The culinary adventure of the silver ladies

 The plane landed at Kota Kinabalu international airport on time at 7.10pm but by the time my Singaporean friends reached my garden home with their luggage, it was past 8pm. 

Although I had planned to take them to a seafood restaurant the first night my friends arrived, the fresh, lovely "Basung" fish, I had just bought that morning was calling out to me, So I suggested to them that we dined in on a menu of fresh Basong fish. fried to perfection with rice. I also picked the luscious purple bird's eye chillies from my garden as one of my friends is a chilli lover. 😍

Simple dinner - Fried "Basong" fish served with hot rice😋.

I told my friends that the fish were special because not anyone can get them easily. My neighbour went fishing as a hobby and caught a lot of fresh fish from the sea . One of them were the basung. They were fresh and delicious because  no preservatives were added like those in the market.

Fresh Basong fish before frying.

Luscious purple bird's eye chillies. 

Our list of food to try on this Culinary adventure during the visit:

1. Tian Yuan fish noodles for the bitter gourd fish noodles and fish eggs.

2.Salim Roti Tissue.
3. Tenom Yong Tau Foo.
4. Rojak / Soto at Sri Rezeki.

5. Dami ABC dessert.
6. Uncle Hon coffee shop -Cockles Laksa noodles
7.Sunset Bar Shangrila Hotel Tg Aru.
8. Steam boat with DIY stove.

The next day we started the food adventure road trip in earnest.
The first stop was,  Salim restaurant for the "Tissue Prata" or "Roti Tissue" is how the people here call it.

My Singaporean friend, Amy said it was the tallest Roti tissue she ever seen in her life🤭. 

Next stop on our agenda was the Famous Tenom Yong Tau Foo but sadly the shop was closed. No worries, we still had other foods on our list and replaced it with the popular Jia Siang soup noodle. 

We had the lovely noodles and also the stuffed Tau Pok which we all agreed unanimously were delicious and so were the Fried stuffed Brinjals. Both dishes were fried to perfection, crispy  on the outside yet soft inside. If only we were not limited by our stomach capacity!

Lamb chop at cloud 9 restaurant at kokol hills kasih sayang resort.

 The lamb chop was perfectly done according to my preference and the sauce was so delicious. The fries was so freshly cooked and cripsy. The sunset view was worth all the effort and courage needed to travel up the steep hills beside satisfying our hungry stomachs. 

Ann ordered TomYam with rice.  

Before the last day, we went for"Uncle" Hon Laksa. To my friends, it's not the Traditional Laksa but curry laksa. Thus, the absence of laksa leaves garnish. Anyway the cockles made for it as they were fresh and a good size. She said in Singapore, the cockles are smaller than what we had here.

"Uncle Hon"  Laksa Siham Bee Hoon.

During the short stay in Kota Kinabalu, Ann and Amy also had the chance to taste the very 1st mango produced by the tree in my garden. Ann also managed to harvest the very 1st Mango from another of my trees to take it back to Singapore.😁What a delicious opportunity! We believed that any fruit produced by the tree for the very 1st time , always taste the best. Do give a try and see the difference.

I kept the mango in the freezer before their arrival. 

I suggested Ann to eat the frozen mango directly like smoothie.

Frozen mango .

Ann was so pleased with the frozen mango. She said its so sweet and yummy!

That really makes my day! ❤️

On the last day, we went for Yu Kee bah kut teh at Beverly Hill Jalan Bundusan.. 

Ann was on a Non-meat diet as it was Friday but that did not stop her from enjoying the herbal soup. She loved the tasty braised Tau Pok and blanched lettuce topped with oyster sauce and fried garlic. Meanwhile we ordered meat varieties e.g. Belly, stomach and ribs and each dish came with a set of Tau Pok. 

What Ann had:

Tau pok and lettuce in oyster sauce and rice and of course she had to have here chilli in black soya sauce as a dip. It was a balanced meal as tau pok is considered a protein too albeit second class protein, Anyway she enjoyed her meal as much as we did ours and that was the most important point.

Although my friends stayed in Kota Kinabalu for a week but still could not fulfilled some of the planned food adventure . One of them was the Popular Indonesian Soto and Rojak mee at Sri Rezeki due to fasting month period, the shop was closed on 10th April when we went there.

