Damai Beach Resort, Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia

The Damai Beach Resort lies on the coast about a half hour's drive from Kuching. Above is a portion of the scenic road which took us there.

Damai sits against beautiful beaches and towering tree-covered hills. The resort is well-maintained and is popular with foreign tourists from all around the world.

Fidelia's dad drove us out there one afternoon, along with my sister-in-law, Florina. Lauren came with us while Leah slept in the car with her grandad!

Entrance to Damai Resort

The beach was a beautiful scene of deep blue skies, pure green hills and light brown sands. Perfect for photographing!

Florina and Lauren looking out to the sea at Damai beach, Kuching. Such perfect conditions.

Planting the tripod in the warm sand, I took this picture on timer...such gorgeous colours

The swimming pool at Damai beach resort

To learn more about Damai beach resort, or book a room there, visit their website: Damai Beach Resort

On the way back to Kuching we passed the famous Mount Santubong. From wikipedia, which tells it better than I, is the legend of Mount Santubong: 

"A legend often associated with the mountain is of two beautiful princesses, Santubong and Sejinjang. Santubong was an expert weaver while Sejinjang was an excellent rice tresher. One day, they had a quarrel and exchanged blows. Sejinjang swung her tresher which hit Santubong's cheek. Santubong threw her weaver at Sejinjang, hitting her in the head. Putting an end to the quarrel, the King of Heaven cursed both of them into mountains. Santubong turned into Mount Santubong while Sejinjang was turned into Mount Sejinjang. It is said that Mount Santubong resembles a woman lying on her back."

The view of Mount Santubong was from the top of a bridge. Since there was nowhere to stop the car, Fie's dad drove all the way down the bridge and pulled over at the side of a smaller road. I made the dash by foot up the bridge to capture this shot:

There will be more stories from Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia tomorrow!

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Genting Highlands - Part 5 - 6,000 feet above sea level

At Genting Highlands resort, we were soon struck down by aches and pains, stomach complaints and in my case, a throbbing head which felt ready to explode! 

It wasn't until we decided to leave Genting on Thursday night down the 18km road to the bottom of the hill upon which this resort stands, that my mother-in-law told us.

Genting sits at an altitude of 6,000 feet! That's almost a quarter of the way up Mount Everest. No wonder my head felt as though it was slowly expanding!

Wednesday night I barely slept at all due to a bad stomach. The pharmacy and some Nestle yoghurts came to the rescue the following day. But we were all pretty tired by the 2nd day and decided to leave that night.

The altitude played funny tricks with us. Apart from the mentioned symptoms, the hot chocolate sachets we brought up with us became tightly filled with air, which disappeared when we got back to Kuala Lumpur (KL). That's exactly how my head felt!

We also later discovered that the tablets in Fidelia's medicine box had melted and were stuck to the edges of the box!

Talk about 'under pressure!'

When we left on Thursday night, Florianna, my sister-in-law, quite skillfully drove us down the winding wet, slippery and at places, dark decline, 18km down the hill. We savoured the crisp, cool mountain air, whilst passing by two separate car accidents to a much lower and bearable level of the atmosphere.

From the top we saw an incredible sight in the darkness of the city lying below, softly illuminated in amber lights. It was a moment that kind of took my breath away. From the bottom I looked back up the hill through the back window and observed the majestic Resort World Genting standing tall and illuminated at those heady heights. I struggled to decide which sight was the most spectacular.