We started looking for accommodation last year. BAD and I love boutique hotels. After some research, we couldn't find any that tickled our fancy. The ones that seemed nice also had bad reviews. So we gave up the idea of a boutique hotel and thought we'd stay at either Shangri-La or Le Meridien. If we were rolling in cash however, we would have LOVED to stay at Gayana or Bunga Raya.

However, earlier this year as I was browsing Trip Advisor, I was taken aback to find a new (boutique!) hotel ranking #1 of 75 hotels in Kota Kinaballu. I read the reviews and they were all excellent! Told BAD about it, we checked out the website, and booked our stay immediately. Good thing we did because with their great reviews on Trip Advisor, the hotel is fully booked for months!

And so after our 2 & 1/2 hour flight, we checked in to Hotel Eden54.

If you're a traveler (not backpacker) like us wanting to explore Sabah and only need the hotel to sleep and shower, then this place is perfect for you. Don't expect 5-star luxury or 5-star facilities. In fact, don't expect any facilities at all. You get a clean cozy room and bathroom, and that's it. There's no restaurant or swimming pool. But... you are smack in the middle of KK town. Walk five minutes to your right and you are at the Jesselton Point to take your boat to beautiful islands. Walk to your left and you have markets, shopping malls, bars, restaurants, etc. Next to the hotel is a nice big supermarket with everything you need. Having no breakfast at the hotel only meant that we had more chance to try the local cuisine. As with most boutique hotels, it is the service of the staff that makes the place special. The staff were friendly and helpful arranging everything we needed and giving advice on where to go/eat/see.

If you are traveling with your family/small children, or you want a relaxing holiday where you spend your day strolling the beach or dipping in the pool or having a waiter bring you a Mai Tai while you work on your tan, then go check into the Shangri-La. This place is NOT for you.

After checking in, we freshened up to have lunch and stroll the town. We barely walked 5 meters from the hotel when it started raining. It was SUNNY an hour prior!

We didn't have an umbrella so we crossed the street quickly to a big shopping mall called Suria. What we didn't know was that Suria was brand new and barely had any shops open! The only thing that was open was the food court at the top floor which overlooked the sea.

The FIRST stall we saw..... 'KL ROJAK'.

Walking.... we did A LOT of it in the 5 days. Because we were so central, everything was at the very most, a 20 minute walk away. Taxis are very expensive. They don't use the meter. The one guy that did use the meter charged us RM16 for a 3 minute drive! (it was late at night so not very safe to walk) Any short distance is usually RM10. There is NOTHING less than RM10. You could ask the cab driver to drive two shops down and it would still be RM10. A fifteen minute distance would be about RM20. Asking the restaurant to call us a cab after dinner one night cost us RM30. By Malaysian standards, this is pretty steep!

That night we went for dinner at a place called Little Italy. It was highly recommended on many websites so we were expecting a good dinner. Unfortunately, we were disappointed. It wasn't terrible (though I'm sure BAD would strongly disagree), but it was below satisfactory. The Mediterranean Salad was over-dressed and the pizza which they are famous for was hard. There's nothing worse than hard dough pizza. The only thing I really enjoyed was the crepe filled thingy below. Can't remember what it was called.

BAD wanted a relaxing birthday. Nothing says relaxing like doing nothing on the beach! So on our second day, we went island hopping. The staff at our hotel recommended that we only do two of the nicer islands - Sapi and Manukan.

We went to the supermarket next to our hotel and packed a little picnic. Stuff to make sandwiches, fresh fruits, and drinks.

We were told that Sapi is less commercialized compared to Manukan. They advised us to do Sapi in the morning, then hop on to the boat and spend the rest of the afternoon at Manukan.

However, Sapi turned out to be ridiculously crowded. Throngs of people and this huge luncheon set up on the beach for what I'm guessing is a tour group. We chose the quietest corner we could find and it was lovely.

Manukan is commercialized in the sense that there was a resort built there. But it was so quiet and peaceful in comparison to Sapi! And a lot bigger too.

