Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Breezy Penang Homestay 槟城微風民宿


A friend of mine, Keith has recently setup and running a homestay in Tanjung Tokong. The other day, me and V went to his condo to help him shoot some photos and at the same time try on his infinity swimming pool~ :D

The infinity swimming pool is overlooking Straits Quay, V said she feels like a mermaid, swimming towards the glowing palace but never able to reach it...

The luxury condo with civilian price, provides wide range of facilities - pool, sauna, gym, playground, big compound at the hanging gardens, condo car park and visitor car park for your convenient.

The apartment itself consists of 3 bedrooms and generously 3 washrooms. All rooms are equipped with beds, linen, air-conditional and fan. Other stuff like water heater, hair dryer, fridge, washing machine...  are provided as well. It's basic but definitely enough for a comfortable stay, even for longer term like 1 or 2 months.
Keith has been busy setting up the homestay, keeping it clean and try to fulfill customer needs. I do hope he will success in this business because that is something I want to do eventually too.

Homestay concept is indeed really good especially for large group of friends or family where the apartment can accommodate at least 6 people or more. More budget, saving and family members or friends can get together in the spacious living hall, the thing I most appreciated when travel with my families and friends.

Do contact me if you are interested in the short term stay at Breezy Homestay.
My Email: johandy27@yahoo.com



Below is the details of rental rates & information:


Facilities:
• Infinity swimming pool
• Wading pool
• Jacuzzi
• Sauna
• Fitness centre
• Playground
• BBQ pit
• 24 hour security
• 1 covered car park. Additional parking spots available for free at the Visitors car park.

Accessibility:
• 1 km to Straits Quay, Tesco
• 2 km to Persiaran Gurney
• 3 km to Botanical Garden
• 5 km to Batu Feringghi
• 8 km to Georgetown
• 12 km to Ferry Terminal / Jetty
• 15 km to Penang Bridge
• 35 km to Bayan Lepas International Airport

Check-in: 1400
Check-out: 1200

Refundable deposit: RM 100

Promotion Rate:
RM 300 per night


Discounts available for return customers.


Location: The Brezza, Jln Desiran Tanjung Tanjung Tokong, Penang, Malaysia
GPS Coordinate: N 5 27.180  E 100 18.484

Attach with some photos taken by me. :)






Monday, March 26, 2012

Hiking Cherok Tokun, Tea Spa Bukit Mertajam

Started to work out since last month for our coming KK Trip. It is always not too late although it scares me everytime thinking of it.

Tokun is one of the hiking place nearest to my house, been there few times but only manage to get to the 2nd Rest Station once. There are 2 trails in Tokun, one is in tar road, another will be walking in the woods.

I always take the soil trail for way up and come down using tar road. It took about 45mins to reach an exit staircase to tar road from soil track. Walk 15mins on the tar road to reach the first shelter, where they call the "Rest Station". If you did not exit from the staircase, continue your way up in the jungle, it took another half an hour to reach the 2nd Rest Station, this is easier than the first part of the trail as it getting higher and have less ground vegetation which means you have more open air and oxygen.
Descend down with tar road takes less than 1 hour, it was easier but my knee and hip was quite hurt. Lots of uncles & aunties walk faster than us... @_@

The whole journey took 2 hours ++ on our very slow speed. :)

Next, comes the whole point of hiking at Tokun, the Tea Spa (森林茶坊). :D

All of the food there are extremely delicious~ Probably too exhausted or they are just simply too nice! Sipping tea while listening to the birds singing, simply what we looking for on a Sunday morning~
Most Delicious Herbal Tea Egg
Feel refreshing having Chinese tea after work out

Extremely love this Mee Tiao! Don't have any ingredient but simply just tasted so nice on its own with garlic! You must try their Chicken &Mushroom Noodles too!
Teochew Mee Tiao 潮州面条

Tea Spa Corner
Opening Hours: Morning after 9am or 10am - evening . Sunday - 10am onwards
Location: Right at the foot of Tokun Hill

Cherok Tokun
Direction: Drive along Jalan Kulim from Bukit Mertajam (BM) towards Kulim direction. Passed through St. Anne Church on your left, go straight for another 300m (agak-agak) and notice a small road on left with a Mee Ketam shop at the junction corner, turn into it and drive till the end. Opposite the junction(right-hand side of Jalan Kulim) is a mosque (Masjid Jamek Cherok Tok Kun). If you passed the mosque, you are overshot.

GPS Coordinate: N 5 22.147  E 100 29.068
Tips: Do bring mosquito repellent.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Shinjuku Cafe, Japanese Restaurant at Raja Uda

I think in the mind of most people, we got to eat western food during Valentine's Day, the candle light's charm...

Therefore, those places are packed with lots of people. To avoid traffic, we, mainlandant have to stay at mainland for the day.
This indeed make people a really big head, where not much nice western food in mainland as far as I know. Moreover, I need something new, not Nando's, not Manhattan Fish Market... @_@

After Googled bunch of things, decided to go Richard's Top Taste Cafe in Inderawasih. It's very near to my house, it's cheaper, and vkeong's blog mentioned about it.
I purposely drive passed the shop on my way back home. I got scared away by it's outlook. Ok, I'm not gonna go there during Valentine's Day. Quickly called another restaurant on my list, fully booked. Call another one... Fortunately~
And here we are, Shinjuku Japanese Restaurant near Raja Uda at Pusat Perniagaan Teras Jaya.

And yes, we going to have Japanese food on Valentine's, not western.

