Kuching Day 1: Sheraton Hotel & Vivacity Megamall

The last time I travelled with both my parents and my siblings was to Shen Zhen & Hong Kong in 2007! At that time, only the Hubby (then boyfriend) was present.

Family photo in 2007!

Fast forward 17 years later, we were finally on our first family trip with my parents, siblings, our spouses plus 2 littlest kids! It's a pity that we couldn't find a common date during the school holiday else my older kids would've joined and it'd be full attendance! 🥲

We met at 9am at Terminal 4 to check in at AirAsia. We booked our flights at approximately S$268 per adult/child (no checked baggage). It was pricey for such a short flight but to be expected as it was Deepavali (we saved 1 day of leave)! 😄

Family photo in 2024!

After having breakfast at the Food Court, I joined my Littlest for some fun at the T4 Slide! I didn't join my girls during our last departure from T4 and had been wanting to.

Excited to go down the slide again!

At the foot of the slide
(My outfit: top from Uniqlo, culottes from Reckless Erika)

Sister accompanied the Littlest up the play structure

We finally boarded our plane, which departed Singapore on time at 11.50am. The flight was only 1 hour 10 minutes and we arrived at Kuching International Airport at 1pm, earlier than expected.

Kuching International Airport, Main Terminal

After clearing customs, we headed to AVIS to pick up our rental car. Due to my brother's AVIS membership, we managed to rent a Proton X90 for RM200 a day. Proton was now under the same parent company as Volvo, which explained why the 7-seater SUV looked so similar to the Volvo XC90 that we test-drove many years ago (would have bought it if it were within our budget)!

Our Proton X90 rental car

Spacious seats that reminded us of the Volvo XC90

Modern dashboard fully equipped with touch screens

The hubby loved the drive of the car! We were in disbelief that a Proton was of this level of quality (Protons are now made in China by the way)!

We drove for about 15 minutes to our accommodation, Sheraton Kuching Hotel.

Sheraton Kuching Hotel was one of the newest hotels in Kuching

Complimentary water at the lobby

We headed to our Superior Doubles Room, which we booked via Agoda for $164 per room per night.

Double beds, so that only one of us will get kicked by the Littlest 🤭

TV and study table

Coffee machine and refrigerator

Shower and liquid toiletries

Toilet

Usual amenities were provided

Our room on the 20th floor had a great view of the surrounding area 

View of popular landmarks in the distance

We could spot the uniquely cone-shaped Kuching South City Council and the beautiful Saint Peter's Catholic Church

As our last meal was at T4, we were all famished! We had our lunch at Nomadic restaurant at Level G of the hotel.

Excited to have our lunch

Our food took a really long time to come but when it did, it looked and tasted great! Maybe we were simply too hungry! 😅

Rice with chicken and prawn

Lobster noodles and fried kueh teow

Yummy satay!

After lunch, we drove to Vivacity Megamall, the largest mall in Kuching, for shopping and groceries.

Vivacity Megamall

Bought groceries from Everrise

After shopping, we gathered at my brother's 1-bedroom suite for dinner.

Living area

Yummy BBQ food we ordered via Grab Food

BBQ squid, cockles and vegetables

Cheers! 🍻 

The Littlest and I had originally wanted to swim but we were too tired! We all returned to our respective rooms to rest for the day!

From our room, we could see the unique illumination of the Kuching South City Council building at night! It was such an interesting sight to behold every night!

Very cool illuminations!

The Hubby and Littlest were asleep long before I went to bed (as usual I had packing and net-surfing to do 🤭)! Looking forward to more fun tomorrow!

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P.S: Read about our experiences with Marriott Bonvoy around the world:

• 2018: Sheraton Tokyo Bay Hotel (Japan)
• 2020: JW Marriott (Singapore)
• 2022: Westin Desaru Coast Resort (Malaysia)
• 2022: Westin Resort Nusa Dua (Bali, Indonesia)
• 2024: W Dubai, The Palm (Dubai, United Arab Emirates)

Continue to >> Kuching Day 2: Borneo Cultures Museum & My Brother's Birthday

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Visit MADPSYCHMUM TRAVELS for the rest of my posts on Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia as well as other travel itineraries!

