Hello everyone!  This is the second installment of my Omy Royal Caribbean Cruise Contest blog entry after returning from the 5D4N Isles of Southeast Asia Cruise on the Legend of the Seas organised by Omy and Royal Caribbean Cruise.  I hope all, if not most of you are feeling hungry by all the food photos taken during day 1 of me feasting on The Legend of the Seas.  If you like to find out more about the food and have an exclusive sneak peek of the back-of-house food preparation, do hop on over to Omy website to check out the photos and videos!

Day 2: Kuala Lumpur Local Shopping & Captain’s Night

After the first day of food and entertainment on board the cruise, I had a great rest but was excited for the second day as the ship will be docking at Port Kelang, Malaysia.  I woke up at 6.30am and looked out of my window and this is what I saw.  

“Lights!! We must be approaching Port Kelang soon!” I thought to myself.  Hurriedly, I went to prepare for the long day ahead as I will be going on a Local Shopping tour in Kuala Lumpur as well as the Captain’s Night function.

Exactly at 7am, the Legend of the Seas docked at Port Kelang right on schedule.  Hurriedly, I went to have breakfast with my tour mate, Cherie!  She is a fellow food lover like me and have appeared on various Mediacorp Channel 8 TV programs and helm the championship for Wonder Chef last year!  (You will get to see her if you continue to read on.  She’s a real beauty! =P)

For the shore guided tours, it’s not part of the package but I strongly encourage to sign up for it as it’s really fun with many choices of tours to choose from!

After checking out of the cruise with our Sea Pass, our coach and tour guide was already at Port Kelang waiting for us.  Our tour guide is Maliga and she is a licensed guide from the Malaysian Tourism Board.  Although it was the morning of the Muslim New Year, her warm, friendly and sincere smile brightened up our day. 

Once we boarded the coach to bring us to our first location, Maliga told to us about the geographic and demographics of Malaysia.  She is also very informative to tell us what are the “must do” and “what not” in Malaysia.  After about an hour of journey on the bus, we finally arrived at our first location, the photo spot for Petronas Twin Tower, the world’s tallest twin towers.

I’m sure we look so tiny here as to capture the twin towers in the background.  It’s interesting as Maliga told us that the 88 stories Petronas Twin Towers are totally identical but built by different construction companies concurrently to cut down the construction time.

Tower 1 of it was built by the Japanese while Tower 2 was built by the Koreans.  Throughout the 6 years of construction, both were competing with the progress of the construction.  However, the Koreans were the ones who completed first by placing the pinnacle at the top and the project of the sky-bridge on the 41st and 42nd floor was awarded to the Koreans.

After taking photos of Petronas Twin Tower, we headed over to the Cocoa Boutique which is just a short drive away.  This is the place for chocolate lovers as more than 300 varieties of fine Malaysian chocolates are specifically produced here based on original Belgian recipes using the finest and quality ingredients!

The tour guide told us that the chocolates are produced with the use of Palm Oil which is one of the local products of Malaysia instead of using eggs and milk.  This is definitely less sinful and best of all, the chocolates will not melt in room temperature!  Unfortunately, when we were entering the Cocoa Boutique, we were told that no photos are allowed beyond this point.  If not I would have shown you how the chocolates are produced!

With so many delicious flavours of chocolate at the Cocoa Boutique for us to sample, I felt like buying most of them!  There are popular flavours of chocolates such as Tiramisu, Espresso, Hazelnut and also more adventurous flavours such as Chilli, Tonkat Ali and the king of fruits, Durian.  I can’t resist buying the Durian Milk Chocolate for other fellow bloggers to try.

After munching on chocolates, we were brought to the Independence Square which is the former cricket field by the British long time ago.  However, the sports wasn’t being passed on to the locals after they had left.  Today, this site is use to hold events such as celebrating Independence Day and many tourism events. 

The square is surrounded with buildings from the colonial era such as this old Municipal Building belonging to the Royal Selangor Club.  As you can see, there are 3 domes added onto the architecture of the building after Malaysia took over the building.

It’s the first time visiting Kuala Lumpur’s “Little India” located at Jalan Masjid with lots of pre-war shop houses selling Indian traditional costumes, crafted ornaments and accessories.  We were given 4 hours of free and easy time to shop around before the coach pick us back to the port.

Cherie couldn’t wait to get herself suited up in an Indian saree and our tour guide told us to visit Madras which has a large array of saree to choose from.  This departmental store is so prominent that we found it in no time.

As the name of the departmental store says “Ocean of Sarees”, we were totally lost in a world of saree clothes and pre-made saree.  For photography purposes, we asked around for pre-made ones so Cherie can have fun suiting up in it!

Finally we found a saree suitable for Cherie.  A friendly sales lady helped by wearing the saree for Cherie.  How it rhythms!  She looks like she is enjoying herself to be a beautiful Indian lady.

Looking beautiful over there suited up in saree!!  Pardon her sleepish face as she didn’t had much of a sleep the previous night.

After all the saree hunting in the morning, we were starving and wanted to find something local and authentic at “Little India” for lunch.  There are popular fast food joints like A&W and KFC around but the business isn’t good at all.  I guess locals there just prefer their own food more than fast food.

Our tour guide recommended us to visit Insaf for their popular Chicken Brayani which have been around for a long time.  When we went it, there are more people in it compared to A&W and KFC add up together.  We went in and got a seat, ordered the dishes and can’t wait for the food to be serve.

