Day Trip to JB: KTM Train to JB Sentral, Tokyo Secret Cheese Tarts

Derp and I took an impromptu trip across the borders few months ago to run some errands.

We decide to take the KTM train instead of the usual bus because the review for the train was good. 

It cost slightly more expensive than taking public bus but it was all worth it to skip the jam :) Save lots of time too!

Prior to the trip, we purchased our tickets online from here. Tickets were sold out really fast so it's all about faster finger first and plan your trip way in advance! 

We arrived at the train station 1/2 hour before the departure time. It was recommended to arrive early because we have to exchange our 'print out' tickets for the actual ticket before boarding.

Queue was expected at the ticket counter as there were people purchasing their tickets on the spot too. 

Exchange our print out tickets for this tickets given to us at the ticket counter.

We took a short walk to cross the custom and in no time, we were seated in the train to wait for the train to move. 

A #welfie of us in our virgin train ride to JB Sentral.

The train didn't depart on 12pm 'sharp' though and I remember it only depart around 12:15pm or so. People were still making their way to the train after the scheduled depature time. 

Guess we were the kiasu ones who boarded the train real early because we were really afraid to miss the train haha! 

It was the most a maximum of 5 minutes train ride to reach JB Sentral and we were totally impressed by how fast and fuss free it was. We sat on comfortable seats all the way and reached JB Sentral in the fastest possible way. Totally understand why the train tickets were snap up so quickly everytime! 

Once the train reached JB Sentral, there's not a need to scan/chop passport again so one can head straight to their destination. We head to City Square Mall straight which is a short walk located away from the train station. Much nearer compare to coming from the bus station.

We decide dine in at Kurotomon Ramen Sumitaki for our lunch. Other than ordering their ramen, we also ordered their BBQ Sotong/Squid.

Taste good though but we will definitely prefer Sambal Sotong instead of just BBQ Sotong.  

I've reviewed the ramen before previously at here so I shall not go into it :) 

We went to run our errands right after our lunch and before leaving. we went to have high tea/dessert at Miyakori Cafe. I've previously reviewed this cafe before too and you may read more about it here.

 Matcha Latte and Matcha Azuki Cake :) 

Around 4pm or so, we decide to make our way to the train station once again. There's already a queuing forming for the train. We went to exchange our 'print out' once again before joining the queue at around 4:30pm or so. 

Tickets back to Singapore. 

If you've noticed, it's RM5 dollars for the return tickets back to Singapore whereas it's SGD5 dollars for the tickets to JB Sentral.  So it cost less than SGD7 dollars in total. 

Waiting for our train to depart to Singapore.

As usual, it didn't depart on time at 5pm. Probably delay for another 10-15 mins or so. We cleared the custom very swiftly too and we were out of the train station by 5:30pm! 

Bought back cheese tarts from Tokyo Secret from JB City Square Mall to give it a try...

Due to poor handling by us, some of the cheese tarts crust has already fell off. Opps! But they still taste as good. They have other flavour of cheese tarts like Matcha and Chocolate so it was kind of refreshing and definitely yummy!

No regrets buying them back though because they were cheaper than the cheese tarts sold here in Singapore :)

Tokyo Secret

Lot MS-03, Level 4, Johor Bahru City Square

106-108, Jalan Wong Ah Fook

Johor Bahru 80000

That's all about my short trip to JB City Square. We will definitely opt for train ride to JB in the near future because it save so much time as compare to taking bus/driving in :)

Impromptu JB Shopping Trip 2015 - Sushi King and Miyakori Cafe @ CitySquare Mall

Before 2015 ends, Derp and I had an impromptu trip to JB :) Basically to run our errands which is to stock up our daily necessities. The very last time we went to JB was to visit Doraemon Secret Gadget Expo in 2014. 

It's been quite some time hence it's time to take advantage of the good exchange rates and head there. 

But because we went during the long weekends, the queue at the custom was longer than usual. We queued for nearly 1/2 hour before getting to our destination, City Square Mall @ JB. Not forgetting the public bus to get into JB was also very crowded despite us leaving for JB only around noon time.  

Since it was during the Xmas period and also the launch of the Peanuts movie, there was this Xmas decoration which is Peanuts theme in City Square Mall. 

Though we are not fans of Snoppy and Charlie Brown, but I thought the decoration was quite nice so here are some of the photos taken.

With Charlie Brown

I thought this 'house' was quite nicely made so here's a photo with it. 

We started running our errands and once we were done, we went to have our late lunch. This time round, we chose to have lunch @ Sushi King.

#onthetable 

These were some of the food we ordered..

They were having promo for their soft shell crab so we ordered that too.

A #welfie taken at the restaurant.

Though the price is affordable, but the variety of their sushis were so-so. There were only a few types going around the conveyor belt hence we kept seeing repeated food. I felt their sushis weren't that authentic especially the rice portion. I will still gladly prefer our local sushi chains like Sushi Express/Itacho Sushi.

Johor Bahru City Square

Lot MB-01,

Basement Level 1,106 & 108,

Jalan Wong Ah Fook 

80000 Johor Bahru, Johor

After having lunch, we continued shopping around since we were done with our errands. We both managed to buy our own stuffs at a cheaper price even though they can be found locally. #cheapthrills

Just before we left to go back to Singapore, we bumped into this cafe. I was totally excited because I didn't know there's a cafe in City Square Mall. That's definitely something new and different from my previous trips to there. And coincidentally, we were there on their first official opening day :)

We went in to have some desserts and rest our legs before the journey back to Singapore...