Please also follow my travel adventures on Instagram via the hashtag #madpsychmumtravels!

KK Day 3-4: Tanjung Aru Sunset, Flight Home & My Reflections

DAY 3 

As we didn't have to wake up early the next morning, we could have a leisurely breakfast at Cafe TATU.

I drink teh-C every day so when I'm travelling and there's no teh-C, I'd turn to the trusty teh tarik instead (life is a pain without both)!

We had chicken rice, tea egg and fishball noodles

Food I chose

After breakfast, we took a Grab to Suria Sabah, located about 10 minutes away at Kota Kinabalu city.

Suria Sabah

Although the mall was smaller than Imago Mall, we managed to shop at Kaison and many of the clothing shops. 

We returned to our hotel and headed to the pool for our final swim for this trip. With time to kill and my curiosity got the better of me, I persuaded the Eldest to explore Shangri-La Tanjung Aru's in-house Clown Fish Discovery Centre.

You can check out the various seasports at Star Marina

The Clown Fish Discovery Centre is located just behind the Star Marina

It is a small room full of different clown fish

Various species of clown fish in their tanks

Close-up of the cuties! 

We probably spent about 5 minutes watching the clown fish before returning to the pool.

Final swim in the adult-only pool

Tanjung Aru is famous for its beautiful sunset, which is apparently top 3 in the world! The sunset view from Shangri-La is much sort after and since we stayed here, we might as well take advantage of it!

View from Shangri-La Resort Tanjung Wing

Great view of the setting sun

Good spot for group photos (1)

Good spot for group photos (2)

Good spot for group photos (3)

Although we were supposed to wait until the sun reached the horizon for the perfect photo, we returned to our room because we were too hungry! We couldn't wait to dig into the local food we ordered via Grab Food!

Don't order when you're hungry as you're more likely to over order! 😅

We can still see the sunset from our balcony! 🌅

We ran out to the stairwell at the back of the building for these shots!
It turned out that the sky will turn purple-pink when the sun reaches the horizon! 😄

After dinner, we packed our luggage and got ready for bed. Can't believe it's the last night of our trip! 

DAY 4

To catch our 9am flight, we woke up at 5.30am and prepared to check out.

View from our balcony at 5.30am

Going to miss this view!

Thank God that Cafe TATU opened at 6am so we can have breakfast at 6.15am, after checking out and leaving our luggage at the concierge.

Our usual table

We're one of the earliest at the buffet!

Yummy kueh

My choice of breakfast

After a hearty breakfast, we called for a Grab at 7am and bade Tanjung Aru goodbye.

Group photo at the lobby in our matching outfits!

We arrived at Kota Kinabalu International Airport Terminal 1 and cleared customs quite smoothly.

Kota Kinabalu International Airport

Our plane was on time!

We were soon on the plane, which departed on schedule at 9.05am. The flight was very smooth and we arrived in Singapore at 11.05am, earlier than expected!

Welcome home!

My 2 girls, Mum and I took the complimentary shuttle bus from Terminal 4 to Jewel to meet my Dad, the Hubby and Boy for lunch.

Lunch at Wa-En

High quality beef!

Yummy BBQ!

It was a good lunch to end our wonderful girls' trip! 😁

My Reflections:

I've been wanting to visit Kota Kinabalu since I was 22 years old. My professor had asked whether I wanted to attend the conference held in Kota Kinabalu on behalf of the team to present our research poster. Despite being a poor, graduate student, I replied that I would! Although I didn't get to attend in the end (my friend did and I was happy for her!), I did a lot of research on the place and it had stuck in my mind for a long time. I'm glad that I finally fulfilled that desire, almost 2 decades later! 😆

Kota Kinabalu is great for short getaways! The flight duration is relatively short, things are affordable, beaches are beautiful and you can Grab everywhere! Definitely recommend it 😊

<< Back to KK Day 2: Kiulu River White Water Rafting & Imago Mall

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Visit MADPSYCHMUM TRAVELS for the rest of my posts on Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia 

as well as other travel itineraries! 

Do also check out my recommendations on kid-friendly activities in West Malaysia!

You can also follow my travel adventures on Instagram via the hashtag #madpsychmumtravels! =)