Ailsa and Andy’s Travels: Day 37 Penang and the silks

This morning when we woke up, we were in Penang! After a bite of breakfast we decided to hop off the ship and go for an explore ashore. As we disembarked, we were greeted with the loud drumming and two dancing dragons! How the people in the dragon costumes managed to jump around in all that regalia in 30 degree heat I’ll never know but they were very entertaining.

We didn’t opt for one of the organised tours, instead, we had a wonder through the streets to see what we could find. This turned out to be a great option - we stumbled across an area called Little India which was full of the most beautiful Sari shops - there were gorgeous silks and fabrics everywhere. We went into one of the larger silk shops and didn’t emerge until an hour later, as I looked at fabric after fabric, trying to decide which one to buy. There was another lady in the shop having a similar problem, only it was shoes she was trying to decide upon. The silk Sari shop also sold the most sparkly glittery bejewelled shoes that you can imagine, she was trying on every shoe in the shop. Apparently it was a very big decision as the lady was going to a wedding. As we left, she was still trying on numerous pairs and undecided.

We walked past a man delivering eggs on a moped - he had huge square trays of eggs strapped on the back of his bike - he was very brave! Something else unusual to us….when people have bought a drink, they are given it in a plastic bag - imagine a freezer bag with the iced tea poured in and a straw sticking out the top. I saw a few of these hanging from a mopeds handlebars! See the photos below.

The ship dock was next to an old fort called Fort Cornwallis which has a steel framed lighthouse poking out the top and ancient cannons stationed all round the walls. The lighthouse was built in 1882, has a 21m white steel framework and a visual distance of 16 nautical miles! The fort is the biggest fort in Malaysia and was built by the Earl of Cornwallis (who was the governor of Bengal) for the British East India Company.

When we are out walking we find ourselves always looking for the shady side of the street as it’s so hot! It’s amazing what a difference a bit of shade can make and I’ve become a magnet for the tiniest bit of it.

We spent the afternoon cooling down back on board the ship - Andy went for a splash in the pool and I caught up on the blog before I completely forgot what we had done.

This evening, we ventured to the onboard theatre and watched a show by a lady called E.Sarah Carter who had travelled round the world with the Lord of the Dance Show…..she was the solo fiddle player and quite incredible she was too! Sarah was very entertaining and played lots of toe tapping Irish tunes and high tempo blue grass songs amongst other things. A thoroughly enjoyable evening.