Penang Day Two

This morning started with a 1-hour massage at the Rock Spa, sweet! Followed by an eggs ben breakfast with lots of extra sides. Then it was off to the Macalister area in George Town (RM40) in search of local food. This fee was confirmed when we got into the cab at the hotel, this cabbie actually started the meter - dunno what for. If these fixed prices were done for the benefit of the taxi drives, then why did this cab's meter stop at RM42 when we got off? Why didn't he just use the meter and make the extra couple of bucks? I don't get it...

Our first target was char koay kok, which Allan found via a Penang food blog. This push cart was elusive, didn't find it until it was closed :( but there was good chendol and wheatgrass drink at the end of that street. Around the corner was soya bean curd with gula melaka. Walking further, we found ourselves back at the coffee shop where the cabbie had earlier dropped us off. There we had steamed and fried yam cake, fried oyster omelet, prawn noodle soup, char koay teow and ice kachang. With a coke and iced milk tea on the side. Too much food again...

There was a kind waitress at breakfast who told us about local buses, which cost a fraction of the cabs. And we were lucky to catch a glimpse of the buses 101 and 102 both mentioned earlier. So... time to venture onto the local bus system. Sitting at a stand which looked like a bus stop but didn't have any indication that is was a bus stop, we sat patiently. After about 20mins bus 102 arrived. The trip back to the hotel was only RM5.40 for 2! Yippee!!!

The afternoon was so hot, we quickly changed at spent more time in the pool. Today there were A LOT of kids... so we kept to the quieter pool until it was time for pre-dinner rum, beer and perrier! Dinner was supposed to be near the Toa Pei Kong Temple, Pearl Lagoon Seafood (RM25 cab ride), recommended by a Penangnite. A lovely local place with a few stalls with seafood was the main feature.

We had crabs, prawns, fried oyster, fried spring chicken, fried spring roll, chicken satay and fried Hokkien noodles all washed down with more beer. Food, glorious food! hahaha... Then Fata said that we had to go back to Hard Rock Cafe for dessert so that we can we say that we ate there. Sure... this time bus 101 was RM4 for 2 people. Luck was on our side as the band was starting in 10 mins and we had that amount of time to order our dessert!

The 7 member band was ok, not great. The songs were old, and the place started to fill with cigarette smoke. We forgot that in Malaysia smoking was still allowed in restaurants and bars :( We spent that set as a pair of air filters... hhhmmm... enough! Back to the room.

Kumxia Penang for another great day, tomorrow we go home and back to reality.