KL and Melaka

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Well after sending the last blog Nick and I went up the Kuala Lumpur communications tower which gave us a 360 degree view of Kuala Lumpur. We left in time for the sunset which was good and looked beautiful going down behind the city. We stayed until it was dark so that we could get some good night pictures of Kuala Lumpur and the Petronas Towers. Unfortunately the view of the Petronas Towers was a bit disappointing as you could only really see one of them from where we were. We stayed up there for quite a while though as the view of the rest of the city was excellent. The next day we went to the Batu caves where the Thaipusam festival is held every year. The caves were big and we had to climb 271 steps to get up there but unfortunately it had been turned into a tourist trap with souvenir stalls and big metal railings everywhere so we only stayed for about half an hour. When we got back to our hostel it absolutely chucked it down, with thunder and lightning as well, so we spent the rest of the afternoon sat on the rooftop talking to other travelers. That evening the electrics went in our hostel so Nick came to the rescue and helped rewire their dodgy electrics (apparently the worst he’s seen anywhere).

We decided that there wasn’t much left to see in Kuala Lumpur so we packed up and headed down to Melaka, a little historical town on the west coast. The bus dropped us in the middle of nowhere so we had quite a trek in the heat of the midday sun to find a hostel. Eventually we found one on the river right near the town square which was quite cheap and has music every night. We paid 5RM (80p) for a ticked that entitled us to go to 5 local museums which took up most of the first day. They were really interesting but we got fed up of reading all the texts after a while so went to St Pauls Church on Melaka Hill. Its very run down but had some interesting grave stones from the 1600’s in it. Yesterday we went on a walk around the town while it was sunny taking in the sights of China Town and Little India. In the evening we went to a satay restaurant where you picked the sticks you wanted and then cooked them yourself in a boiling satay pot that was put in the middle of the table. We ended up trying gizzard, fish balls, clams and pigs ear (I thought they were disgusting but nick quite liked them!), but we also had some massive prawns and normal things like pork and veg. We then made our way to the weekend night market which was quite good and there was a little stage at the end of the street where people were doing karaoke. Today we went to the local shopping mall and watched a local break dancing competition which was quite interesting and then watched a film in the local cinema. We’re planning to stay here for one more day and then head east to Pulau Tioman where the diving is meant to be excellent.

Hope all is well back home and will write again soon xx

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