Getaway...

By the time Ben, Sham and I reached Perhentian Putra, the heavy rain had turned into a light drizzle. 

The first leg of our journey was uneventful. We reached Hentian Bas Majlis Bandaraya Kuala Terengganu at about 5.30 in the morning.

We decided to rest a while at Masjid Abidin, also known as Masjid Putih.

A beautiful mosque but the security guard advised us to keep a sharp eye on our luggage at all times.

Dawn approached. We went back to the bus station for breakfast, purchased tickets for the journey home (which we almost couldn't get) and then headed out to Jeti Shahbandar to catch the 9.00 o' clock boat to...

...heaven! No lah! Just kidding :P

We chose a 3 days 2 nights package at Laguna Redang Island Resort. Quite pricey but the atmosphere was well worth the money spent.

We were given a briefing upon arrival at about 12.00 noon. The brief was light and funny. I enjoyed it immensely but few others laughed at the jokes, which was what I found sad about Malaysian society. Or perhaps the group was just too tired... (yeah, right!)

Buffet meals at the Sang Suria Restaurant from lunch on day of arrival to breakfast on departure day was part of the package.

This was the first peek at the beach from the balcony of the restaurant. Even I had trouble believing that this was taken from my very own camera! It looked like something out of a brochure!

The only quarrel I had with the amenities was that the standard room provided in the package lacked a drying area for our wet garments. Duh! With all that water around, it's only common sense that every room had to have one (even if it's not a deluxe room)!

The package allowed for 3 snorkeling trips. To my surprise, as tired as we were, we went to all three! I even had the chance to see a baby shark while swimming around the coral rich area at one of the beaches!

I had one snorkeling experience before this at Pangkor so I know enough that it is a good idea to rent the life jacket even when you could swim very well. It allows you to relax while looking at all the wondrous sights.

And since I never could get used to the snorkel breathing apparatus, I decided to save RM10 by bringing my own goggles...

The ones in blue were our guides while the ones in red were boat crew cum life guards. Oh, how I envied their freedom of movement in the water because they were experienced and seasoned enough be rid of the restricting life jackets!

That water is really blue, I kid you not! It's like someone rinsed blue watercolour off their paintbrush in the water.

We had the privilege of visiting the waters off Pulau Kerengga, the Redang Marine Park and C.K. Bay...

...and was crazy enough to go for the photo shoot at all 3 sites. Unfortunately, I'm no Tyra Banks so I was captured in a variety of weird poses and expressions in most of my photos :P

Despite that, I bought all of them even after hearing that they charge RM5 per frame! So people, my advice would be to save all that money and buy yourselves one of those fancy cameras that could be used underwater.

I went for a walk on the 2nd night and shot a lot of night scenes. Unfortunately, the yield rate was very poor due to blurring. I forgot to bring my tripod along on that particular night and was too lazy to go back to the room for it!

Yurusenai! :(

I walked along the beach into the territory of neighbouring resorts and found abundant night life. In light of the 'island party' recently highlighted in the news, I really shouldn't find this surprising but I did anyway with this being Terengganu and all...

I enjoyed this scene very much. There was a family playing with sparklers and crackers on the beach just like in the animes I often watch.

I ended my walk by relaxing next to the Tupai Cafe and listening to the resident Filipino band Tequila Sunrise.

The next day, after playing around the resort area for one last time, we packed up and took off for the mainland...

Once back at Shahbandar, we walked a few hundred meters to Pasar Payang for lunch and souvenirs. It rained that afternoon so we relaxed at one of the wakaf provided along Bazaar Warisan.

Once the rain stopped, we returned to Masjid Putih to freshen up before embarking on our journey home...

Goodbye Terengganu! Hope to see you again... if we have the budget :P