Hello again dear readers,

This next blog might be a tad longer but i actually (finally) have something interesting (at least I hope you guys find it so) to write haha. Enjoy!

So I survived my first night in the busteling city of Kuala Lumpur. Jetlag has cursed me already but hopefully my body is still young enough to cope! After 25 it all goes downhill i’m afraid…

My anxiety also decided to pay me a visit. Not being able to sleep and having anxiety all in one night is not the greatest combination but I am very lucky to have an amazing support team back at home who help me every day so an enormous thank you for friends & family (especially my big sis, yes Rose i’m giving you a shoutout) for helping me ❤️

Having all that said, let’s continue the positive part of today’s story: I have set off for my rainforest trip! Aaah so exciting! I hope to bring my trip to life with words to all of you.

I tried to upload photo’s but that didn’t work so if you can/want to follow me on instagram or the app Polar Steps, you can find me via: Georgina Antonia.

So first of all, this country is filled with lush green. The hills, some small mountains, that climb towards the sky are covered in a velvet carpet of green with small and a only few clouds that hang around the tops like a scarf and the sun is kissing my skin today (hopefully not burning it… one of the downfalls of being British but to that we just say: “oh well” and carry on with our lives)

What I have also noticed is that every hill (or to give a clearer idea of what i mean for my Dutch friends; mini mountains) have all got small winding steps going up to the top which makes me wonder, what could be up there as most of them are randomly placed and do not have any paths leading towards them…

Do the locals walk up and over or are the places/buildings to be seen?

Most of them are just hills covered in a lush blanket of trees and bushes…

Guess i’ll have to leave the wondering to my imagination. If any of you have any ideas let me know!

After a long drive, as-in a nearly 6 hour drive *inserting dead emoji here*, we finally get to my next hotel which is in the middle of the jungle. To get to the resort we had to take a small river boat to obviously cross the river.

Once across the first thing we see is a tall staircase up a hill that is covered in tree’s. On the top of that hill sits the resort.

They cleverly had tracks at the base of the hill that ran all the way up the hill and a sort of mine-cart that went up the hill with our luggage. Unfortunately for our legs we had to take the stairs…

The resort is made up of little wooden cabins that sit in between the tree’s. Simple yet stunning.

There is only wifi in the restaurant which means I am often alone with my thoughts and surrounded by natures voice that fills my ears. Crickets, birds, insects and even frogs can be heard clearly.

In the afternoon I took a shower, here the showers are cold and I cannot believe I’m saying this but I was actually really cold as-in I got goosebumps even though it is 32 degrees… Some things will never change. 🤷‍♀️😂

After my cold shower I had a nap as I was absolutely knackered and by the time I woke up the sun was already setting.

Dinner was amazing, had a curry and forgot for a moment that spicy here means: let’s burn our tongues, cheeks and lips off… it was delicious and painful at the same time. Lesson has been learned folks haha.

Now that the sun has set the nature around me has seemed to pump up the volume.

Bats are seen flying around and hanging from my porch ceiling, I have understood that there hasn’t been any Dracula sightings here so I’m safe from being bitten, I hope.

Spiders gliding down their own silk. (sounds nicer than it actually is… *inserting scared shitless emoji*) and the crickets & cicada’s have decided to have a party and make as much noise as they possibly can.

Am I slightly freaking out by all the noise and not being able to see what it all is because the sun has long gone? Yes, yes I absolutely and whole heartedly am but at the same time it really is spectacular.

It really does remind me of how much I respect nature.

After dinner I am off on a night tour through the jungle. All of my senses are heightened and our tour guide explains that we will be focusing on the insects and creepy crawlies we bump into.

(Yes as soon as he said this I was slowly freaking out on the inside but on the outside I put on my brave face)

As soon as we start walking we bump into our first animal of the night: a small green tree snake, harmless and sitting above in the tree branches just happily sleeping.

Next we spot three deer in one of the towers that looks over a grass field. They come here as man have made a salt lake for the animals for minerals and water.

Afterwards we spot my favourite animal… (read this in my most sarcastic voice ever..) a massive spider. And I mean MASSIVE. It’s green and brown body camouflaging and flat against the bark near the base of the tree minding it’s own business.

Now the first thing I want to do is squeal & run away, which I will admit to doing in my head but in reality all i did was say a big: “nope” out loud and moved swiftly away and hid behind the other tour members.

Our tour guide thought we would all like a mini presentation about Mr. Spider and decided to tell us everything we needed to know about said spider, all whilst standing not even 10 cm away from it… It was then that I slowly started to regret coming on this tour but I conquered my fears (kinda) and took a photo for you and to mostly say I stayed standing next to it for a full 3 seconds!

After my dream date with Mr. Spider, we moved along and saw scorpions (that was pretty awesome and here they are not venomous), centipedes, millipedes, birds, bats, stick insects and butterflies. Gotta end this is a more positive insect right?

The tour took about and hour and a half and I loved every second (apart from my date with Mr. Spider, I can safely say we did not exchange numbers for a second date).

If any of you get the chance to visit a jungle during a vacation etc. try and do a guided tour at night, it definitely is worth it!

Tomorrow I shall have a longer tour, hiking through the jungle during sunlight and hopefully getting to see a waterfall. Unfortunately the tree top canopy is closed due to maintenance but we will be swimming in the afternoon to cool off.

All I can say is that I here’s to spotting more animals with hopefully less amount of creepy legs and general creepiness about them… give me the fluffy kind of animals please!

Right to end my night I will be enjoying happy hour with my Malaysian version of a Gin & Tonic – don’t judge me – and then off to bed.

Talk soon!

Lots of love,

G.