Due to the time constraint, we also did not manage to try Damai ABC dessert but we found something else just as exciting. It's a dessert too😁.

We happened to pass by a corner shop selling coconut drinks.

Ann, a coconut lover, decided we had to try the Coconut Shake Special. I was game.
The price was Rm 9 but we were disappointed that the shake came with a vanilla ice cream topping. We enquired why it was not coconut ice cream topping? We were told that we need to ask for it and also it cost another Rm5 for the coconut ice -cream.

Question: How can we request for Coconut ice -cream instead of Vanilla ice-cream when we were not aware of the need to do so?

 

A spoon and straw were provided.

First, use the straw to suck all the melted ice coconut shake. It's so refreshing especially during the current hot spell: sure brought much relieve for a while.

When the shake is gone, use the spoon the scrape out the tender flesh from the coconut to complete the "journey".

Even if we couldn't make it for the ABC dessert in Damai, we loved the replacement - the  cooling iced coconut shake. We enjoyed the coconut shake in style especially on a hot day. 😍

Writer: Beckie

Co writer : Antoinette S. 

Reference :

Cloud9 restaurant

Kasih Sayang Resort

Jia Siang coffee shop

TheRoyal Coconut

You Kee Bakuteh 

Salim Restaurant

Three senior ladies on a road trip adventure

 Pondering life mysteries😇 

It is said that a journey of a thousand steps begin with a single step . In this instance, it began with a single invitation to visit Kota Kinabalu. However, my friends' visit coincided with a really hot spell.

On 12th April, 2023, the weather temperature of Kota Kinabalu was 32 degrees Celsius but felt like 40-41 degrees. So I thought we would escape the sweltering heat by "running" away to mountainous area. Unfortunately the heat followed us up😞

12.4.23
We were on the way to our planned journey around 6am.

It was recommended to start the journey as early as possible. So we set off around 6am and aimed to reach the viewing platform by 8am.

 We managed to reach the the destination before 8am. 

Unfortunately it was a hazy day so we couldn't get a clear photo of the majestic, 4095 meters, Mt Kinabalu. We continued our journey to the National park. The roads were not so good. A lot of repaired pot holes so the road was bumpy. Thanks to my trusty "Betsy", my 15yrs old car , the potholes were surmounted and we arrived at National park safe and sound albeit a tiny bit shaken. 

 ENTRANCE FEE WAS RM3 FOR ADULT WHILE FOR SENIOR CITIZENS LIKE US, IT WAS FREE!😍

We stopped by at Liwagu Restaurant at National park, for our breakfast, but unfortunately the restaurant didn't serve Ala carte menu, only a buffet which cost Rm50+, per head. We decided to just have a drink before heading back home. But the moment we came out of national park, we changed our plan and drove down the valley of Bundu Tuhan instead. We didn't know that it's a hidden Gem of Sabah until I searched through Google about Bundu Tuhan and came across an article written by "Lost Borneo", an interesting read and how the valley got it's name.

A lovely hidden treasure nestled in the valley.

Hidden Gem of Sabah, down the valley of Mt Kinabalu

There is a beautiful little church with a chapel, down the valley of Mt Kinabalu.

St Pius X church,  Bundu Tuhan

Inside the church of St Pius, Bundu Tuhan

 

 My Singaporean friends were amazed by the sight of Grotto down the valley. 

The little church was surrounded by the hills in the valley and views was spectacularly beautiful. My friend, Antoinette, shared with me a beautiful poem written by Tracy Mayfield.

It's in the valley I grow 

Sometimes life seems hard to bear,

Full of sorrow, trouble, and woe,
It's then I have to remember,
That it's in the valley I grow......

To  read on, click here and it will link you to this poem.

On 13.4.2013 we decided to drive up to kokol hills and stayed overnight at Kasih Sayang hotel. It only took us less than 30mins to reached the top of the hills at 2400 feet above sea levels. Weather temperature was normally 18-23 degrees Celsius but when we were there the temperature was about 27 degrees Celsius. It was considered warm up the hills. Due to the heat, we hardly saw any fireflies around. Juliana, the hotel staff said there wasn't many fireflies left up in the hills because of the climate change.

