No, we are not on Jess. She is wrapped up for the winter. However, we have decided to log and blog our other, non-van trips away, not only for our own memories in the future, but also to share our experiences with our friends and family.
Winter is fast upon us, so we have decided to escape the cold and the grey and get away to Southeast Asia. We have been to the region a few times before; in fact, on this trip, it will be the 5th time that we have been to Vietnam.
So away we go…
Join us on our travels through Asia without Jess (she is wrapped up at home waiting for spring). We are away until March 2026 and will travel via Dubai to Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand, visiting multiple places in each country. For Del, it’s been a long, and sometimes hard, couple of months at work, most of the time away from home, so for him, this trip can’t come quick enough.
Week 1 – Sunday 14th December – Saturday 20th December 2025
Sunday 14th December 2025
Today we are off to the Gatwick Travelodge, our usual hotel before a flight out of London Gatwick. It’s reliable, good value and handy. We toast the start of our trip with the usual glass of Prosecco in the bar, as is customary.
We are flying to Dubai for 2 nights first and then onto Kuala Lumpur to spend 5 weeks in Malaysia. We like to break the trip halfway in Dubai instead of the 14-hour slog of a direct flight.
Monday 15th December 2025
We are up at 6 am sharp, and on the Hoppa bus to the airport, north terminal, where we check in easily and quickly. Soon we are on our favourite plane to travel on – the magnificent Emirates A380, the biggest passenger aircraft in the world. This plane is amazing. We are on the lower floor, and it’s hard to get a scale of the thing. She’s a very comfy plane, solid and very quiet. We have the only really ill person on the plane directly behind us. We think she has the flu, which is currently circulating in the UK. She coughs violently for a full 7 hours, so we blast the cabin air on us in an attempt to deflect it. We’d rather freeze than get ill…
Once landed, we collect our bags and are soon at our hotel, The Pavilion at the Jaddaf Waterfront.
Tuesday 16th December 2025
After a good night’s sleep, we get breakfast and hit the gym. The camel racing is on TV, which is, let’s say, interesting.
They run without jockeys, and having ridden a walking camel in the past, we can understand why. You wouldn’t want to ride a running one.
We grab a cab and walk around the Al Seef area, which has lots of shops in an old-style souk. After a nice walk down the creek, we hire a private Abra boat for a 30-minute cruise. The old wooden boat looks very weathered, but we love it.
Next, we head to the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. Last time we were here, we went up it. It’s an amazing construction, especially considering it’s built on sand. There’s a huge mall and a huge fountain area around it, and they are well and truly geared up for Christmas, with lots of lights and decorations.
We are going to eat early and go to bed early tonight, but first we have a tea and delicious Baklava. The mall here is quite something, but it’s only the 30th biggest in the world; most of the largest malls are in Asia. Still, this mall has an ice rink and a huge aquarium with a massive tank on view in the mall with an immense HD video screen above it. It’s quite something.
We eat outside in the warm evening air and have a Lebanese feast. By now it’s dark, and the Burj Khalifa is showing off its full height video screen (clouds are passing through the top of it), and there is an impressive fountain display.
We head back to the hotel for an early night. However, at nearly 11 pm, we are woken, rather abruptly, by fireworks very close to the hotel. It sounds like a war zone. It’s for the festival of shopping, apparently.
Wednesday 17th December
Today we are flying to Kuala Lumpur, another 7-hour flight on another A380.
We end up arriving quite late at our destination after sitting on the plane at the stand for 1.5hours in Dubai waiting to push back. The delay is because of a sandstorm. We are finally glad to arrive at our next hotel, the Ibis Styles, at 2 am after a lot of queuing here and there and walking for miles at the airport.
Thursday 18th December 2025
At 7:30 am, we are up once again and back at the airport to fly this time to Penang, where we will stay for 5 days. We are staying in the historic town of Georgetown (named after King George III).
