Above: Peeling my mango like a banana, for breakfast.
I finished my last mango this morning, opting to peel it like a banana. It was juicy and I had to eat it over the sink. Muesli followed later after I packed my stuff away for the last leg home.
Checkout was 1100 so I went down at 1045 and walked across the river to the Queen St bus station for the bus to JB Sentral. The queue was long but it moved swiftly as a bus came in and took on a large chunk of the crowd. I got on the second bus and was on my way in about 15 mins.
We were dropped at the border after a 30 min drive. Singapore formalities and the queue for reboarding took a further 30 minutes before we made a slow drive across the causeway. Inside the Malaysian CIQ complex, the queue for foreigners were long whereas us locals had only a short queue for the autogates.
I exited at 1240 at JB, a little less than 2h after leaving the hotel. The next bus to Johor’s Senai Airport was at 1300 which would get me there at 1340. That would mean a travel time (Queen St bus station to Senai Airport) of 2h40 compared to my previous 2h when there were absolutely no queues. I’d say it wasn’t too bad considering the post-CNY and weekend crowd.
As I had lot of time on my hands I decided to take the 1400 bus and dragged my luggage along the walkway around JB Sentral and to a couple of malls across the road in search of Johor Laksa (a fish-based laksa). It was in vain; even the places that normally sell them didn’t have it at that time.
Arriving at the airport, I had just over 3h before departure and took my time to retrieve a change of clothing so I could have a fresh change after a shower at KLIA2. Even for international flights to New Zealand, the kiosk check-in worked complete with passport scan (without throwing up a name mismatch with a Malaysian passport that’s always experienced in New Zealand). Bagdrop wasn’t automatic as they wanted to put a transfer tag on it.
My hopes for a Johor Laksa in the Plaza Premium Lounge was dashed as I found the place closed since April 2016. I spent my time quite comfortably outside paying for a Coke Zero and later a very delicious cafe latte before boarding.
The aircraft came in late by 25 mins (due to a delay from its previous sector from Langkawi to KL). We got away 30 mins late. The so-called 50 mins flight included about 15 mins of ground time. As soon as we finished climb, we began our descent into KL. The Malindo Air flight which left a few minutes beforehand was visible in the distance lined up to land on the other runway. It was like a slow-motion race as we came into land together and we probably touched down within a second of each other.
With my transit time reduced to 3h30 due to the delay, I managed to grab 2h in the lounge. That was adequate for a drink, a meal and a shower. I wanted to go through security a little less than 1h30 prior to departure in case of queues, and be in the gate lounge about 1h prior in case there were issues.
I was asked at the gate if I had my return ticket out of New Zealand. I knew I didn’t one having a resident visa (electronically rather than a label). I queried asking if the APP had gone through as “OK to Board” or “OK to Board with Onward Ticket” but wasn’t given a proper answer. It was just easier to show them my ticket from my next trip and make them happy.
The nearly full flight to Gold Coast left 10 mins late. I was meant to have been in a full row of three people, being the meat in the sandwich. The people on either side of me had been split from their party which included an infant. The lady in the window seat managed to get a better option and moved away allowing me some extra room.
I took a sleeping pill after take off which helped me get 5h dozing until the second meal service 2h30 prior to landing. I wasn’t hungry so it was just sitting up and doing stuff.