Labuan,oh Labuan...

...atas feri la konon...1st time...

Labuan, oh Labuan...so near yet still so far. Separated from our shores by a small stretch of water but what i mean is, even though the island is within our shores, the number of times I've been there is less than the number of fingers i have in one hand...this is why I didn't think twice about going along on a road trip to the island the other day with my better half and two overzealous kids...Normally,i wouldn't agree to such an arduous journey as some stretches of the road to the ferry terminal in menumbok are a bit suspect; our purple bad mobile would just barely make the trip. Plus, the trip could bring some negative effects to my current condition (dibuat orang wakakaka....). But on this occasion we would be riding along in me hubby's (and mine too for that matter) good buddy's ultra-comfy Toyota Harrier.

Now, Andrew(our mutual good buddy's name), for those who don't know him, is a "totally on the spur of the moment" type of guy. On top of that he is a great delegator of mundane and undesirable tasks.He called up my husband the night before the day of the trip and came up with the idea of this excellent adventure to labuan...my husband (being the neutral analyzer that he is) was left with finding out the relevant infos, timetable, hotel bookings, etc required. Knowing my husband too well, i actually did the hotel reservation/booking part (he says that he's too shy to talk to the reservations person on the phone?!).

Another personal trait of Andrew (well actually almost all of my husband's friends have it as well) is that he is notoriously well known for his extreme tardiness when it comes to appointments. On this particular occasion, he was actually on time, which caught us by surprise! The agreed time was at half passed seven in the morning,but due to some oversleeping by my husband and due to a minor spat which would not be delved into in this entry, we only managed to leave Lok Kawi Heights at half pass eight. The trip was almost called off because of the spat but my stupid (correct only at time of spat) husband managed to talk me into going along with the trip.

We managed to make it to the ferry terminal in menumbok on time thanks to some brilliant and at times dangerous bit of driving from Andrew.Plus we managed to suppress our hunger and postpone a planned stopover at bongawan/kimanis for breakfast. The brilliant driving was inspired by a strategy proposed by my husband whereby we imagined that every car in front of us was headed to labuan as well so that any car that we overtook meant that we were ahead of them in the queue for the ferry. Wipe that smug look on your face, hubby...

We imagined that the ferry would be something like that of a lesser Titanic, we would go to the bow of the ship and imagine ourselves flying...whoops, wrong ship! There was nothing aesthetic about the ferry at all. It was built for function and function alone. My hubby said that it looked and felt like the same ship he took to labuan 17 years ago. A crew member assured us that it was a new one but my husband wasn't entirely convinced.

After a brief stroll along the middle and top deck of the ferry we decided to stay in the harrier where it was more comfy. Stories were shared and jokes were told...we began to run out of stories but we still haven't arrived! Andrew began to sarcastically say that someone said that the ferry trip be one and a half hour long, referring to my husband of course. We could see the island already but it seemed to take eons to get there. In the end it took more than three hours to get our feet on to the island!

After the necessary hotel check-in was done, we went to our first round of duty free shopping. The usual stuff was bought without any major mishaps. We then went back to our rooms for some much needed rests before a small dinner get together with our good friends Royani and Zul and their cute son Thoriq. My two sons messed-up the bath tub of course as it wasn't always that they could go and pretend to be a swimming sensation.

We were joined by stanley and osmand later that day. they took a speedboat from menumbok and it only took them twenty minutes to get to labuan! again andrew started to mention about someone saying that the ferry trip would only take one and a half hours without looking directly at my husband. why men do these things is still beyond me.

Meeting up with roy and zul and thoriq brought up a good feeling inside. there is always something special with meeting up with a familiar face in an all together not so familiar atmosphere. we traded stories and shared experiences throughout dinner time. zul actually told us that the ferry must of ran with only one of its two engines because the trip would usually take less than two hours. this is when my husband shot back at andrew for the earlier sarcasms. Anyway,trip was fun & adventurous...wow! can't believe wrote this long la...i guess better stop now...continue in part 2 maybe...hehehhe...Good Day!

See more photos here