and simple Genting a lot but unfortunately, that is the price of success.
Coming back to the present, it was not a very eventful day…the only thing I can say is that I spent the whole day watching movies at the new PictureHouse Cinema. I watched three movies in all – Paradox, Wolf Warrior 2 and Mon Mon Mon Monsters. Wolf Warrior 2 was good but the other two were so-so. A movie ticket costs only RM16 (S$5.11) and it comes with a free packet of nuts. The cinema is also very comfortable, with plush seats and a powerful sound system. It’s a good way to pass time.
I also visited the Starbucks Reserve store and had a cup of specially brewed coffee. It was my first time trying out Starbucks Reserve. What makes it special is that you can pick your favourite coffee beans and choose the brewing method. Upon the advice of the Coffee Master, I picked the Eastern D.R Congo Lake Kivu beans and Chemex brewing method. A Grande size cup costs RM20 (S$6.40), which I believe is slightly cheaper than in Singapore.
It was quite cool to sit on the bench and watch the Coffee Master prepare my drink on the spot. As she placed the flask on a weighing scale and poured boiling water into it, she explained what she was doing so I could understand the process better. About 10 minutes later, my coffee was ready. I don’t usually drink black coffee so I can’t comment much, but it tasted good enough.
For dinner, we went to Madam Kwan’s, which specialises in authentic Malaysian cuisine. I ordered a nasi lemak, which was decent but I wouldn’t say it was fantastic. And that about wraps up Day 4!
Day 5: 25 August 2017, Friday
For our return trip to Singapore, we decided to try out WTS company for the coach service instead of our usual Transtar. From First World Hotel, we took a shuttle bus down to mid-mountain before transferring to the actual WTS bus to take us back home. However, the transfer was not immediate and we had a long break there at mid-mountain, in the middle of nowhere.
There was only a simple restaurant called Heritage Fusion Kitchen so we had a quick meal there. The food was not bad. It was the end of the trip and everyone just wanted to go home quickly, but the bus still wasn’t ready to leave after we were done with lunch. We ended up waiting 50 minutes before finally setting off at 1pm.
As for the ride, the WTS bus was spacious with ample legroom but the seat length was not deep enough, so it was not as comfortable as the Transtar bus. We dropped off at Sembawang and took a taxi home. We all agreed that we will stick with Transtar in future.
And that’s the end of my short escapade to Kuala Lumpur and Genting Highlands. I’m guessing it won’t be too long before I’m back again!