Our next stop on our journey was going to be Penang. Just surprisingly the trip there was a bit difficult. The night before we left we walked to the bus terminal in Tanah Rata and purchased tickets for the 8am bus, then showed up early, around 7:30 the following morning with plenty of snacks for the journey. (Tickets are 32.00 RM)
Our bus wasn’t too bad, except for some reason the air conditioning was cranked to arctic cold for the entire ride making it difficult to nap or do much other than shiver. The Cameron Highlands are much cooler than the rest of Malaysia so to leave the rainy cool Cameron Highlands via an arctic bus was just a bit much.
Our bus stopped once. Which the previous bus to the Cameron Highlands had done as well. The one to Cameron Highlands had stopped at a side of the road restaurant/shop with toilet-paper-less and soap-less squat toilets. On our way to Penang our rest stop was a train station. So this time we had nicer bathrooms but then had to remember which bus we were on. While soaking up the warmth before getting back on the bus we crammed the snacks we’d bought down our throats: rolls with peanut butter. Maybe not the best, but I was too concerned that if we bought something at the station (like super tempting smelling popcorn) that we’d either get in trouble (the bus had signs saying it wasn’t a cafe and not to eat on board) or we’d get left behind because it took too long.
The ride was a little over 3 hours and when we were all dropped off the majority of us were a bit lost. With the destination in Penang being Georgetown we had to take a shuttle bus and a ferry in order to get there. This confused us because the drop off point according to the website is in Georgetown at Sungai Nibong Bus Terminal. But anyway we were dropped off a little early and told to catch the ferry. The ferry didn’t take too long and wasn’t too expensive (1.50 RM) and it was kind of pretty, if you could squeeze past cars and people to get a good view.
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