And we're off!

Our road trip started early at 4am, with us waking up to daddy having cooked Indomie for us all. He was worried that we'd be hungry as we would be arriving in Besut at 9.30am. 

After breakfast, we went up to get shower or use the bathroom. Some of our bags were already loaded into the car the night before so that we could minimize the time spent loading the car. 

We managed to leave the house at the planned time of 4.45am. Soon we had crossed the Penang bridge and entered the Butterworth-Kulim Expressway. It was a short drive before we arrived in the Kulim High-Tech Park. Once we cleared that sector, the roads were VERY dark. Once in a while we'd meet a lorry or car. To our surprise, we discovered that daddy's car's headlights will turn off on the driver's side whenever it detects an oncoming car. Some sections were very misty too. 

After driving for around 1.5 hours, we needed to pee, so daddy stopped at one of the BHPetrol stations. We took quite a while as Mei-mei had a tummy ache and had some diarrhea. We hit the road again once everyone was ready and reached the Belum Resort. We had planned to have another stop there, but there was a gantry at the entrance and since no one needed a break, we continued on our way. (We later found out that they wanted to charge RM5 per entry into the resort, hence the gantry!).

It was soon getting brighter and we enjoyed the beautiful scenery and found that the temperature was very cool. Daddy opened the sunroof and we enjoyed the cool breeze and could even hear birds chirping outside our car! Can you imagine, the temperature dropped to 20 degrees Celsius even. 

Soon we were going to lower grounds again and arrived at Jeli. This section right up to Besut was a tougher drive as traffic was heavier, we were driving through towns and villages and obvious it was not as scenic as before. 

Waze for whatever reason directed us to a loooong route to the Besut office of our hotel. But we finally arrived (just on time) at 9.40am.

We "checked in" and had our bags tagged. Soon we walked over to the jetty to pay for our entrance tickets into the island and hopped into our waiting boat. 

We sat up front and it sure was a bumpy ride. Mei-mei had lots of fun and Ko-ko even took out his phone to take pictures. Daddy had to remind him to hold on tight to his phone.

We finally arrived at our resort's pier and none too soon as I was starting to feel woozy. In fact, I kept praying for Mei-mei to stop talking to me as it made me feel worst!

Our ride to Perhentian

Mei-mei's wind-blown hair

We were welcomed right at the pier and the staff brought our bags to the lobby while we walked with Josh from reception. We were given cool towels (wow.. so refreshing) and a cold, cold drink. 

You kiddies discovered a ping pong table and played a while:

Then since it was 11.30am, we decided to head to Sunset Deck to have lunch while waiting for our room. Before that, we signed up for the 3 points snorkeling trip. The waitress Boki informed us that food wasn't ready to be served but that we could have drinks first.. ok.. that works too!

Mei-mei with her "Alunan Sunset"

Soon we could place our orders. We went light as we planned to go for the 3 points snorkeling at 3pm:

Beef carpaccio

Margherita pizza

Quatro cheese pizza

Halfway through the meal, daddy received a message informing him that our room was ready. After  lunch, we headed back to reception where Josh brought us to our room, room #4. 

Welcome pack in our room

View from our room

Later while daddy and Ko-ko rested, Mei-mei got changed and we headed to the beach.

It was so-so hot, so we went in search of the swimming pool. 

Soon we headed back to the room to get ready for our snorkeling trip.