Team-BHP - Causeway to two Nations

Date : 1-3 January 2010
Source : Singapore(SG)
Destination : Malaysia (KL)
On Road : 1200 Kms
Places :Kuala Lumpur , Kuala Selangor , Batu Caves , Genting Highlands, Port Dickson

Prologue

I had never bothered to venture across the causeway to Malaysia even after being a resident of Singapore for 3+ yrs. Its primary reason is to travel by public transport and hop around two immigration offices across the border. It changed after my friend a.k.a driver migrated from Australia to Singapore.

This travelogue is dedicated to my friend a.k.a driver who tirelessly drove for about 1200+ kms in 3D2N.

Chapter I - Putting the pieces together

It is always said that the discussion over drinks were always forgotten the next day . But we proved it wrong by executing the plan formulated over few drinks . It happened over the Christmas'09 dinner/drinks to go for a long driver across the causeway from SG to KL. We had driven a rental car in other islands of Malaysia & South east asian countries. But was skeptic about driving across the causeway. We were initially worried about couple of factors.

1. Immigration Counter Q: as it was a long weekend, local SG people would go for a getaway and the immigration counters would be jammed with cars.

2. Accomodation due to holiday/long weekend.

To overcome the immigration jam , we planned to go as early as possible & accomodation was pulled off without any trouble by a friend in KL using his corporate tie up.

By 28 Dec'09 we managed to book the car, accomodation & finalized the travel plans/routes.
Still we had apprehensions about pulling this off without any major problems.

Chapter II in the following post if this thread hopefully gets approved.

Route map
1. Home (SG) to Johor (MAL)

2. Johor to KL

3. KL to Batu Caves & Genting Highlands.

4. KL to Port Dickson
5. Port Dickson to Johor
6. Johor to Home(SG)

Routes 4-6 are the same as 1-3 except by taking a diversion from expressway to reach Port Dickson.

Sample of the photo album: Pls bear with the quality as they were uploaded from iPhone photo album , will replace them from the ones in my Mac later.

Thanks guys(harjeev,WDM007,MX6,esteemer) . Replies to your queries in order below.

The vechicle was none other than my favorite one ~ Honda City . AFAIK there aint different variants in Malaysia its either Manual or AT . We were not worried FE as the rental cost of the vechicle was much less than the total amount of fuel filled for 3 days/1200 kms. We spent approx RM 150-200 on fuel with one litre costing around RM1.7-9.

Yes, its 180 kmph & the vechicle did not rattle or vibrate even at this speed & there was absolutely no noise. The rental company did keep up their word on the quality of vechicle except for slight scratched and a cracked fog lamp.

The expressway between Singapore & Malaysia was a absolute heaven for driving as its beautifully planned & executed especially the rest stops every 50 kms approx. I m planning to go for another one soon.

Here goes the rest of the Travelogue in parts.

Chapter II - Day One (Jan 1'2010)

We had a small party on the new year's eve as we had to drive on the following day . We had few drinks & pizza and hit the bed by 1230 AM . Our plan was to start early to avoid the immigration queue at the Singapore - Malaysia border. We left our apartment by 6 AM with backpacks as it was just a weekend getaway. We hailed a taxi from home to Queens Street, where you can either take a bus to Johor or get a Taxi for $10/head. We took a taxi as it was faster & easier to reach the destination and also we can avoid the hopping to both the immigration offices as you get it done by sitting in the taxi.

We reached Singapore immigration @630 hrs and cleared it in less than 10 minutes and followed by Malaysian immigration which was delayed due to the traffic on the causeway connecting singapore and malaysia. Finally we managed to reach the Johor bus terminal @ 0800 hrs and had breakfast @ Amma Restaurant which caters south indian food located opp to the bus terminal. We had a sumptous breakfast which costed us RM20 for three persons.

@0830hrs we were standing outside the car rental office which is also @ the bus terminal which proved to be too convenient. We had requested for a GPS unit as we were heading towards the city which is quite difficult to navigate unlike the highways. But to our surprise there was no GPS units available & we had to settle for the car without it. The paperwork/formalities/payments were done in the next 30 mins and the car was ready by 0900hrs with the final inspection of current damages.
The rental cost was RM150/day , the total cost including insurance etc turned out to RM500 which is INR6500/-.

We picked up water/soft drinks/snacks and couple of maps for the expressway & city driving plus the automatic toll clearance card. We were ready to roll by 930hrs. We reached the E2 expressway from the Johor and from there it was simply amazing 6 lane roads . We stopped atleast 4 times for smoke/rest room breaks and not to mention the exceptional planned exit roads for rest areas. We reached KL city limits by 1200hrs which was roughly a 2 1/2 hr drive for 300+ kms & paid a toll of approx RM60/- with 5 toll plaza's. It was an absolute nightmare until we reached our service aptmt which is located @ Jalan Ampang near various countries embassy. :deadhorse

We were used to drive with GPS for driving within city limits but it was a total disaster with maps in our hand. We were going around in circles along the embassy roads & clueless about our destination. Finally by 130 hrs we reached the aptmt, cleared the checkin process & payment which costed us about RM720 for 3D2N in a two bedroom apartment on the 30th floor facing the Petronas Towers :Shockked:. We settled in our aptmt and freshened up in the next 30-45 mins and started planning on the easir route to go to a indian restaurant for Lunch. We had a late lunch @ saravana bavan which was quite far from our aptmt. The food was total disaster to the quality served in India or SG except the coffee. But the hunger shadowed the desire for tasty food .

After the late lunch we started driving to Kuala Selangor which was supposed to be good place for Sea foods. It was a 50+ km drive from KL and we managed to reach there by 1930hrs due to traffic within the city limits. We were desparately searching for the restaurants with some good seafood and managed to locate one near backwaters of the river. It was a total bummer as the crabs were totally sold out @ the restaurant. So we had fried calamari , chilli prawns & a sea bass for dinner with some chinese tea. We left the place around 2100hrs & picked up 2 six packs of beer & chicken from TESCO & KFC . We reached our aptmt by 2300hrs and retired to bed around 0100 hrs after finishing the beer.

~~~~~~End of ChapterII
Chapter III - releasing soon