Restaurant Reviews – Travels with Ali

Once again we were back in Penang, almost a year to the day. Anthony was determined to accomplish what he failed to do last year and climb Penang Hill. It was my turn this year to succumb to food poisoning on our first night here. Fortunately not as bad as he was, just had to spend the first day in the hotel, sleeping it off.

We were staying in a place called the Ascot Gurney, situated on Gurney Drive. It was a fabulous hotel, ideally situated within walking distance to many restaurants and right on the waterfront.

A view from our room and the pool area, where I spent many an hour relaxing and reading.

Mixing the old with the new

We did some walking around and did some shopping, also had lunch in cafes and restaurants. I wasn’t fussed about doing any sightseeing as we saw so much the year before. I did manage to eat some of the massive lunch that we ordered, good job we were sharing!

The day dawned when Anthony finally made up his mind to climb Penang Hill. It was decided that he would take a taxi to the bottom of the hill in the botanical gardens and I would take the funicular train up. Once he had left I looked up how to get there and realised it was closed for maintenance that week! I was in a dilemma about what to do. Once I had spoken to him he said there was a jeep service that took you up the hill, so I jumped in a taxi to where the jeep service was.

Honestly these guys were raking it in, it was one jeep per party of four. When I asked if I could share they said no, but Anthony was allowed to come back down with me. It was organised chaos, you were given a number on a small sticker to put on the back of your phone, the price was astronomical and one guy said it was more expensive than his air ticket from Kuala Lumpur to Penang. I had to wait for around 30 minutes for a jeep to be free and then it was a 15 minute drive to the top. It took Anthony just under two hours to climb up.

Penang Hill

A number of hills are covered by Penang Hill, with the highest point being Western Hill that stands at an altitude of 833 meters (2,733 feet) above sea level. Penang Hill is a hilly and forested area that stands out from the lowlands of Malaysia. The area was used as a retreat during the British colonial period, and is now a very popular tourist destination due to its history and heritage.

Because of the funicular railway being closed most of the shops and cafes were closed also. The only place open was The Bellevue Hotel, where we sat and had lunch. Here we spotted black gibbons swinging through the trees. They moved too quickly for me to get a good photo.

Breathtaking views from the top, and so much flora and fauna to see. There were bees and dragon flies swooping in and out of the flowers.

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On our last night we decided to treat ourselves to dinner in a fancy restaurant. It was called Thirty Two at The Mansion overlooking the water. Having just recently celebrated our 32nd wedding anniversary, I thought it was very apt.

The lobby and waiting areas

Not sure of the relevance of Boy George being hung on the wall, but he’s a favourite of mine so I snapped him at once.

There is also a beach bar at the back, called Beach Blanket Babylon.

The food was delicious and I would recommend a visit here if you have the time.

As usual though Anthony was still hungry, so off we went looking for pork satay which is not easy to find in Penang. We took a taxi to a street food market and saw there was a long line for the satay. Deciding he didn’t want to queue up, he went straight to the cook and got served straight away!

This is the end of our adventures in Asia, thanks to everyone for tagging along.

Continuing our three day break in the South West, we drove down to Albany with a stop in Coalmine Bay and Broke for lunch. I should point out that this isn’t a grammatical error, there is a place called Broke!

This beach looks perfect for a summer swim.

The drive from Pemberton to Albany is almost three hours, by the time we had stopped a couple of times, we finally arrived in Albany at 4.30 pm.

We normally stay in an apartment in Albany, but I noticed when I looked on Booking.Com that there was a new Hilton, so thought we would check this out. It’s in a great location, overlooking the harbour. I didn’t book a sea view but guess what we ended up with a fantastic view over the harbour. We had a beautiful luxurious room with lovely toiletries from Crabtree and Evelyn, no expense spared there.
The reception, bar and restaurant are all located in the same space downstairs, making it all very intimate.

After checking in and unloading our bags it was still light out so we went to have a look at the latest silo mural, which we could actually see from our room.

The above mural was painted by New York artists Yok and Sheryo. It features the Ruby Red Seadragon, and is only the third species of its kind ever recorded. It was discovered on the Albany shores 150 years ago. I’ve been fortunate to see quite a few of these silo art murals around Australia, but hope to see them all one day.

We had a quick drink at the Royal George Hotel before heading back for dinner at The Garrison.

For dinner that night I had booked The Garrison, which as you might guess is situated on top of the hill where the old garrison used to be. It’s a wonderful restaurant with great service and food. I find many places we go now are short staffed due to Covid, some places manage superbly with only two or three serving but others don’t seem to have coped as well. The wait staff seemed to move swiftly between table to table and we had no waiting time at all between courses. A definite 10/10 from me, I must remember to write a review.

After a great night’s sleep and an invigorating shower using the deluxe toiletries we headed down for a buffet breakfast.
The rain had set in by now so we chose to head off to our final stop, Margaret River. I realised after I looked at the map that I had planned our trip backwards, which meant much more driving! From here to Margaret River it was a four hour drive.