First of all, the Brayani Rice was served with Papadum!  We have an internal joke about Papadum with the other bloggers on the Legend of the Cruise and we started comparing which is better.  It turns out the ones at Windjammers Cafe still win hands down as it’s tastier and crispier!

The Masala Chicken was what Cherie ordered and it’s so titillating just by looking at it.  Ain’t you feeling hungry just by looking at it too?  Cherie can’t wait to start eating while I was taking photos of the food.

I didn’t know to order and the waiter recommended the Lamb Shank which is not available on their menu.  He mentioned that this is exclusive and only sells only a few each day.  So I followed his recommendation and ordered it and loving it.  The lamb was nicely done and the meat was tender to the bite! *Slurps!*

So much of soaking into the local culture, we shopped a while more at their local street alley somehow similar to our Bugis Street.  However, almost everywhere we turn, it’s all saree cloth.  We also visited the Sogo Departmental store and chilled out a little more before heading back to the coach which brought us back to Port Kelang.

Before we left, we can’t resist taking a photo with our tour guide, Maliga, who have been so helpful to navigate us around on our first visit to KL’s “Little India”.

Hello the Legend of the Seas!!  We are back on board by 4pm.  As the other bloggers were busy preparing to dress up for the Captains night, there’s something special for me, Yee Leong and Darren.

We were being called up to the Viking’s Lounge at deck 11 of the ship as the Omy team will be doing some filming to feature the drinks at the bar.  The friendly bartender Ali, connoted some cocktails for the camera and also for us to try.

Watch his swift actions as he prepare the cocktails.  We were intrigued by the way he prepared the cocktail.  Totally effortless for him!

Ultimate Cosmopolitan (USD$9.25) - Zodiac vodka, Cointreau and cranberry juice with a dash of lime juice.  This is what I drank in the video.  Stay tune for it on Omy!

Lava Flow (USD$7.00) - Mount Gay Eclipse Silver rum blended with Island Oasis strawberry and pina colada.  This is another of my favourite with ice blended and the alcohol content is pretty low and the taste is more towards sweet.

The drinks here at the Viking Lounge are chargeable but it’s a fantastic place to have some private time and unwind in the afternoon without all the dance music in the night.

After all the drinking, it’s time to get change and prepare for the Captain’s Night happening at the Anchors Aweigh lounge!  We were there early while the performers are still rehearsing their songs because there’s something special arranged for us!

That’s right!  A private session with the Captain and Vice-Captain who is always at the bridge making sure that the ship is safe always.  Hard work for them!

It’s such a rare and exclusive chance for the Captain to rub shoulders with the passengers on board so I couldn’t resist this wonderful photo opportunity!  We were joking that who are the ones steering the ship while the both the Captains are out from the bridge.  He told us that there’s a computer system & other crew members on board taking care of it. (Stay tune to Day 4 of my blog entry.)

All of us were commenting that seldom we have a chance to dress up so nicely so we were busy cam whoring and taking lots of photos that night.  I guess a few of us were high from the free flow of champagne going around the house.  The Captain’s Night lasted for 1 hours after some songs performance and introduction of the chief of staffs.

Following the Captain’s Night, we had dinner at Romeo & Juliet which the Omy crew did a short filming on the 4 of us being food bloggers.  If you have not watch the video, you may do so on the Omy website.  Here are some of the dishes I had for dinner.

Escargots Bourguignonne - Tender sails, drenched in melted garlic-herb butter and baked to perfection.

Golden Sea Bass - Pan-seared and served on a mound of creamy black olive polenta, and accompanied by Spanish sofrito and fried capers.

Filet Mignon (USD$14.95) - 10 ounces of a thick and flavourful cut from the tenderloin.  Served with your choice of mashed potatoes or baked potatoe, green asparagus or vegetable of the day.

We had the Filet Mignon done in medium and the colour was beautiful.  The tender and succulent slice of tenderloin is just so irresistible!

Grand Marnier Souffle - A hint of bittersweet orange liqueur is released with every single bite of it.

With warm milk added into the hole created at the center of it, this warm delicacy melts on the tongue.

Double Strawberry Cheesecake - Creamy cheesecake laced with a strawberry swirl.  Accompanied by a dollop of whipped cream, swan shaped chocolate and a spoonful of strawberry compote.

Ice cream, sugar-free ice cream and sherbet selections.  3 scoops of ice-cream - vanilla, strawberry and mixed fruit sherbet.

It’s another night of entertainment from a production team performing the greatest hit songs of all time.

It’s been a long day of fun, touring KL, food, entertainment and booze.  I was so tired and tipsy at the end of the day and I decide to call it a day.  When I got into my room, I got a surprise when I saw what’s on Yee Leong’s bed!

I thought he folded the towel with the shape of a dog as it is holding the dust roller which belongs to him.  Later on, we found out that it is our dear room attendant, Ericsson, who have folded it while doing the evening turnover.

Alrights, that’s the end of part 2 of my Royal Caribbean Cruise adventure on the Legend of the Seas!  Stay tune for part 3 as I will be having lots of exciting fun over at Phuket and also my very first time attempting rock climbing wall on a cruise!

*This is a contest entry for Omy - My 5D4N Royal Caribbean Cruise Adventure.

**Do visit my Omy blog and vote for me!