A family vacation trip to Koh Lipe, Thailand

My family has just spent a breakaway vacation to a small island called Koh Lipe in Thailand. The island is also known as "Maldives Of Thailand" for its beautiful coasts and beaches, clean and wonderful sea, and very relaxing simplicity lifestyle. It is located at the northern-west of Pulau Langkawi.

We first drove our car to Bukit Kayu Hitam, parked our car at the carpark near the border. Then, we hired motobikes to escort us to the Malaysia custom, and then cross the border to Thailand custom. After that, we took a minibus to Hat Yai, stayed a night there, and then transported by taxi to a jetty at Pak Barra. From Pak Barra jetty, we took a speedboat to Koh Lipe. There is only one boat from Pak Barra to Koh Lipe per day during this low session, departed at around 11.30am.

We landed at the Sunrise Beach, and walked to Castaway Beach Resort which we've booked for 2 night stay at the cost of 2500 bahts.

We settled down at our double-storey wooden hut of Castaway Beach Resort.

Downstair is an open shower place and toilet with no shelter. So, this kind of hut is only suitable to stay with close family members, and could be embarassing to live together with ordinary friends.

Upstair is the sleeping room with a balcony. There is no aircond but there is a ceiling fan on top. Mosquito net is provided as there will be insects at night.

Castaway Beach Resort has a nice restaurant with delicious food, just nearby the huts.

As in our travel plan, after 2 days, we moved to the more "civilized" Sita Beach Resort & SPA at another end of the island. Sita Beach Resort provided motorbikes transportation to bring us there.

We stay in bungalow villa there, at higher cost than Castaway of course. See the difference between them.

Koh Lipe is about castaway and relaxing, a nice getaway for urban people to enjoy the nature. There is a small street at the center of the island, and the rest is about scenery and nature. The island is so small that you can walk on your legs from one end to another.

We also spent a day visiting to Koh Adang, Koh Ravi and some nearby islands with long tail boat. There is a small island with lots of rocks called Koh Hin-ngam nearby, which is a nice place for swimming, snorkeling and even diving.

Here are some of the photos taken there with my Canon PowerShot S95 digital camera.

 

 

 

Citibank finally got their Online website fixed for IE 9

If you are a Citibank Malaysia customer and have been using their Citibank Online website for online banking, you might be aware that there is a major revamp to Citibank Online 1 month ago.

If you are using Internet Explorer 9 (IE 9) to access that website, you would find the webpages after login all got screwed up. This problem would not happen if you access it with  other browsers such as Firefox.

Well, it is a long known issue that Microsoft's IE browser does not follow the general standard in rendering webpages, especially in later versions of IE 7, 8, and 9 in handling Web 2.0 components. Web developers always find they need special treatments in their codes to make the webpage in IE to be appeared as the same looks-and-feels in Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, etc.

However, it is the QA issue with Citibank and their web vendor for failing to test and assure the accessibility of their new website in all major browsers, which should include IE 9 (as it is pre-installed in all Windows 7 computers).

I am among the users who had provided feedback to Citibank regarding their web accessibility problem. After waited for about 1 month, finally they fixed this issue by today. Citibank and their web vendor should be more careful in handling the QA of their website, and should not simply roll out something without thorough QC. Luckily, this is just an accessibility issue. If this is a security issue, happened to a bank website, you imagine what would be the impact and lost incurred.

Garmin releases MalSingMaps Malaysia/Singapore/Brunei NT 2011.30 for free update

Garmin has made available MalSingMaps (MSM) Malaysia/Singapore/Brunei NT 2011.30 (2011-Q3) for free update now.

You can click here to download the installation file of MalSingMaps Malaysia/Singapore/Brunei NT 2011.30 from Garmin server. The download file is split into 4, and you just need to download the file relevant to your Garmin GPS navigator:

• nuvi 3790V or 3790
• nuvi 1250
• nuvi 2575R, 2565, 2465, 1460, 1350, 765 or 255w
• nuvi 205 or 205w

The installation file for nuvi 255w is 234MB (245,858KB), about the same size with its previous version released in 2011 Q1.

For nuvi 255w, the installation program requires you to have an SD Card slotted in your GPS before it can proceed. Just like the previous version of MSM NT 2011.10, it will install gmapprom1.img (44,484KB) and SGMYMAL.JCV (215,715KB) into your SD Card instead of the flash memory of your GPS. If you prefer them to be in the GPS internal flash memory, you can manually move them from your SD Card to the flash memory, and I've done that without any issue. Anyhow, the gmapprom1.unl file is still updated in the flash memory of the GPS.

During the installation process, you'll be asked for the unlock key. The key is stored in the existing gmapprom1.unl file in your Garmin GPS navigator, which you can open with Notepad or any text editor. Just copy and paste the key to the installer when asked.

I couldn't find any description about what has been changed in this new version of MSM.