Our family blog

We couldn’t have chosen a better day to leave for Desaru. It was a gloomy day and the sky threatened to open up on us anytime. However, with much invested into the trip, we decided to brave the weather, hoping that it will be sunny at our destination.

In addition to the weather, we had to brave the traffic jams at the checkpoints…

the Causeway…

and in Johore Bahru City…

before we hit the highway.

Hallelujah! The traffic was finally behind us. The skies were still dark but our mood was significantly better.

We arrived at the Pulai Desaru Beach Resort at around 3.30 p.m. After sorting out some confusions with the room allocation, we managed to check into our rooms at around 4 p.m. The room was quite spacious and it even had a balcony.

Unfortunately, from our balcony, the weather didn’t look promising.

It was too early for dinner and we decided to take a walk at the beach.

There were less than ten people on the beach and the reasons were obvious. Strong winds hit us from all directions and menacing waves pounded the shore, reminding us of the recent Tsunami.

The red flag at the life guard’s tower was conspicuously hoisted; indicating that swimming was a bad idea.

There were no lifeguards on duty though. Maybe they had assumed that no one would be crazy enough to jump into the sea at this time. Seizing the opportunity, I decided to play lifeguard for the day.

The swimming pool was also deserted.

Even Santa decided to stay away from the water.

Sensing that being too near to the sea could be life-threatening, we adjourned to dinner.

After dinner, I gave Jolyn some tips on billiards.

We also had some retail therapy at the gift shop.

Internet services were available in the shop, but we did not make use of them.

The girls had a nice dip in the bathtub before we called it a day.

On the second day, Anna woke up with a severely upset stomach. We suspected that she was suffering from food poisoning. She rested in bed, in the morning, while the girls played in the play room.

Later, despite her discomfort, Anna did not want to disappoint the girls and sportingly agreed to take them to the swimming pool. The girls were naturally overjoyed.

The pool was again deserted and the water freezing cold.

Even the girls couldn’t sustain their enthusiasm under these conditions. After a few splashes in the pool, they were promptly bundled up and we sent them waddling back to our room.

As the day progressed, the weather and Anna’s stomach turned for the worse.

We decided to cut our holiday short and made a hasty retreat to Singapore. On hindsight, our early departure turned out to be a blessing in disguise because the day after we had returned, Johore was under water due to the relentless rain.