TacoCat’s Travels #215 (KL-Genting): Prelude to our Mountain Adventure! 🛫

August 2023 · 10 min read · Kuala Lumpur

Hey Hive!

If you missed the last post, I just finished writing about our short getaway to Penang Island, Malaysia, back in July 2022! It was our first time going to Penang together after almost a decade of going with our individual families. It was a new experience for both of us exploring Georgetown; enjoying the history and street art, and savouring all the delicious street food!

Our next trip after that was also a short one, back in mid-September in 2022! Sean's been talking about taking me to Genting Highlands which is an integrated resort development perched on the peak of a mountain called Gunung Ulu Kali at 1,800 meters high. It's only an hour's drive away from Kuala Lumpur and at a higher altitude, visitors can enjoy the cooling weather and serene mountain environment.

Source: klpropertynavi

I'd never been there before, since my family used to just travel to Kuala Lumpur for holidays to visit family. But Sean has been there countless times since he used to take family trips up to Genting Highlands when he was younger as his grandfather enjoys going to the casino. Sean said he would just stay in the hotel which in my mind sounded pretty dull, so hopefully this trip would make up for it.

Source: viator

Anyway, the way to go to Genting is to either take a coach from KL, or you could also take a cable car up the mountain. I think the coach was slightly cheaper but the cable car seemed like a rite of passage that everyone takes at least once every time they go up to Genting so we decided on the cable car up, and we would take a coach down.

But first, we would spend a day in Kuala Lumpur so here we go!

10 September 2022. Saturday.

We had an early flight so we could maximise our time in KL a bit before going up to Genting. We got to the airport in the wee hours of the morning so we could relax and have breakfast here.

And of course our breakfast of choice was from McDonalds! I rarely get up early enough to get Mcbreakfasts so every time we have the chance for it it's my go-to.

Sean got his favourite Sausage McMuffin with Egg while I ordered the Breakfast Delxue so we could share the pancakes. This set also included McMuffins, a sausage patty and scrambled egg so it was almost the same as a Sausage McMuffin with a different egg and no cheese.

It's still yummy though and what I like to do with the McMuffins is to construct them together into a burger with the hash brown too so there's a crunch in there as well! It's soo good!

And of course we'd share the 2 pancakes; it's a pretty perfect meal for 2 of us since neither of us would be completely full with just a Sausage McMuffin with Egg.

At the airport, there was a pretty cute dinosaur interactive play area not too far from the McDonalds.

And on the way to the skytrain platform, we saw this cool exhibit with lots of traditional local items to showcase what daily life is like in Singapore I guess.

The inside of the exhibit was full of nostalgia - from the orange bus bench to the tiled tables at void decks, to the classic barber shop and even the archway resembling those in residential housing blocks! It looked like a really cool exhibit but too bad it was too early at the time and it was closed.

We cruised our way past immigration and had to find our way to the gate shortly after. After our near-miss at the airport last time, we didn't want to take any chances.

There was quite a crowd at the gate, but soon enough we boarded and were up in the air!

The flight only took about an hour since it was to KL so by the time we arrived it was still before noon.

KLIA is so huge and the budget terminals are pretty far off from the main entrance and exit that we ended up walking for more than 15 minutes to go to the customs.

There was quite a crowd there once we arrived so we waited patiently to get through the customs but thankfully it was pretty smooth. Once we were out in the shopping area, we waited for our friend to come pick us up.

We have a friend who lives in KL and he very generously offered to pick us from the airport to our hotel since we were going to be hanging out today anyway.

I think it was noon by the time we were on the road, but thankfully the traffic wasn't too bad. KLIA is quite far from the city centre just like Changi is and it takes about an hour's drive. It did get quite jammed when we went into town where our hotel was though.

Back when I used to visit KL biennially with my family, we wouldn't go into KL sentral much since it's really crowded and expensive. It's like the Orchard Road in Singapore or the Ginza in Tokyo where all the luxury brands live.

Since my relatives stay in the suburbs we'd just stay in their neighbourhood, so I didn't really get the chance to see much of KL sentral. I don't even remember when I was here last, so it felt quite new to me.

Our hotel was the black building called WOLO in the back, and just opposite that was a huge mall called Lot 10, which I often get confused with a mall called Lot One in Singapore.

It was still a little early to check-in, so we left our bags at the concierge while we went to check out the mall and get lunch.

But first we made a stop at the bubble tea shop just outside the mall! It had a nice aesthetic and a cute logo, and there was quite a few people also drinking it in the store so we thought it might be good.

They had quite a good view of the street being at the front of the mall.

The main reason why we wanted to try this shop tbh was because of this neon sign in the back that we thought was pretty cute.

They had so many options to choose from, including some bottled drinks. I guess these were their specials with some fruity drinks, slushies and many milk tea options.

Here's the full menu printed on this giant scroll on the wall:

Sean and I bought the regular milk tea to share and we also got a drink for our friend since he drove us here.

Sean looks really intense about the milk tea. 😄

We weren't that hungry yet since we had a big breakfast, and after we got our drinks we decided to explore the mall and see what they had.

And of course we end up going to Don Don Donki first. Our friend Dean wanted to buy some tea here anyway so we stopped in to get some snacks for the road.

The mall was fairly big and had an interesting design; not very uniform floors so you could see the second floor from the fifth for example.

There was also a very traditional looking food court in the basement.

While the upper floors were very Japanese, with many Japanese restaurants and a huge ISETAN taking up a whole other wing.

ISETAN was a whole other department store offering mostly Japanese goods but they also had their own stalls and restaurants so it felt like a mall within a mall.

It was also more luxurious and had a different ambience compared to the rest of the mall. Just look at this fancy salad counter!

They also had their own convenience store selling snacks and knick-knacks.

And even a bar where we saw some people drinking already at noon.

The upper floors of ISETAN were mostly apparel and accessories, and we saw this huge model of Astro Boy! I guess there was a brand featuring some Astro Boy merchandise.

There were also plenty of these brick bears just beside him.

Upstairs was the lifestyle section with some household wares, and we saw this whole row of delicate Japanese teapots!

This shop was also selling fancy tableware with various patterns. It looked really expensive so I guess it must be from a famous brand.

On the highest floor was the fancier restaurants and you could just tell from the decor.

It felt like a different vibe up here with an open bar and so many people around. It felt like we were in a club but thankfully not as noisy.

There were some other low-key restaurants here as well and they were all specialising in different Japanese dishes.

There was also a mini food court here too with smaller Japanese stalls. There were so many choices and everything looked pretty good that we didn't know what to pick!

I didn't really have a big appetite at the time too so I didn't want to spend too much so Sean and I decided to share a bento meal from this stall at the food court. It was also fairly crowded in the restaurants so we didn't want to have to wait too long.

There was also ample seating here and looked comfortable so we could just hang out here for a while after all the walking we did.

We chose this stall that sells Premium Beef BBQ Rice Bowl and it looked pretty good! They had different sets you could order and toppings if you wanted.

We settled on just the normal beef bento and it looked and smelled really good!

The beef was nice and tender and had a savoury seasoning with some yuzu in it. It wasn't charred that much but you could still get a light BBQ taste.

It was really yummy and made me want to get more tbh but I stopped myself. I wanted to get sushi later from Donki too.

We hung out at the food court for a bit in a more secluded corner catching up and making our mutual friend jealous that he couldn't hang out with us irl. After a while we left and started making our way back to the hotel since it was about check-in time.

Curiously enough, there was even a basketball court in the middle of the mall! It wasn't a full court but still. I guess it's for people to exercise and since there were athletic equipment stores around it was fitting.