Day 14: Rasa Ria

Relaxing by the pool

So, we all slept well last night which was good, as it was the first time we have all been in a room together during this holiday.  We had a leisurely wake-up and then headed down to breakfast.  Wow, we have not seen a breakfast buffet like it ever!  You name a type of cuisine and it was there.  There was so much that we got a little overwhelmed as to where to start.  Rather than describe it, here are our meals:

Tom
Chocolate donut, takoyaki, rice, bread, emmenthal cheese, hard boiled egg, 2 x marshmallows dipped in chocolate, papaya, milk and mango smoothie

Matt

Ready for the challenge

Cinnamon bun, lemon danish, pancake with dried fruit and maple syrup, fried rice with lamb curry and beef curry, fried tofu (maybe), watermelon, local orange, unknown local fruit (nasty), double espresso, large black coffee, pineapple juice, hash brown

Me
Bread, edam cheese, hard boiled egg, rice, stir fried veggies, sauteed potatoes, granola parfait, cinnamon roll, melon, lychee, local orange, green apple juice, orange juice, pineapple juice, dried mangoes.

Basically there was an Indian area, a Chinese area, a Malay area, a British area and a European area.  It was mad, I have never seen so much food!  When we left the restaurant we discovered a whole other area where chefs were making omelettes, soup and stir fries to order.

It was the breakfast of champions and we feasted like kings.

Body boarder

We went back to our room and got changed into our swimmers.  Yep, we were going swimming on full stomachs (we had promised Tom!)  We got in slowly, the pool water was lovely and warm.  We lazed about for a bit, played with our beach ball a bit, went down the slides a couple of times, all the usual things, until a fitness instructor came by and wanted to do aqua aerobics - we got out!  Certainly not Matt's sort of thing, Tom was too short to take part as he couldn't stand up in the pool and I would have felt very self conscious and silly doing it.  Tom asked to go to the beach so we did so.

Competition time.

The beach is gorgeous, beautiful, fine yellow sand and then we got to the sea (South China Sea) wow, it was literally as warm as bath water - warmer than the warm pool water!  I have never been in sea so warm and I've been in quite a few seas in my time.  It also was very gently sloping meaning that even Tom couldn't begin to get out of his depth without wading miles out.  I then discovered that you could get body boards from the hotel to play with, so we got three and had a go.  There wasn't much of a surf on the sea, but it was nice bobbing around on the sea, enjoying the warmth of the waves gently lapping over us.

It did begin to rain at this point, the clouds were forming so we thought we would have one last dip in the pool in case it all went off again.  It didn't 'go off' as such today but it did rain and it has got cooler, must be around 25 this evening, which to us is now cool and rather refreshing after days and days of very hot and very humid weather.

Excellent Indian dinner

We then went back to the room, had showers to get rid of the salt and chlorine and went down to the shop to buy ice creams (lunch).  Tom then went to Kids Club as they were learning how to make mocktails and as we have all drunk A LOT of them since arriving here, he was keen to learn how to make them.  We thought it would be a great opportunity for him to meet other children too.  It wasn't to be, he was the only child who turned up for it.  He didn't mind though and happily went off to learn his new craft.   Matt and I were a bit lost without him, but we went to the wildlife reserve to see what there was to do.  We found all sorts of trails, but you can't just do them - you have to have a guide with you, so we booked a nocturnal walk for tomorrow night for all three of us and picked up a leaflet with other activities, including one which was a Junior Nature Ranger, where children get the chance to help the rangers in their day to day work.  We thought he might be interested, he is and we have booked him in for tomorrow afternoon - once again he is the only child doing it, but he is fine about that.  Matt and I then played table tennis until we could pick him up from his mocktail making.

The hotel lobby - quite swanky

We then returned to our room for some down time.  We played Uno and flags, had our beer (iced tea) and crisps and then headed out to the Nature Information Centre for a talk they were holding about the animals of the nature reserve.  We were the only ones to turn up and they were quite surprised to see us.  They actually allowed us into the reserve by ourselves for a wander round which was good and we remembered quite a few of the plants from our trip to Mt Kinabalu Nature Reserve. Problem was we were all in sandals and although we sprayed ourselves with insect repellent, the bugs saw us coming and feasted on us.  Within minutes we were all itching incredibly, so we didn't stay long.  We got back to our room for quick shower to get rid of the bugs.  I had at least 16 bites just on one foot.  Well that was a mistake I won't make again - durrrrrrrr!  It will be boots and long trousers tucked into socks for me tomorrow!

We then went for tea, this time we decided to go to the Indian, where we had a very lovely dinner.  Tom had a special curry for children, then Matt and I shared a lamb kebab and a chicken curry.  All washed down with lassis and posh iced tea for Matt.  It was all very very delicious.  The chef came out to chat to us as we were the only ones in the restaurant with a child and as he said if the child is happy and eats up you know you have done a good job!  The waiter also stopped and chatted to us, he was amazed that we got the coach from Sandakan to Kota Kinabalu - I guess not many guests who stay here would do such a thing!