The shop is on the same street with Who's Bryan and Apex, and on the 1st floor (upstairs, not so easy to spot), opposite of Chung Ling Secondary School (北海钟灵中学对面). The interior is ok, not a high-class one but with dim light, room temperature, not hot and not cold either, and not noisy, the thing that I felt most grateful.
My kids just tooooo cute
In fact, I was quite worry about the food.

The first dish comes up was salmon sashimi. The salmon given was quite thick, but still small in portion with a price of RM13.80. It's fresh and taste good, which make us happy for awhile.

 Next is the cheese-baked scallops (hotate), RM12.80. It was disappointed. I need to scratch the shell to take out the scallop meat, obviously overcooked. And I could not understand the taste of the sauce. Taste like there is ginger inside... never had a scallop with ginger before. Kinda weird, probably because I really don't like ginger.

Teppanyaki chicken set came later. The chicken tasted quite nice, a satisfied one. It costs RM16.80 with miso soup, salad, fruits and green tea. The miso soup is terrible by the way. I cooked a better miso soup with the miso paste bought from organic shop. @_@

Another main course we ordered is Gekikara Ramen (Spicy Seafood Ramen). The appearance looks convincing, but the first mouth make my eyes really big, what is this...?
It taste really weird, I can't tell what is wrong with it. After few more mouth, I felt it was scorch. I didn't ask waiter/waitress about it. Still wondering is it how it supposed to taste or it is really burnt. I couldn't finish the noodles.

Well, it wasn't a good experience. I just so glad it was my main course that tasted terrible. But still, we hardly get a pure Japanese Restaurant in mainland here (Sushi King & Sakae not count la), it does have a chance that their sushi could be nice. If anyone happened to taste their sushi, do update us on it. :)
 



Shinjuku Japanese Restaurant
Address:28,Lorong Teras Jaya 8, Kawasan Perniagaan Teras Jaya, 12300 Butterworth, Malaysia
Business Hour: Mon - Sun:   11:30am - 03:00pm / 05:30pm - 10:00pm
Tel: 04-3246588
GPS Coordinate:N 5 26.022   E 100 23.436

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Stone Age Cafe & Restaurant in Bukit Mertajam

There is an area in Bukit Mertajam that has recently became a fabulous hang out place, Pusat Perniagaan Gemilang. Cafe, restaurant, dessert house, boutique, saloon, pub and club established like growing mushrooms. Soon it will be like another Auto-City! Glad for fellows staying in BM.

Not too far from the auto-city, the place located on the famous off Jalan Song Ban Keng, Opposite Taman Limau Manis and behind Taman Gemilang. It's like my second home and I came here almost everyday. Due to laziness, now only I started blog about this place. This post, we going to talk about Stone Age Cafe & Restaurant. I will write about others later. :)

To our surprise, all the while we thought it is a pub, and I dressed really well that day, hah! At the end, it's actually a restaurant.

The interior and exterior using plenty of wood as their theme. Wood-like table, chairs and the significant big tree at the center of the restaurant which you can see it even if you just drive passed the restaurant.

Looking up on the menu, the price is surprisingly reasonable given on the very nice look and feel of the restaurant. Drinks are consider reasonable for a hang out place.
 

Once you step into the restaurant, you could simply sense that the whole place is covered with attempting BBQ smells.

The food on a 400 Celsius hot stone, their signature dish.
Grilled Chicken on Hot Stone, Rm16.80
You can choose from the various main dish on the stone. There are chicken, fish, steak, tiger prawns, scallop and etc. And complimentary 4 sidelines you can choose out of 6 selection, among them are wedges, mashed potato, rice, corn and etc.

The chicken that we had, marinated well and on the hot stone is definitely an interesting point. However, the sidelines are not hot, like fries and wedges are pre-fried. So we ended up putting all of the sidelines on the stone to heat them up (if that was the intention... lol).

We also ordered the seafood carbonara fettuccine. It was not hot either, just warm and the scallops are small and over-cooked. I understand that it is not so easy to cook scallops to its perfection, let's just don't take risk. This one failed.
Seafood Carbonara, <RM15
Another thing that deserve compliment is the services. The staff they recruit always with positive attitude and really responsive as far as I seen. Just got to know that every Tuesday is their hot stone BBQ buffet night, RM50+ per pax, RM25+ for children below 12 years old.

The hot stone meal is satisfying and have a generous portion. This make me definitely want to revisit again.

* Photo credited to V - Life Simple Pleasures

* Revisit Stone Age today and tried on their Hot Stone Tilapia, still prefer chicken because unlike chicken, fish doesn't have much oil to burn on the stone, which make it a little bit dry.
The sidelines do have improvement, getting hotter nowadays, but still don't feel like they make it upon order.

Stone Age Cafe
Business Hour:
Mon - Thu: 11:00 am - 1:00 am
Fri - Sat    : 11:00 am - 2:00 am
Sun           : 11:00 am - 1:00 am

Contact Number: +604-537 7228
Address: 11, Jalan Gemilang 2, Pusat Perniagaan Gemilang, 14000 Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia
GPS Coordinate: N 5 21.044   E 100 26.555

Direction: If drive from Penang Island, drive toward north-south highway (Kuala Lumpur direction). Exit at Juru/Bukit Mertajam, turn left without waiting for the traffic light. Drive all the way straight until you reach a T-junction with small weird round about with traffic light. Turn right on the traffic light you will find yourself driving on Jalan Song Ban Keng. Drive straight until you see Honda Center on your left, then ready to turn into left. After turn into left, turn right immediately and you will see Stone Age on your left.