Who said
Genting Highlands is all about casinos? The
Genting Theme Park in Genting Highlands is one exciting Malaysian destination for the young and young at heart. I really don't visit theme parks on my own. So when Tourism Malaysia invited us over to Genting Theme Park, why would I refuse?
For a change, we tried public transportation going to Genting Highlands. In fact, there are many ways to catch a bus to Genting Highlands. Buses depart from One Utama, KL Sentral, Puduraya, and Pasarakyat among other places. But these buses go through KL traffic and we were advised one of the fastest ways of getting to Genting Highlands was to catch the bus at the Terminal Putra in Gombak which is on one end of the Kelana Jaya (Pink) Line of the RapidKL LRT. So if you're in a hurry, this is one option.
We left after rush hour since we didn't want to join the KL commuter crush. From Terminal Putra, you can catch the bus to Genting Highlands. But in our case, our van picked us up there and brought us to the terminal of the
Genting Skyway, said to be the longest and fastest cable car in Asia, for our trip up to Genting Highlands.
We went straight to the Genting Theme Park as soon as we got there. Given that the weather was unpredictable, we decided to go for the outdoor rides first and reserved the indoor rides for the afternoon since it usually rained later in the day.
Of course, our priority was the park's signature rides which included the
Flying Coaster and
Space Shot. The Flying Coaster is a roller coaster. But instead of sitting down, you lie on your stomach face down, which gives you a sensation of flying. While the Space Shot is a 185-foot drop that gives you a few seconds of weightlessness.
After our second ride, it started to rain. So we moved indoors and had lunch at the
Penang Food Village, one of the many restaurants in the area. From the restaurant window, one could see Kuala Lumpur down below (it's the same view from the top of the Space Shot). Our food inlcuded fried
kuay teow,
mee mamak,
kuay teow soup,
asam laksa,
lobak and
rojak.
Later in the afternoon, since the rains didn't stop, we tried out the bump cars and another signature attraction of Genting Highlands which is
Snow World. The Sports Unlimited crew was also shooting inside which explains our TV appearance some weeks back.
Anyway, after more rides and some shopping (believe it or not, they can have good bargains there in Genting), we had to rush back to KL for a dinner appointment. We took the Genting Skyway back down where our van was waiting for us. If only we could have stayed longer, there were more rides we wanted to try out!
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Nasi kandar is a steamed rice meal that is originally from Penang. It can be plain or mildly flavored, and served with a variety of curries and side dishes which include fried chicken (ayam goreng), fried squid (sotong goreng), curried spleen, cubed beef, fish roe, or fried prawns. For our last dinner in Kuala Lumpur, we were brought to Nasi Kandar Pelita along Jalan Ampang, a famous and the largest nasi kandar restaurant chain in Malaysia.
But the menu of the restaurant went beyond nasi kandar since it included dishes one would find in a typical mamak stall. Among the dishes we ordered sotong goreng, kicap ayam (chicken in soy sauce), ketam goreng (fried crab), chicken tandoori (chicken marinated in yogurt and seasoned with tandoori masala) with garlic naan, murtabak ayam (chicken murtabak), murtabak kambing (mutton murtabak), and sup ekor (oxtail soup).
After dinner, we were brought to Zouk along Jalan Ampang for a preview of KL nightlife. But since it was a weekday, and still early for the party crowd, there wasn't much action. We would have wanted to stay a little longer and wait for the people to come, but unfortunately, we all had to wake up early the next day. So we'll have to save that for another day.
