With cheap deals available every other week, it’s easy to take flying for granted and forget that it was only until relatively recently that most of us have been able to travel freely, and on a plane no less. For many of our neighbours who live in larger countries, there are many people who have not had the opportunity nor the privilege to travel outside of their home state. A generation ago, before air travel was more accessible, most holidaymakers in Singapore had one choice for a holiday destination: up north to Malaysia. Chun See recounts his first package tour in 1970, which took him up peninsular Malaysia, sampling all the delights from Malacca to Penang.

Chun See’s holiday began at Outram Park, at the tour offices of C&E:

I do not know in which year Outram Park was built. But I remember clearly the first time I went there was early one morning in December 1970 to board the coach which would bring me and my family (my parents and my sister) for my first packaged holiday tour to Malaysia. I had just completed my HSC exams – today’s equivalent of the A-levels – and was waiting to be enlisted into the army. There were two well-known tour agencies at that time. One was called Nam Ho and I think the other was called C&E. We booked our tour with C&E. Can you guess how much was the fare? I think it was slightly less than $100!

Our tour covered the main attractions in Peninsula Malaysia all the way up to Penang. Of course at that time there wasn’t any North-South Highway. Neither was there a Penang Bridge. Along the way, we stopped at several popular Malaysian tourist spots. For example, we stopped at Kajang to sample the famous Kajang satay. And then there was the Batu Caves near Kuala Lumpur and the very popular Cameron Highlands hill resort. Our itinerary did not cover Fraser’s Hill, the other famous hill resort. But among our group, we made a collection and got the driver and guide to add that to our itinerary. I remember the poor driver’s arms became stiff from all that mountain road driving. At that time, Genting Highlands was not built yet.

Today, people still take a drive up to Malaysia (yes, even a 10-hour journey up to Penang), although it is much easier to get there because of cheaper flights that have opened up not only Malaysia, but the rest of Southeast Asia too. In fact, you can get to any major city in Southeast Asia from here in under four hours. I’m not sure how popular bus tours up to Malaysia are anymore, but Chun See’s post gives us a glimpse of how it was like before.