Petrosains @ KLCC

My dad and I took Hannah and Heidi for a 3 days trip to KL last weekend. The initial idea was actually to bring the girls to Kidzania, which was a total disaster so I am not going to blog about it. I wrote to complain and they were nice enough to respond with a personal phone call, but that's that and I don't know if we will go back again.

But anyhow, we also went to Petrosains at KLCC and it was such a good experience! Highly recommended for kids and adults too! Not to mention the super affordable entrance fee. For kids it's only RM8 and they have a family package (for 2 adults and 2 kids) at RM40 so that's what we took as it worked out cheaper than paying individually.

To enter, we had to take the "Dark Ride" which was pretty cool. Here are the 2 girls waiting excitedly for their turn to get on the ride.

The capsule that we were sitting in was supposed to be in the shape of an oil drop and it took us through Malaysia's rainforests, mountains and underwater sceneries.

All their exhibits are interactive, so the kids got to do their own experiments. There were also lots of helpful volunteers (most probably uni students) and they all spoke excellent English.

This was a capsule which was supposed to simulate the wind on planet Jupiter. It left our hair in a big mess cos the wind was really strong!

Another volunteer explaining an experiment to the girls:

There were lots of exhibits and experiments for the kids to see and touch, and I can't remember what all of them were, so I'll just let the pictures do the talking.

Playing virtual football with Kung Kung:

We also had a look at what it was like on an actual oil rig.

And Hannah had a go on this super slide. She just made the height requirement, so Heidi could not play. But when Hannah came down, she said it was quite scary!

Towards the end, we watched a 3D movie in their in-house theatre, and there was also a class for the girls to create their own experiments. Today's class was making "jumping cups". We still have those at home, and when they got home, they made one for Helene too :)

All in all it was a fun outing, and we would certainly come here again given the opportunity!

Hong Kong Trip Day 5 - Ocean Park

After almost 2 months since coming back from our trip, here's the final instalment - Ocean Park on the final full day. We chose to do theme parks on weekdays in the hope that there would be less people. Unlike Disneyland where it was raining, on the day we chose to go to Ocean Park, it was really really hot! So the kids had their hats and we applied lots of sunscreen on them!

There is no MTR at the moment which goes to Ocean Park, so we took the MTR from Mong Kok to Admiralty, and there is a bus from Admiralty direct to Ocean Park. There is however construction work going on on an MTR station just next to Ocean Park, so there will probably be MTR access to Ocean Park in the near future.

The kids were pretty used to lining up in position by now, so it was nothing new to them haha. Reminds me of the Von Trapp kids in The Sound of Music :)

The older ones had their maps, so they led the way!

Most of the theme park is located up on a hill, so we could either take a cable car or a train up. We opted to go by cable car going up, and took the train coming down. We did initially plan to go to Ngong Ping cable car the previous day, but due to the unpredictable weather, we cancelled that trip. But at least the kids were not disappointed, since we got to ride on a cable car after all!

It was quite a fair way up and it took quite long too. The kids were more excited than the adults haha. It was quite scary actually. I didn't even dare to go up the cable car when we were in Langkawi.

Our first stop was the shark exhibit.

And then it was time for the sea lion and dolphin show! Look at the backdrop - with the actual sea behind.

 Hot and sweaty - but Helene was happily clapping away at the dolphin's leaps and tricks.

Then it was time for some rides! The rides at Ocean Park are more of the "thrilling type" so they are not really suitable for kids, unlike Disneyland. Hannah was quite disappointed that she couldn't ride most of them because she couldn't make the height requirement (Heidi and Helene were totally out for the rides). But here are some of the ones that she could ride.

Due to the blazing heat outside, we disappeared into the penguin exhibit to cool off, and it was freezing inside! Talk about extremes. We were informed earlier that this particular exhibit would be cold so we had prepared jackets for the kids, but we didn't expect it to be that cold.

Happy kids with their loot from the gift store:

Then it was out into the heat again to see the panda exhibit. There was a panda mascot which we took a photo with.

It was so hot that the panda was hiding inside.

This was a really funny clown which made balloon animals for all the kids. It started out with only the little kids (Samyra and Helene) wanting balloons, but in the end he had to make for all of them :)

We stopped for a meal at the cafe next to the panda exhibit before leaving, The price was even more ridiculous than in Disneyland, but they did have these cute panda buns.

 Guess who enjoyed them the most? :)

Back at the hotel that night, the adults had their food indulgence - curry fish balls and other yummy snacks!

And the next day, it was time to go home. Kids took a photo in our room before checking out.

Bye bye Hong Kong, it was a fun trip! Have to now start saving $$$ for the next holiday! :)

Hong Kong Trip Day 3 & 4

It's been almost 2 months since our trip, and I still haven't finished posting about it! But I am quite determined to complete it, as this blog will help us to remember our life events many years down the road.

So day 3 and 4 were more for the adults. I'll try to summarise mostly in pictures.

On day 3, we started the day with the Michelin star Tim Ho Wan dim sum. While waiting for a table, we had the standard kids line up picture. Serious - then silly!

And then there were these 2 - clearly Samyra was not impressed by Helene's antics :)

We finally got a table and sat down, but we had to split into different tables as there wasn't one to accommodate all of us. It may look like ordinary dim sum, but the taste was superb. And the price was superb too. Welcome to Hong Kong :p

We had a pre-booked tour to go up to The Peak, but after breakfast we had some time to kill, so we went to the Hong Kong Observation Wheel which is something like the Singapore Flyer/London Eye. We got some really nice views of the city (and ourselves!) from up there.

And then it was time to go up to The Peak! We used the tram which is much like our Penang Hill tram. Packed like sardines, as you can see.

But it was worth it for the view! This is not yet the highest point, but the views from here were already very nice.

This is at the highest point - the night views are nicer, but we didn't want to fight with the crowd. Speaking of which, when we came down, the queue to the tram was crazy because everyone was rushing to The Peak at night to get the best views. But this is good enough for me.

There were also these interesting 3D pictures on display for people to take photos. Quite amusing I must say.

At night, we went over to Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront outside the Hong Kong Cultural Centre to catch "A Symphony of Lights". I personally found it rather disappointing as only certain buildings participated in the "symphony" and it was not as dazzling as I thought it would be. But it did make for a nice backdrop. Pardon our tired faces as it had been a long day!

The next day, we went to Citygate Outlet mall for shopping. We had intended to go for the Ngong Ping cable car, but due to the unpredictable weather, we decided to skip it. The one day that we stayed indoors, the weather was fine lol. No pictures from here as it looked just like any other shopping mall.

In the evening, we had another Michelin star dinner - this time at Lei Garden restaurant, also at Tsim Sha Tsui. The food was good, and again the price was better! Haha. Definitely one of the more expensive meals I have had.

Again it had been a long day, so this little girl sat on the pavement outside after dinner to rest her little legs. It was going to be a fun-filled packed day the next day at Ocean Park - blog post coming up!