What's really sad though is that there is quite a lot of garbage in the water. It's still pristine and clear, but every so often you would find a Coke can floating, plastic bags, etc. Not just at the beach, but we could see all of it floating in the middle of the sea as we were on the boat to the islands. I don't understand how people would want to throw their can drink into the beautiful ocean. It's not the lack of education. It's just common sense. Very sad.

I managed to keep his birthday dinner venue a secret. KK is very small and there are very few fine dining places. After some research, I decided on @mosphere. It's a revolving restaurant in the tallest building in Sabah. I thought the view at sunset would be magnificent, and a revolving restaurant would give us a great look of Sabah from the top. In theory anyway....

When I told my friends that we were going to Sabah, they asked me, "Are you going to climb the mountain?". I stared at them and exclaimed, "Did you just meet me yesterday?! Seriously?! Do you guys not know me AT ALL?!"

For those reading who really don't know me at all.... I don't do climbing. Or jungle trekking. Taking days to climb up a damn mountain just to see the view? No thanks... I can see the view just as well from the airplane. Really not my cup of tea.

BUT, going to Sabah and not seeing Mount Kinabalu, that's just a shame. There are treks to follow for the non-climbers.

Our hotel booked us a private car (which turned out to be a van) and a driver for the whole day. At RM350, it is quite a hefty price to pay. It would have been very reasonable in a big group. If you have seven people to fill it up, it would just be RM50 per head. Anyway, we're glad we did it even though it was just the two of us cause it was a long 2 & 1/2 hour journey each way, we could do it at our own leisurely time, and didn't need to be squished with other smelly people after a sweaty trek.

Bright and early, the driver picked us up and took us for breakfast at an apparently famous coffee shop. They made their own noodles and it was yummy.

Then the journey began to Mount KK. He stopped us halfway at a point that has the best view of the mountain. Unfortunately for us, the clouds were not on our side. Still beautiful anyway.

There was a Caucasian girl at this pool. She was wearing a regular brown bikini. The young Malay boys all around the pool just sat there ogling at her. I felt bad for her. She was doing what was natural for her. You go into a pool, you wear swim wear. Not jump in fully-clothed! As a result, have all the young boys stare and have dirty fantasies about you.

All was not lost at Poring. If it was only the weird hot springs, I would have been sorely disappointed. One of the highlights is the Canopy walk. But before you get to the canopy, there's a whole lot of trekking to do! Then several scarily shaky canopy walks. I'm scared of heights! It was fun but extremely tiring! I was sweating buckets when we were done. A much harder trail compared to the Mount KK one actually.

When all the shops closed, we walked to the handicraft market. One thing Sabah is famous for - cheap pearls! And I went crazzzyyyy! Almost every shop at the market sells pearls. How do you chose and where do you start?! We took a general walk around first just inquiring about prices and learning about the different types of pearls and quality. After several shops, we got the hang of it and understood the general pricing/quality, and how it is sold.

We chose a shop with a friendly sales girl and parked ourselves there for the next two hours. After choosing, haggling, sweet talking, haggling some more, we walked away with a whole lotta pearls and a whole lot poorer.

After all the walking, haggling, buying.... we sat down for some Ben & Jerry's and 'admired' all my lovely purchases. The pictures speak for itself....

Kerry's parents picked us up for lunch and took us to a place that had the best Tom Yam noodles. It was yummmeeeeehhhh!! It wasn't super tom yam spicy.... it was just perfect.

They took us for a drive then dropped us off at the airport. We looked at the screen to find our flight number to check in. It wasn't there. I double checked all my flight details - date, time, terminal.... everything was correct. We went to information and asked them about it.

The lady replied, "AK5123 sudah berlepas pagi tadi"

WHAT?! So when in the bloody world would Air Asia have liked to inform us that our flight changed?

Went to another counter to change our flight. She put us on a slightly earlier flight. Great! Then it started raining. And all flights got delayed. So we ended up leaving at the same time we were supposed to leave anyway!