Putrajaya Botanical Garden

Soft sunlight, soft wind, fresh air, and lushly green surrounding. That's a nice day for us to visit Putrajaya Botanical Garden. We went there once long time ago, without our camera. So, this time, with our camera (we brought Kelly and Livien as our cameramen as well :-p).

Our photo at the stairway from the open air carpark to the main entrance.

Upper left: Nicely tiled stairway (upper left). Tiles at the main entrance are embedded with pictures of plants that are available inside the garden with their scientific names (not all of them, as the garden accomodates more than 700 species of plants)(upper right). Photo on the right shows enlarged photo of one of the tiles with the pictures of plants.

Covering an area of around 90 hectares, Putrajaya Botanical Garden is the biggest botanical garden in Malaysia to date. We started our exploration with canopy bridge- a hundred meters long overhead bridge, overlooking a huge area of canopical shrubs with scattered bushes. Ferns, climbing and parasitic plants? More than you can count. All of them were harmonized nicely for a peaceful mind... and produce a lot of oxygen.

Tourist's information centre (the entrance) from the canopy bridge (left). The long bridge cut through the canopy of trees.

When you walk on the canopy bridge, that what you can see 20 feet above your head (left), and what you can see 20 feet below your feet (right).

Others attraction for us- Vine garden with high density of climbing plants, including big Nepenthes, Sun Garden with ornamental sundial, cooling Floral Steps with shady trees, and Ficus Shades.

Left: Betty and Kelly at The Vine Garden. Right: Nepethes and flowering climbing plants available in the garden.

Our photos at shady Floral Steps.

Situated high above Precinct 1, Seri Perdana, the official residence of Prime Minister of Malaysia in Precinct 10 can be seen afar from top of Palm Hill of the botanical garden.

A unusually big Sundial (or just a monument?) at Sun Garden (left). Livien, Betty, and Kelly on the stairs we took from Palm Hill to Sun Garden.

Path of Ficus Shades brought us to the lakeside with nice view on Putrajaya.

If you are Malaysian, you should know how do Malaysian botanical gardens look like. If you are not Malaysian, then, from here, you shall know that you cannot expect more than a beautiful garden, for the place named "botanical garden" in Malaysia (no research institution, plants library, genetics library, or any hightech. facilities).

Live nearby, and need a half day off from your routine without a long travel? This garden is an excellent place for you and your family. But, if you are from other country, having a short and tight vacation here, this garden shall not be in yours top priority. Anyway, you are welcomed to put this garden as one of your many stops for your whole Putrajaya tour.

Well blended architectures with the environment.

The park opens 9 am - 7 pm daily, and the admission is free. There is an interaction centre, opens from 10 am - 6 pm, admission is RM 3.

Several advices from us: visit the garden early (9 a.m. should be fine) to avoid burning sun, apply some insect repellent to ensure that you won't become the buffet breakfast for mosquitoes, avoid Lake Broadwalk unless you are really interested in it, as the broadwalk will put you directly under the sun, lastly bring enough drinking water, as we didn't see any canteen or F & B vendor inside the garden.

Btw, the best way to get there is by car. Alternatives, take commuter train to Kajang Station follow by taxi, or take ERL to Putrajaya Station follow by taxi or Nadi Buses (recommended) to the botanical garden.

Before we left the garden around 1 p.m., we grabbed the opportunity to take photo at the lakeside, opposite to the Prime Minister Office, Perdana Putra and Putra Mosque. The Formula Futura power boat race was held on the lake at the moment we took this photo. You might be able to catch the small racing boat on the far left of the lake in this photo.

For more information about Putrajaya, you can visit our blog on Agriculture Heritage Park, Floria 2010 and Ministry Precinct in Putrajaya.

You can get some advice from Malaysia Board of Tourism and Malaysia vacation guide, or join a Putrajaya sightseeing tour as well.

More places in Putrajaya on our list:

[Agricultural Herritage Park] [Ministry Precinct] [Perdana Park] [Wawasan Park]
[Floria 2010] [All Our Destinations]

Floria 2010

Again, wave of natural beauty swept Putrajaya, with hundred thousands of plants. Just this time, less flowers, but better gardening and designs. Held on 11-17 July 2010, same location, about the same time and same weather, the differences, the designs and themes.

Floria 2010, with sea of flowers, enriched Putrajaya with wave of nature. These photos shows the flower power at the main entrance of the exhibition. Instead of on the second last day, we went to the exhibition early this year, on the forth day. The flowers there looked vitally fresh, greatly contrasted the lushly green leaves.

Creative design, by putting a red star-shaped polygon at the middle of yellowish flowers. 

Left: our photo on the wooden observation stand along the walkway from the main entrance. Right: One Malaysia floral display along the walkway to Millenium Monument.

Flowers with various colours at one of the wooden observation stand.

Orchid garden, one of the highlights in the exhibition.

