Capital Gate, the Abu Dhabi office and hotel development set for completion by the end of 2010, has been certified as the World’s Furthest Leaning Man made Tower by Guinness World Records.

The tower project, has been built to lean 18 degrees westwards – more than four times that of the world famous Leaning Tower of Pisa. The building will house Hyatt Capital Gate hotel as well as premium office space.

I have never had an interest to visit the Middle East. Mainly due to the heat which I hate.

Japan Airlines (JAL) is having a promotional fare Singapore to Kuala Lumpur return for only RM92 (excluding taxes) for groups of 2 passengers. The promotion is valid for ticket issued and travel from now until 31 December 2009.

For more details and to make your reservations, contact any travel agent in Johor Baru.

Here are some travel tip that I would like to share with you whenever I travel especially on long flights.

Fully Charge A Second Battery
Always take a second fully charged battery for your laptop so that you can work during your flight even if there is no power on-board.

Fill Your Notebook with RSS
I usually fill my laptop memory with RSS feeds just before boarding so that I can read them during the flight if there is no Wi-Fi.

Noise Reduction Headphones
Carry headphones with noise reduction to block out the sound of the engines and other passengers. It make a world of difference on long flights.

We recently went for my holiday in Langkawi. It was the first time for both of us to visit the place and we truly enjoyed ourselves. If you have not been to Langkawi and planing to do so in the near future, here’s a guide and review for you.

Travelling Around
I would suggest renting a car and if you have a GPS, it would be superb! We rented a Perodua Viva when we arrived at the airport. For four days, we were charged RM300 + RM50 (deposit). With the car, we could easily zip around the island. The GPS (Garmin) helped a lot. All we needed was to key in our destination and it will point us the way!

Hotels
There are many hotels on the island but I would suggest staying in Pantai Cenang or Pantai Tengah as food outlets are plenty. We stayed at Frangipani Hotel & Spa, an eco-resort which is quite nice as all the rooms are in the form of villas.

Food
Food in Langkawi is mainly seafood. Price is about the same and sometimes more pricey than Kuala Lumpur but it’s fresher. We noticed they take a long time to prepare food. On our first night, the hotel recommended Tang Lung Restaurant which is about 1km from the hotel. The food was edible but we had to wait almost 1.5 hours before food was served.

One place we would recommend is GLK Restaurant in Kuah. The boss is friendly and would recommend dishes for you to try. We loved the steam fish and will definitely be back if we are in Langkawi again.

Langkawi Cable Car
During weekends, the queue for the cable car can be quite long. We had to waited about 30 minutes before boarding the car. It was an enjoyable trip up the steep Gunung Machincang. At the top, the panoramic view is spectacular and breathtaking.

Telaga Tujuh
In English it means “seven wells”. The location of the waterfall is quite far from the car park. The long walk up mountain is quite tiring and there is nothing much to see.

Langkawi Wildlife Park
Formerly known as Langkawi Bird Paradise is one of the better managed attractions in Langkawi. There are quite a few variety of birds and animals. Visitors are allowed to feed the animals (food is sold at the entrance).

Air Hangat (Hot Springs)
We felt rather cheated by this place. The place is currently under construction and there are no signs to the location of the hot springs. We walked around a bit until a security officer showed us where it was. What we saw was a dirty well with hot water. Nothing great.

Langkawi Crocodile Farm
It’s suppose to the largest crocodile farm in Malaysia and I was disappointed. There were not many crocodiles and the place is not really well kept. I have been to better crocodile farms nearby Bangkok, which has more variety of crocodiles and even allows visitors to feed them from a bridge. The show was also disappointing as I have seen a better one in Thailand.

Langkawi Underwater World
Quite a big variety of fresh and saltwater fishes. The latest attraction includes penguins and seals. You can give the show at the theatre a miss. The show is poor quality – it’s a documentary about Malaysia Islands and corals in VCD format and it’s projected on a big screen. Would have been better if it was in 3D.

Malaysia Book Village
We could find the book village but there is a waterfall near the car park and quite busy with locals.

Mardi Agro Park
Located near the Book Village, it’s a place worth visiting especially between May and July as lots of fruits will be available. The place is a fruit and vegetable orchard. Visitors will be taken on a ride around the orchard. Several stop will be made and we can get down to look and eat the fruits. We managed to eat dragon fruit, starfruit, papaya, pomelo, passion fruit, bananas and pineapple.

Black Sand Beach
Located at the north part of the island is a short stretch of beach with black sand. Nothing much here, except the sand is black. The colour is due minerals found in this part of the beach.

KILIM Geoforest Park
An interesting tour by boat with a choice of  1 to 4 hour tours. The operators charge per boat and not per person, therefore it’s better to find 4-6 persons to share the cost. The tour includes visiting the mangrove, cave exploration, fish farm and eagle feeding. We also had a short tour of the Andaman sea which our boat driver pushed the engines of the boat to the max. It was an exciting tour and both of us enjoyed it.

Langkawi Snake Sanctuary
The place is a little run down which is a pity. The place quite small and the visit can be completed in 15-20 minutes. There is also a snake show but again, I have seen better ones elsewhere.

Dataran Lang
The icon of Langkawi – the reddish brown eagle statue stands near the jetty to welcome visitors arriving by sea.

I stayed at the Frangipani Langkawi on my recent holiday. One of the reasons I chose this resort as it calls itself an eco-resort and it’s located in Pantai Tengah, near to airport and also the restaurants and shops, making it easy to find food.

The efforts on being environmentaly friendly can be seen throughout the resort – rain water being recycled to water plants, solar hot water panels on every villa, rubbish bins for paper, plastic and other rubbish.

I stayed in the Garden Villa. The rooms are spacious but there were lots of bugs and ants in the room. The resort management must be well aware of this problem as a can on insecticide can be found in the room cupboard.

The beach is beautiful and quite but there is the danger of jelly fish.

The only bad experience I had was when I requested for late check-out. I made the arrangement the night before and the receptionist said it was ok. The next morning, I got a call after breakfast and they wanted to charge RM60 for the late check out. I told the gentleman that I was not pleased and he then discussed with his colleague and reduce it to RM50. I was getting pissed and said it’s not the amount but the principle. I should have been told that there will be a charge when I requested for the late check out and not on the day when I am suppose to check out. He kept quiet for a few moments and said “ok, foc (foc = free of charge)” and put down the phone.

Overall, I like the resort and location. Everything would have been great except they wanted to charge for late check out at the late minute.