There were 3 rooms on the top floor and we booked a room each for Rm150+ as an overnight stay. My room was 104 at the  top corner end. It has a panoramic view of kokol hills, the forest and the city. 

Room was reasonably clean and comfortable. Some items were missing in my room and other 2 friends' as well but the staff "Jan" solved it fast. All the staff at the resort were very friendly and polite, including the gardener, made us feel so welcomed,😊 They willingly answered all our inquisitive questions.

 I enjoyed my room and would definitely come back for a few nights on another trip. There wasn't any mosquitoes in the room. Maybe because of the netting door. At night, I left the door open but with the mosquito netting door closed. It was lovely. No need to switch on fan because the mist and cool air penetrated through the netting so the room feels like there is air con in the room. 

At night, it was so quiet. Only the sound of crickets and the forest insects can be heard. We had a good night sleep. 

I don't mind seeing some harmless insects in my room. It's normal to have those around because the area is surrounded by natural forest. 

Lunch at Cloud9 restaurant

13.4.23 @6.08pm 

Getting ready to watch sunset from the restaurant balcony overlooking the hills. The view is amazing.

According to weather forecast, sunset timing on the 13th was 6.23pm. We decided to just relax and watch the sunset before having our dinner.

13.4.23 @6.12pm 

13.4.23 @ 6.15pm

13.4.23 @ 6.18pm

13.4.23 @ 6.19pm
Sun looks so red. It was a very very hot day, but up the hills the air was cooler and comfortable as if you are sitting in an AC room

13.4.23 @6.23pm

sun going down fast

Video of the sun at 6.23pm. 

13.4.23 @ 6.48pm

13.4.23 @6.50pm

After sunset, we had dinner.

Lamb Chop was really good. We complimented the Chef, Morris. We hope his name is spelt correctly. The lamb was done according to my taste preference. The salad was fresh and tasty, The chips were crispy and the sauce , wow, so good.  9/10 for this dish. The dish cost Rm38, that's  cheaper than other places. Before we came to Cloud9 restaurant, we stopped by Kokol Haven for a drink and ordered fries- They were horribly looking ( more to orangey color)  cold and  tasteless.

 Tom yum with rice. 

While we were eating, we noticed a moth look alike insect on the table, quietly staying still, but it's antenna were moving.  hahah....

13.4,23@ 7.23pm

Night view from Kasih Sayang hotel, Kokol Hills. 

Spectacular night view. 

Sun rise: 14.4.23 @5.59am
Photo taken from our front door.
 For sun rise, we opened the front door, to witness sun rise behind Mt Kinabalu. 

14.4.23@ 6.14am

14.4.23 @6.27am

14.4.23@ 7.03am

14.4.23@ 7.03am

A very steep road beside the hotel.
Make sure your car brake is in A1 condition. We saw a few stones where guests used to anchor the back wheels of the car. Guessed it's for double safety.

There are so many beautiful flora which we have never seen before.

Beautiful big flowers on the rooftop 🌹

I know this ! It's Chinese Lantern flowers.😄

Looked fake to us but this is a real tree trunk

Looks like sunflower but it's not!

Viewing platform of kasih sayang hotel with lovely unique plants which we  have never seen before.

Amy admiring the plants😃

Flowers on the rooftop! 

Bees pollinating flowers 

Unique loud Sounds of birds. 

Down the hills surrounded within the forest filled with the natural sound of birds and insects.

Camouflage - I was wearing green! .hahaha.. can you spot me from this photo? 

Easier to spot Amy though😁

Can see me better from this distance😂

Lovely place to view the forest from the hills.

The hills are alive with the sound of birds and insects.

Our Breakfast at KasihSayang hotel

The Mee Goreng (fried noodles) and Nasi Goreng (fried rice) were good

American fusion breakfast

Western breakfast were so so .

Water melon was crunchy though not sweet .

Staying overnight at Kasih Sayang hotel up the hills at 2000 feet above sea level.
The Balcony has a good view of the forest and city . Also an ideal place to watch sunset during good weather season.

The view alone made the drive worthwhile. So, a last look of the peaceful view of the hills before we checked out .

Writer : Beckie
Co Writer : Antoinette

References:

Mount Kinabalu

It's in the valley I grow

Bundu Tuhan

Kasih Sayang Resort