Had a light breakfast before splitting up to 2 groups. The swimming group of two and the walking group of 6. We walked around the hotel via Jalan Chan Koon Cheng, which was longer before reaching the same bridge as yesterday's to cross over to Lorong Hang Jebat. Not much interesting things along the way. A pretty boring stretch.

We walked along Jalan Hang Jebat this time, and also a few smaller roads which are not documented in my lousy map. We passed by the Cheng Hoon Teng Temple, supposedly the oldest temple in the country. P's parents and I went in for a while. There's just something about places of worship that manage to radiate peace and serenity.

There was also this old shop where this old man was doing this extremely old way of welding aluminum cans. He was probably in his 80s, very scrawny looking. His is really a dying trade. We were lucky to catch a glimpse of it. It was sad the way he carried on his welding, without acknowledgment of the gawking ppl (us) watching his every move.

Went past Jonker street again. This time, we stopped at the famous Jonker dessert stall for very very nice dessert, nonya asam laksa and ondeh ondeh. The shaved ice simply melted in our mouths. The viscous gula melaka drizzled on the shaved ice.. simply heavenly! We took away fruit juices which were the real stuff. No added sugar water like in singapore. 3 apples and a lemon juice means just that. A refreshing change from the fruit stalls who frequently managed to short change us with watered down juices.

Met the gang back at the hotel, showered, packed, checked out before heading to the megamall again. This time, mj, xl and I managed to depart the Levi's store S$100 lesser. I bought my first pair of Levis, supposedly quite a good investment cos it was cheaper than in sg. I guess so. still a little skeptical at spending a 3 figure sum on clothes.

Had the HK styled baked rice with chicken. Not bad at all! Good choice by mj. By then, it was time to head back to the hotel and await the arrival of the F ive Stars bus.

Bus arrived at 230pm, bigger, newer and muchmuch faster than the previous bus. We took only 2.5 hours to reach Yong Peng and another 1.5 hours to reach SG customs. A total of 4 hours as compared to the 6 hours there.

Glad the trip was so hassle free. Total damage done to wallet - Around S$ 300. Enjoyment Level: 3stars out of 5. It was the company that made the difference :) Other than that, melaka was just that, a small town with a few historical buildings and limited sights and shopping.

written by  karyote on April 7, 2007 from Melaka, Malaysia
from the travel blog: Malaysia - Melaka
tagged Malaysia and Melaka
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But if I thought reaching there at 8am was a feat in itself, well... p and family out-performed us.. they reached at 730am!

The bus left at around 830am. It was slow. Very slow. Factor in the short half hour break at Yong Peng and it was in all a very long 6 hour ride to Melaka. I've heard that it would have taken a bare 2 hours by car so I'm sure the bus driver was reeeeeaally taking his time.

Once at Equatorial hotel, only 1 out of 3 rooms was ready so without further ado, we dumped all our bags in P's parent's room and set out to take in the sights of Melaka.

P insisted on seeing the famous red building before she was satisfied so we ambled along using a rough cannot make it map taken from their tourist counter.

First stop: the Proclamationof Independence Memorial.
not much to mention.

Second stop: A' Famosa & St.Paul's Church
A long series of steps greeted us at A'Famosa. Erm.. and a strange man with an iguana, trying to earn $$, charging 3 ringgit per photo with him and the ig.
Photos taking, P's sis trying to race up the steps.. the steps eventually forked out to either St.Paul's Church and the Dutch Graveyard. No prizes for guessing which route we chose.
St.Paul's church was interesting. The infrastructure of the little church was interesting, there were many tombstones looking engravings lined up at the walls of the church. took some photos and walked around, along with the many tourists there.

Third stop: Christ Church (aka. The Red Building!!!)
We found it! The famous red building of Melaka. (anyway, many of the buildings in melaka were red I realised. Took a few photos. Regretted that I didn't go in to take a look. Could have made a comparison against the other churches (domo) I've seen in europe.

Fourth stop: Cendol! (across the street from the red building)
Small bowls of chendol.. or rather cendol as it was printed on the stall. Nice cold sweet coconutish dessert did much to neutralise the very hot and humid weather.
Following which we crossed the bridge to Lorong Hang Jebat.

Fifth Stop: Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock
No, this isn't exactly a venue. It was a street full of chendol, chicken rice balls stalls! In fact, the whole of melaka is full of chendol and chicken rice balls stalls.
We stopped to sample the chicken rice balls. One small pingpong sized ball for each of us since we were pretty full. Wasn't really impressive, but I guess you can't say you've been in melaka without tasting the chicken rice balls.
We saw one orangutan stall, not real orangutan! just a small shop selling unique nicely designed t-shirts. We later saw a few more similar stalls all belonging to the same orangutan.

Sixth Stop: Jalan Ong Kim Wee
Strangely, we started to encounter numerous pineapple, belachan and gula melaka stalls as we turned into Jalan Ong Kim Wee. The gals bought pineapple tarts from the very first stall they saw, which unfortunately didn't look as if they baked it themselves. We later encountered many stalls who actually baked the actual tarts themselves.

We were getting pretty hot and sticky by this time.. and we were walking further and further away from our hotel so we decided to turn back via another route.

Seventh Stop: Jonker Street
Many interesting shops here. There was also the famous jonker street dessert stall here, which will be elaborated further on day 2.
Many shops selling peranankan wear, beaded shoes, melaka foodstuffs and of cos the usual pineapple tarts and chendol (again!)
We had some pretty decent ondeh ondeh - with delicious gula melaka oozing out of it's sticky skin covered with coconut shavings. nice :)
Jonker street is famous for its night market, but unfortunately, it was only 5plus when we reached there so the shops were barely up. We decided to come back later at night for dinner. which, to jump the gun a bit, never materialised as it was drizzling and the sky was dark around 7pm.

Eighth Stop: Jalan quayside
We decided to walk a different route back to the hotel in order to cover as much ground as possible. Alongthe quayside was this Maritime Museum. Unfortunately, we need to pay to get in and it didn't really look that interesting, nor were there crowds of tourists waiting to get in so I decided to just admire the ship (where the maritime museum was housed) as we walked passed.

Of course, how can a trip be complete without shopping?

Ninth Stop: the MEGAMALL. (aka Dataran Pahlawan Melaka Megamall)
They had quite a few international brands incl. Mango, Levis, FOS, just to name a few. P's mum bought something from Hush Puppies, the rest of us got stuffs at MANGO and FOS. It wasn't really mega.. probably the mega was by melaka standards. The mall only had one level with limited tenants. Oh, and did i forget to mention they had starbucks, macs, a foodcourt and some hk food place? Not bad at all, tho i heard the foodcourt sux.
by this time, it was drizzling so we decided to go back to the hotel, put down our stuffs and adjourn to the award winning nonya restaurant at level 3 for dinner.

Tenth stop: The Nonya restaurant.
Not fantastic food. Service was slow and mediocre. The manager managed to ignore our many requests for photo taking, delivery of food and water with a mere glance to show that he was paying attention at the most. The food was quite alright but.. they charged us for belachan! 3 ringgit per small bowl. We had 2 bowls cos we thought it was free. those idiots! No wonder they stop winning awards in 2004,5 and 6. I was telling P that no way were they going to win an award in 2007 if that's the kind of service they were providing!

Eleventh stop: the swimming pool
very serene, very quiet place at night. Didn't swim. the pool was closed after 9pm.

Twelth stop: bed and much needed rest.

written by  karyote on April 6, 2007 from Melaka, Malaysia
from the travel blog: Malaysia - Melaka
tagged Malaysia and Melaka
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