October 5,

Today the sky was cloudy but not raining, so we decided to continue with today's plans. Jeff sequestered a Grab taxi and we are off. We went to the Penang Funicular. We arrived in time for the funicular ride up at 0730. The Funicular or hill cable railway is just now 100 years old, as it opened on October 21, 1923. It cost 60 MYR for a round-trip. We boarded and it took us seven minutes to go up, stopping midway at middle station for residents and/or workers to embark/disembark. At the top station, we unload and are 2336 feet high, according to signage. Welcome to Penang hill. The weather has really socked in, but sunny up here. We can hardly make out Georgetown, down below! We sat to eat breakfast of our yogurts & an apple that we brought with us.

We walked around exploring a bit, going around the Hindu temple and the Mosque, which are both dappled with some timid rays of sun – made for good pictures. Then we trek to Monkey Cup – 1.2 km around and up the windy road. We explored on the way, seeing many plants and flowers – more than we saw at the Botanic Garden, and passed by bungalows of  where people live here. We even spotted a monkey from a distance swinging in the trees.

Arriving at Monkey Cup, we paid and had a little talk on pitcher plants. Monkey Cup is reference to these strange pitcher plants – not monkeys. HEE-HEE! We then walked about the 100 species of pitcher plants they have here. Crazy plants I'm tellin' ya!! The place also had two glass aquariums- one of horned toads, one of scorpions.

We walked back the road to the funicular – as we went hoping the fog would burn off. But it did not, so we decided not to do the sky walk – a elevated loop topping the hill. It has great views of George Town and Penang Island. But what would we have seen through a foggy mist? We checked out a cafe for brunch, but decided against it. So we lined up to ride back down. It is way more crowded, but we got on with the next car. It only took 5 minutes to go down.

Jeff “e-hailed” us another Grab taxi. We went to Miami Beach, it was not much of a beach, nor was it Miami, LOL. But we watched the water a bit. There were locals taking advantage of the free activity for their children. We checked out the stalls for a bite to eat, but not really anything we wanted. So we caught the bus back to the mall near us for lunch. We chose to eat at 7 Village Noodle. We had the same as before: Kuey Teow dry soup, and Spicy Cumin Pork Belly. YUMMY!!😋

Then back to our place and started laundry. We showered, relaxed, and finished the popcorn. Then did a second load of laundry – the last of it – and started packing, in between me blogging, and Jeff reading. Supper was eclectic. Jeff went to US Pizza, getting a small mushroom soup and order of twisted garlic bread sticks. We also had our last egg fried (BTW – was not double yoked, lol); Muesli and milk; and Tim Tams (which are Australian chocolate covered cookies and if done right become milk soaked – so good). We then finished packing and turned in early. We leave tomorrow… before the sun comes up.