We have a suite in a nice hotel, The Granite Luxury Hotel, which has the highest cantilevered see-through swimming pool and the highest automatic stacking car park in Malaysia. We shall have to check these out.
After a sushi lunch, we explore the area for a while, then rest. We are very tired; the jet lag is now starting to catch up with us. For dinner, we stay local and visit a highly recommended Bahn Mi street food cart. The Bahn Mi is the king of sandwiches, soft yet crusty Vietnamese bread, tasty sauces and herbs, pickled vegetables and usually a choice of meat, although these are vegetarian. They are delicious, maybe the best we’ve had.
Friday 19th December 2025
H couldn’t get to sleep last night until the early hours, and Del doesn’t sleep great either. We are up quite late at 9 am and hit the gym. Afterwards, we try the pool. It’s a long infinity pool with see-through Perspex sides, and one end hangs over the building with a see-through Perspex floor! You can look 14 floors down to the ground. It takes H a while to get the bravery to swim and walk over it, but it doesn’t bother Del. No fear that boy! (Not!)
Once changed, we head into the old town and have lunch at a recommended tandoori place. It’s delicious, and we can watch them cook the chicken in the tandoor in their almost open kitchen and make the naan breads while we eat. We are aware that we haven’t actually had a Malaysian meal yet (having had so far Japanese, Vietnamese and Indian since we arrived), we are working on it. Penang is known as the foodie capital of Malaysia because of a melting pot of cultures, made up of Chinese, Indian and Malay, each bringing their own delicious foods with them, so there are many different styles of food here in Penang.
The town is very nice with interesting street art and some ‘floating ‘ jetties with houses and stalls over the water on stilts. We plan to go out and find some local food tonight, but after a rest at the hotel, the weather changes, and it pours down; it is the end of the rainy season here in Malaysia, so it is expected. It doesn’t let up, so we have dinner at the rooftop bar at the hotel, but they don’t have any Malaysian food!
Saturday 20th December 2025
We start the day with a couple of breakfast sandwiches called a sandos. It’s a Japanese sandwich, which is served in a Chinese coffee shop in Malaysia! H’s is a delicious spicy Thai one.
After taking in the sights of a nearby food market, we head over to the Komtar tower, which is directly opposite our hotel. It’s 249m tall and at the top is an observation deck. We buy tickets and get the lift to the penultimate floor, where there is an outside ‘skybridge’ walk. We have seen these before, but normally they are an expensive upcharge and something we would not normally do, but our ticket includes it, so we feel we should try it.
We get harnessed up. H is a little nervous as she’s scared of heights, but is still up for the challenge. We are in a group of 4 with a guide, and we clip on and step outside. After a moment of gripping onto anything she can find, including Del, H gets her confidence as we slowly walk around the edge of the building, walking on see-through grating. It takes 10 minutes, and we are back in. H is very proud of herself. There’s also a glass floor here, and on the top floor, there is an outside glass-bottomed walkway. The ticket also includes the aquarium and the “Jurassic research centre“, which are quite good.
It’s very hot today with high humidity and around 39 degrees C, so we go back to the hotel to recover before dinner. Dinner is in a simple local place. and is finally Malaysian. Del has Chicken Nasi Lemak (coconut rice with fried chicken and dried anchovies), and H has Char Kuey Teow, a popular local dish similar to a pad Thai.
There’s a Christmas parade on tonight, so we get in position near the start and have some chilled coconut jelly to cool down. It is oppressively hot as we watch the fabulous parade of marching bands, dragon dancers and men who balance 10m flag poles on their chins and foreheads. Why? The Penang Christmas Parade is returning after 25 years.
So not a bad first week. A couple of flights on the world’s biggest passenger plane, a hotel with Malaysia’s highest cantilevered swimming pool, a tethered walk around a 249m building, the return of a Christmas parade, lovely hot weather, and lots of delicious food! Not bad. Not bad at all.
Here are more pictures from our first week
See you next week.
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