Last weekend---I say weekend, but really I mean Sunday and Monday---I escaped the smog and pollution of K.L city and retreated to France, seeking refuge at a chateau on a hill.
But wait...something doesn't quite sit right...this foliage...some of it looks rather tropical...and that landscape...
...fine, cicadas that croak like bullfrogs and attack you are distinctly French, but still...is this really Europe?
Hahaha, the gig is up. I wasn't actually in France, but at Berjaya Hill (formerly known as Bukit Tinggi) in Pahang, just an hour's drive from Kuala Lumpur and near Genting Highlands. I tried maintaining the provincial provence pretence for all of a day and a half, but all my friends saw right through it.
I spent the weekend recharging my batteries at The Chateau, a spa and organic wellness resort:
"Modeled after an 12th century medieval ‘ Haut Koenigsbourg’ castle in Alsace, France, The Chateau is the world’s first organic wellness spa resort offering the ultimate in health and wellbeing enrichment.
The Chateau offers guests a complete organic experience as well as impeccable service and unsurpassed hospitality standards. La Santé Organic Wellness Spa sets a new benchmark for a destination spa which blends the best of European spa expertise with renowned Asian hospitality."
The Chateau website
Long story short, I was hiding from everyone in a French castle themed spa retreat.
Or as one calls it 'a subtropical spoof by a theme park billionaire who loved Les Moules'.
Four floors of rooms and suites overlook a courtyard. Should one wish to communicate with someone from another room the rustic way ie. no phones, just waltz out to the corridor and let your voice carry across like the wind. I don't recommend it though, this is a place of wellness and rest, not a yodelling competition in the Swiss Alps.
The policy on considerate silence quelled my urge to walk out to the corridor, lean over, and sing Belle's song. 'Little town, it's a quiet village...'
I got distracted by that last paragraph and spent about twenty minutes on Youtube watching videos of yodelling.
It was a welcome respite from the city and an escape from everyday life. March was not the best month for Malaysians what with so much tragedy going around and so even in April a nagging sense of discontent loomed in the air like the last remnants of smoke after a fire. Even as the haze from Indonesia fades into a hazy (haha) memory, temperatures in K.L still soar to unbearable heights.
Being away in the hills where the temperature was a balmy 25-27c for just a weekend did wonders for my tranquility.
I'm loving how my new Lady Dior instantly adds pizazz to any outfit. My dad asked me 'Did you glue your high school badges on to the bag by yourself?' Ummm...no. Clearly my mother is the fashionable parent.
The rooms...!
I stayed at the reasonable but still very comfortable Noble Suite.
Yellow and purple make for a surprisingly good combination, individually I dislike those colours (I used to adore purple until I found out it was my unlucky colour) but together they make for an energetic but not brash coupling. The colour scheme of the Noble suite made me feel upbeat, I think I shall be taking some styling tips from the suite.
Meanwhile the Son Altesse suite, the best one's money can buy (at RM7000 a night) is terribly elegant and spacious, with a dressing room the size of most people's entire apartment.
Beside the gentle dove grey colour scheme and marble, the main draw for me was the bathroom.
Specifically the massage table in the bathroom overlooking a gargantuan mirror.
So terribly sexy, so perfect for role-play...imagine one's lover, good with their hands, giving you a slow massage with a happy ending, with that mirror to watch the explosive conclusion. Grrrrrr.
On to more wholesome thoughts.
Din dins with the fam fam.
To keep up the joke about being in France I did Whatsapp a few people "Sorry, I have to go, breakfast is calling...". I am the worse.
Will a weekend break from the city cure those dark circles and eye bags? The answer is no.
The menu was thoughtfully planned for us (and featured a lot of potato foam) to spare us the strain of any decision making, because if I wanted to use my brain I wouldn't have taken a weekend getaway, oui?
Amuse bouche was scallops on salsa.
Entree number one; prawn ravioli in a bath of double boiled chicken consommé flavoured with thai basil (also known as fancy wonton soup). Topped with potato foam.
Entree number two; risotto with slow roasted tomato and basil, crisp, and topped with...potato foam.
Mains number one; roasted john dory with braised artichokes, red pepper and potato...thankfully not foamed.
I pulled over a waiter and told him to keep the potato foam off my second mains.
Mains number two; medium rare rib eye with wild mushroom ravioli, broad beans, and thankfully no potato foam.
Followed by tea and pudding.
A giant lychee macaron sandwich with lychee custard jelly, fruit, and lychee sorbet.
I learnt at breakfast the next morning that lychee features quite a bit in the menu, even more so than the potato foam. Which can only be a good thing, you have to be positively soulless to not love lychee.
Exhausted from my drive up to The Chateau and positively knackered from eating more than four macarons a day I called it an early night and looked forward to passing out in my giant bed. Except that I didn't quite call it an early night because all well-laid plans run awry.
No matter, I managed to wake up for breakfast the next morning and make it to the award-winning spa, which I shall share in the next post...!
Outfit of the day details; Chula dress (the designer paints on his creations, making them literally works of wearable art), Gucci heels, and Lady Dior.
#chateaulife #chateauselfie #chiggasinchateau
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