Kota Bharu to Kuala Lumpur by Train

If you're going back from Perhentian Island to Kuala Besut, there's only three departures daily; 8am, 12pm and 4pm. So you need to decide which time you want to go back and be punctual cos once you miss the boats, you have to wait quite long for the next departure. 

If you stay on Long Beach like I did, just wait at the beach, and then ride any available water taxis. They will bring you to the boat parked in the middle of the sea. Just hop in and show your return ticket.  

I went for a morning dive on my last day in Perhentian. After diving, you have to wait at least 18 hours before you can fly so I had to go back by land. I am quite skeptical taking bus nowadays. So.. let's go back by train! 

Since the train from Wakaf Bharu (Kota Bharu's stop) would depart at 7pm, I took the opportunity to have a look at what Kota Bharu has to offer. I didn't have much time actually cos the boat reached Kuala Besut at around 1pm. I had my lunch at the restaurants nearby the jetty and took a taxi to the town. The ride cost RM35.

With that short amount of time, I just went to Pasar Siti Khadijah and its surrounding area. The market is a must visit destination in Kota Bharu I guess. You can get almost everything here; traditional local delights, fresh produce, batik, silver and bronze items, as well as many other types of household products.    

Food lovers will definitely love it here. You can try all sorts of local foodstuff which are very hard to be found outside of Kelantan.  

I was amused seeing some shops in the town has Jawi writings. Reminded me of the time when I was in Dubai.. 

Anddd.... there's sooo many gold stores here! Seriously I felt like I was in Dubai. haha...  



By 6.30pm, I was already at the train station.



I saw quite a number of foreigners waiting at the platform. So proud of them for taking the train to travel around our country. Have you, Malaysians, ever tried travelling with our own KTMB? You should try it. A very nice experience, I would say.

The train ride is also quite cheap. I booked the ADNS coach. I think it's the 2nd class coach. Not really sure about that though.


 inside ADNS coach

  I took the lower berth so the fare was only RM54. In case you don't know, lower berth and upper berth fare is different. Upper berth is slightly cheaper but I prefer the lower one cos it's easier for me if I wanted to go jalan-jalan along the coaches.


upper and lower berth

the toilet

There's also a canteen in the train but it was so full I decided not to go in.

If you think you can't sleep riding a train, you are definitely wrong. I slept like a baby all the way to Gemas.



I only woke up cos the train stopped quite long here I thought we already reached KL Sentral. Turned out the train got some problem so they stopped to fix it. We were supposed to arrive at KL Sentral at 8am but finally we reached there at 9.30am.

Well.. I enjoyed the trip nevertheless. I wanna try the Butterworth - Bangkok train next!