This summer my wife and I did two short trips to Malaysia. The first trip was in July, and it was a quick trip to Johor Bahru to test a newly opened train between Singapore and Malaysia. The second trip was to a small, local holiday destination called Desaru Coast.

Let me start with the short trip to Johor Bahru. There are multiple ways to go from Singapore to Malaysia: a bus, a plane, a boat, your own foot, a taxi, etc. And I tried the majority of them, but, unfortunately, I haven’t yet had a chance to try a train that runs between Singapore and Johor Bahru.

A while ago, both countries had a plan to build a highway between two major cities - Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. Unfortunately, the initiative failed, and the whole rail track in Singapore has been converted into a long (about 23 km), narrow park. However, the last mile of that railroad is still operational and connects Singapore and a nearby city from the Malaysian side - Johor Bahru. The ride is extremely short, about 5 minutes. But it’s very convenient as the train line has a dedicated custom line due to the train schedule. On a busy day, it may take up to 2 hours to cross the border, but for the train line, it’s no more than 30 minutes. Consequently, it is very difficult to get a train ticket.

But my wife can do impossible things, so she managed to purchase train tickets a few months in advance. On the trip day, we jumped in a cab about an hour before the train’s departure, and, as expected, managed to easily cross the border. It was an extremely pleasant experience as the waiting time was reduced to only half an hour. It’s a 5 minute ride on a train and we are in Malaysia.

Interestingly, one of the reasons for the train tickets deficit is a group of Malaysians, who are living in Johor Bahru, but working in Singapore. The cost of living in Johor Bahru times less than in Singapore. Consequently, there is a group of people, who are willing to sacrifice 2-4 hours of their life daily to save a significant amount of money on an apartment rental.

Once we crossed the border, we proceeded to the usual Singaporean routine in Malaysia: got a famous banana bread, had lunch in a nice, cosy, old eatery, and watched a movie. The time passed pretty quickly and we returned back home at about 8 pm. To conclude, it was a very nice half-day trip overseas.

The second trip was far more interesting. During my first drive to Malaysia, we visited a very lovely, local vocational area called “Desaru Coast”. The area has a nice, surf beach with a small cluster of different hotels. During that trip, we managed to eat breakfast in the Hard Rock Hotel, visit an ostrich farm, and note the place as worthy to explore further.

I always thought that hard rock was a genre of music associated with independence, loneliness, and individualism. It was quite a surprise for me to realize that the Hardrock Hotel is just a family hotel with a crowd of kids roaming around a lonely guitar in a breakfast hall. That was quite an ironical revelation.

For the subsequent visit, we decided to spend a bit more time in Malaysia. The last visit to the Desaru coast lasted only for half a day. This time we decided to extend our vacation for a long weekend. As per the original plan, on Thursday evening I picked up a rental car and in the afternoon we crossed the Malaysian border. Both my wife and I were working that day, thus we decided to spend our lunch moving to Malaysia during non-peak hours so we could continue working that day. That day the bridge between Singapore and Malaysia didn’t have heavy traffic, and we managed to cross the border in about two hours. After a swift dinner and a couple of night calls, we were done for the day.

On the next day, both of us still had to work half a day, thus I managed to squeeze in a meeting with my manager as well as some documentation work. After half of the work day, we left for the second most important attraction at Johor Bahru - Premium Outlet. Obviously, the first and the most important is Legoland*. Once we bought the necessary stuff for our new house, mainly bed sheets and towels, we moved toward our hotel at Desaru.

Personally speaking, I quite like the road to Desaru. It’s a relatively free highway, with a fair bit of amazing views, and no speed cameras. Usually, it takes about an hour to reach the Desaru Coast, so we arrived at the dot to check-in.

The hotel was amazing. It has a great, unblocked view of the ocean not only from the hotel lobby but also from the room. There are plenty of activities within the hotels such as night movies, BBQ, two types of restaurants, and two types of bars. It also has plenty of bikes to move around the hotel’s grounds. Lastly, the hotel has a great breakfast with a pretty good spread. It was quite a surprise when I met one of my ex-colleagues on one of the breakfasts.

The room was very spacious with a great balcony and bathroom. The staff provided us with a fruit platter and a cake due to our “anniversary”. That’s the usual trick that we abuse from time to time. Pretty frequently, the 4-5 star hotels have freebies for couples, who celebrate (e.g. create memories) with them. The cake was amazing, by the way.

On the other hand, I was quite disappointed with the number of attractions/activities on the Desaru Coast. There are three options: a golf course, an aqua park, and an Insta-worthy cafe. That’s it! Obviously, there are a couple of restaurants and bars in the other hotels, but there is nothing outside of the “hotel circle” that we didn’t visit.

The aqua park that weekend was very empty and I’m not a big fan of aqua parks. Also, I didn’t bring my golf clubs, so I didn’t have a chance to have a game on the golf course. Thus, I’ll share my findings on the Insta-worthy cafe.

I found this cafe accidentally by scrolling Google Maps, but the place very much deserves a small detour. It’s located south of the Desaru coast, I think in the abandoned dock. Firstly, the cafe is nice and cosy with an attractive interior painted in azure and white colours. In addition, the cafe has quite a pleasant, unblocked view of the Singapore Strait with plenty of oil tankers far away and a gas or oil refinery afar. I understand that not everyone enjoys industrial views, but for me, it’s a big plus. Lastly, the place had quite a versatile menu. I especially enjoyed a coffee in a pink cup that perfectly matched the Barbenheimer theme that was the main news topic at that time.

Unfortunately, we didn’t find anything else in Desaru, so the majority of the time was spent in the hotel. Fortunately, as I mentioned before, the hotel was gorgeous. I very much enjoyed both local and western restaurants, two giant swimming pools, friendly and attentive personnel, and, lastly, a long, non-crowded, strip of sandy beach. It was the first time I swam in the sea this year.

To conclude, I very much enjoyed the Desaru break, but I won’t be repeating it too often as there are not many things to do there. On the other hand, I’ll definitely return back to the place to enjoy its tranquillity.

*That’s the joke, the most important attraction is the shopping mall that is connected to the customs.