Port Klang, Gateway to Kuala Lumpur

Port Klang was literally built to allow cruise ships to go into Kuala Lumpur from what I could see. It was a dock and small building with fields all around it, nothing else in sight. We had joined a private tour and were off the ship to meet with everyone at 8. It was about an hours drive into the city. Our first stop was a Chinese temple. The large displays put up for the recent Chinese New Year were beautiful. There were scenes with life sized people and animals made with wire frames covered with colorful fabric. The temple was on the 4th floor, so we walked up. Nice view of the city from there. As always the incense was a bit overwhelming. 

Our next stop was the royal palace. It was enormous off in the distance thru beautiful gates. There were guards on horses on each side as well as a lot of tourists. We then went to Independence Square, celebrating their independence from British control. There were several mosaic portraits of former kings. It amazes me what they do with mosaics in Asia, just beautiful and so detailed. Across the street from the square were 2 beautiful moorish style buildings. One was the Museum of Textiles. Wish we had had time to go in. 

We next went to the Kuala Lumpur orchid garden. It was very tiny compared to the one we had just seen in Singapore. I think we were there for about 5 minutes. We then made quick stops at a chocolate then batik factory. We never did see anything other than a store at the chocolate factory. The chocolate was very good. And to my surprise they had beautiful french macarons! They were very good also. The batik factory had tables in the back where the batiks were made. But it was lunch time so no one was working. I was able to find my favorite style of batik shirt that I bought on 2 previous trips to Malaysia, I was happy about that. 

                                                                                            

We decided to skip lunch in a restaurant and have our snacks from the ship at the icon of Kuala Lumpur, the Petronas Towers. They are the tallest twin towers in Asia, and beautiful. There was a lot of very interesting architecture in the city. It was nice to take a break from the van there. We saw others from the ship on a ship's tour. We then just drove thru different parts of Kuala Lumpur, Little India and Chinatown. After seeing the market in Chinatown from 3 sides we all decided that we should stop. It was crowded and dirty just like markets all over the world. There were a lot of knock offs and souvenirs. I bought a magnet and shot glass. I think our days of arriving back at the ship loaded down with parcels is over. There is no more room in our house! I did find some dvd's of the latest films like Birdman and The Interview. I will watch those on the ship. We were back to the ship after a nice day by about 4.