To be honest, this cute logo caught our attention first :) 

I'm so going to lay my hands on the cake with the 'bear' print on it haha! 

Because we weren't hungry or neither full, we ordered a piece of the 'bear' cake to share because it seems to be their signature cake. Too cute to not have it :)

So here's what we ordered..

Kuromitsu Coffee (RM13.90) and Signature Peanut Chocolate Cake (RM 13.90)

Both of us actually like their coffee because it doesn't leave a strong aftertaste. If I'm not wrong, it's actually honey infuse black coffee so it's somewhat sweet and bitter at the same time. I will say it's a very special taste for coffee :) 

The cake was pretty average other than the cute design on it. Will definitely try their other cakes (the sakura flavour seems to be a popular choice) the next time I go back there again. 

Miyakori Café at City Square Johor Bahru

Address: Lot J5-10 level 5 106-108, Jalan Wong Ah Fook, 80000 Johor Bahru

This blog post pretty sums up my latest JB trip. Till the next one then :) 

100 Doraemon Secret Gadget Expo @ JB City Square

A long post ahead filled with lots of pictures! 

So here I go.. 

After our lunch at Kurotomo Ramen Sumitaki, we head down to get the tickets for the 100 Doraemon Secret Gadget Expo. Actually,  we aren't very sure where to get the tickets so we roamed around till we find the ticket booth. It's actually at the McDonald's area. 

A very small booth but the booth is quite prominent for you to notice it.

The ticket price for adults and children. 

No queue at the ticket booth and we got our tickets in less than 5 minutes. Can't wait to enter the exhibition to meet the many many Doraemons! 

The entrance to the exhibition is less than a minute walk from the ticketing booth. 

A selfie stick works wonder at such places haha! 

I believe everyone who have watched Doraemon would have remember this classic pink door :)It's call the "Anywhere Door". It will bring you to the destination you wish to go to. 

So much of a coincidence, I'm wearing pink too! 

Doraemon used to have ears before his ears got eaten up. 

#selfie with doraemon. 

Asked Derp to give it a try too lol. 

Okay time for more Doraemons! Although we are not big fan of  Doraemon, Doraemon played a big part during our childhood days.

Fyi till this date, if we wake up early on weekends, we will auto change channel to Channel 8 to watch Doraemon while having our breakfast. 

Don't know why the Doraemon mouth like that de! lol. There's quite a few Doraemons in the exhibition with such mouth. 

#uglybutidon'tcare

So many Doraemons behind us :):) 

There will be a description tag attached to the Doraemon and we go one round to read it. Some of which we are pretty familiar with but some we totally didn't know such 'power' exists. 

Basically anywhere is a good #welfie spot for us since we have the selfie stick. 

May Derp's wish come true after touching that lamp. 

Doraemon is cute in the way that he's round everywhere! His hands, legs and basically his whole body is round :) 

I make a collage of all the different Doraemons we met after walking 1 round.

After we were greeted by the many many Doraemons, we walked to the next section which simply illustrate the story of Doraemon. 

He first looked like this. 

This explained why he lost his ears. 

And one fine day, he accidentally drank the wrong potion and cry for many days which resulted in him changing color. 

The Doraemon that we are familiar with.

This room keep changing color but anyway our main purpose is to take photo with the Doraemon who is driving some machine.

With Shizuka Minamoto aka 静香

Derp wanted to put this as his new display pic, but we only realise that this thing doesn't match a normal adult height after viewing the photos. 

Nobita Nobi and Shizuka Minamoto got married in the end :) 

A much better display pic for Derp haha! 

Derp was the one taking this photo first and I couldn't figure out why he looks weird. 

And he told me to hold the specs and I did. So this picture is my new display pic.

This is so fun but Derp don't want to take a photo with it. Everyone is pretending to 'fly' and take photo when they reach there. lol. They even cater to kids/adults with the different height of this flying hat. 

A booth for visitors to take photo with and they will print out the photos for you. But I don't know what's so nice to take photo with 2 emo people. -_-".

Alright, last 2 photos..

One last photo with Doraemon before we left. 

There were many Doraemon's merchandise on sale but we control ourselves. Now that we have our own place, we do think thrice before buying anything. Need to be conscious about the space we had since new flats are so small nowadays :( Not forgetting, one need to consider where to keep it too! 

Derp bought himself a new lanyard and I bought the eye mask for Lester lol. Nothing from the exhibition for myself. 

We finished walking the exhibition in 2 to 2.5 hours. The whole area isn't big and it's not crowded even on weekends which made it easier for you to take as many photos as you like. :) Though it's a short getaway, we enjoyed ourselves because it's our only getaway this year!

We didn't went to the cafe to have the coffee with Doraemon latte art because we couldn't locate it in the first place. It's actually at the higher levels up, very near 'inner city'. A very small area for this temporary 'cafe', we could not get any seats when we finally found the cafe hence we gave it a miss.

After walking the exhibition, I think there's high chance this exhibition will come to Singapore but the ticket price might be S$25 and not RM$25 anymore. Not forgetting all the merchandise will be double the price too.

I do think it's worth it to make a trip to JB City Square for the 100 Doraemon Secret Gadget Exp. It will only be there for 100 days so do act fast :)

100 Doraemon Secret Gadget Expo @ JB City Square

Address

J3-12A, Level 3, Johor Bahru City Square,

No. 106-108, Jalan Wong Ah Fook,

80000 Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia.

Opening Hour

WEEKDAYS -WEEKENDS

10AM - 10PM

Website 

www.citysqjb.com

Facebook 

https://www.facebook.com/jbcitysquare