Our photo at another side of the orchid garden.

Orchid on sales. Lured by the great display at the orchid garden, these orchids should be the red hot targets of the visitors.

One good thing that we didn't found from the previous Floria-the bonsai displays.

Indoor display: animals shaped floral displays, with strong Malaysian endogenous identity (left); The Prince and The Frog (right).

Orang Utan and Rafflesia were the highlights of the rain forest in Malaysia. The floral display themed animals and flowers of rain forest in Malaysia was the first runner up of the indoor floral design competition. 

Unlike previous Floria 2009, the exhibitors for Floria 2010 had prepared nice places for photo taking, backgrounding one of the dazzling Putrajaya bridges. This photo was taken by putting the camera on a bench nearby the lake, with 10 seconds timer on. Two ladies on our right are Livien and Kelly.

Our photo on another side of the garden.

As we had talked a lot in our blog on Floria 2009 last year, so, we decided to put in more photos and talk less in Floria 2010. We hope you enjoy our blog. You are most welcomed to visit our blogs on other attraction in Putrajaya, such as Agriculture Heritage Park, Botanical Garden, and Ministry Precinct.

Back to All Our Destinations or go to our Floria 2009 (Last year) blog.

Bali 4

A walk down Legian Road followed by a round at Kuta Square and Matahari Square made a "home run" shopping for us. Kuta and Legian are the best places for shoppers to unleash their "talent" with hundreds of small shops-souvenirs, clothes, shoes, surfing equipments, glasses, bars, bistros, pubs... all of them lined up, awaiting to be explored.

Upper row: Shop lots along Legian Road. For those who has strong legs, they are hundreds of shops lined along 4 km of Legian Road for you to explore. Lower row: Shop lots around Kuta Square and Matahari Square.

Stuffs available in Bali: Wind chimes, batiks, casual clothes, CD and DVD, decorative items, shoes, bags.

Balinese Batik and picture drawn by local painters are something unique that we can bring back home as souvenir. We went to visit local batik manufacturer (Tohpati) and local picture painters (Batuan) on our way up to Mount Kintamani. The prices offered there were much more cheaper than what we could get in Denpasar. Clockwise from upper left: photo taken beside local weaver, local painters, pictures available for sales, and local Balinese lady painting batik.

Our group photo at Dewa Putu Toris Art Gallery, Batuan. The gallery was big with hundreds (maybe thousands) of pictures, drawn by local artists and painters. We bought some Balinese painting for quite reasonable price (compared to those sold in our own country)

Beautifully decorated Matahari Square.

Some interesting facts and findings in Bali, firstly, the flower offerings given by Hindus to their Gods twice to trice daily, can be seen everywhere. Secondly, many motorbikes on the road. Motorbikes for rental are available in every street. The boothes offering tour packages are available every hundred meters, offering tour packages with good bargained price. However, beware of the company that comes out with unreasonably low price, as they might offer you a trip that might ruin your nice day. Then, taxis with standard meter are mostly blue.

In Bali, there is no 7-11. What you can see are the substitutes, Mini Marts, one in every 500 metersBig statues always available at the middle of roundabouts showing the stories taken from either Ramayana or Mahabrata. Last but not least, beware of the money changers with super attractive rates, they are good in tricks (we experienced it once). They will make you loss more than those with reasonable rates. Always go for the money changers that produce receipts. They will offer less fuss and problems.

Clockwise from upper left: Flower offerings; Motors for rent available just beside the road; Blue taxi; Sign of Mini Mart; Memorial for the victims of 2002 bombing tragedy in Legian Road; Statue showing a story from Hindu's epic (Ramayana and Mahabrata); One of the hundreds of booths that offer tour packages.

As long as we had noticed, Bali's streets were safe, at least around Kuta and Legian area. Most of the shops along the main streets stayed operational until 9 or 10 pm, and some of them, remained open after 11 pm. Most of the people there can speak simple English. Malay Language or Indonesian Language is widely understood (we can speak fluence Malay Language and had no problem to communicate with the locals).

Night at Legian Road, Bali. Photos were taken around 10 pm. The street was still bright with many visitors.

Lastly, the food. We could find a lot of food around Legian and Kuta- Brazilian, German, Malay and Padang (Halal), Indian, Australian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese and many many more. For us, we prefered Malay or Indonesian food here (they just tasted like Malaysian food) for their reasonable price and wide availability.

Clockwise from upper left: Western food; Local fried rice; Betty dining in a local restaurant; Indonesian food (satay, fried rice, and fried potatoes); Balinese curry tomyam.

For more information about Bali, please refer to some of the website like Bali star island, Bali 123, and Bali-online.

High resolution of photos of Bali is available on our Travel Photo Gallery. Back to All Our Destinations.

 [Bali Page 1] [Bali Page 2] [Bali Page 3] [Bali Page 4]

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