Colmar Part I

Irfan ready to go with his hoody!We were grumpy as a group all morning. The boys wanted to go out. I wanted to go out after the fall I had during my jog this morning. Thankfully it was just cuts and bruises. My iPhone was banged up pretty badly, but luckily it was in a case. The cover was scratched real good! Suffice to say, we needed to get out of the house.

My banged-up iPhoneI told you it was cloudy ....Puan Anita decided maybe some fresh air would be great. We headed for Bukit Tinggi. Colmar Tropicale, just 45 minutes drive from our house, driving toward Karak on the Highway, taking the Bukit Tinggi exit. I remembered being there back in 2004 when Anita was pregnant with Idlan. We were there again the next year when Idlan was barely a year-old. Irfan have never been there. So why not.

The drive there was longer than I remembered. How I wished that we had an MPV rather than our saloon. More room for the boys to maneuver. The weather was unfortunately rather overcast by the time we reached the top, threatening to rain. Five years back, they were still building a convention center next to the main hotel. It was ready now, and that was where we had to park. I remembered paying more than the RM12 per adult we did today. I guess some price came down. The car park was only a 5-minutes walk to the main entrance to Colmar.

For the uninitiated, Colmar Tropicale is a tourist destination built by the Berjaya Group based on a French theme. There were French restaurants here - well, plenty of pasta and pizza from what we saw. It housed a hotel, complete with suites and swimming pool, a piazza with shops and cafe, all in the nice cool surrounding of Bukit Tinggi, high up on the mountains. I might be wrong, but it was at least as high as Genting Highlands, but less hectic. From the main hotel, there were surrounding attractions for activities and sight seeing. There were pony rides, botanical gardens, a Japanese tea garden with a Japanese restaurant - at the botanical garden, which was separate to the tea garden. There was also a rabbit park, team-building facilities for the corporate-types to organise events, with top-notch convention facilities. 

The place was definitely family-friendly with, many activities for children. The boys enjoyed the day with a play area, kiddy playgrounds and clowns walking around the place entertaining them. All for the RM12 per adults and I think RM8 for kids - both my boys got in free of charge. We did enquire about lodgings. There were suites and hotel room going at a reasonable price. Young couple might be concerned about lack of activities in the evening - definitely so compared to Genting Highland proper. But for a family like us, the cool weather would have been enough to keep us going. I promised the boys in the end to take them for a couple of nights stay later in the year.

To be continued in Part II tomorrow.