Plenty of monkeys around. This guy had just scored a banana from the side of the road.
And they like the netting of the bird sanctuary too. They look like a bunch of pirate monkeys setting sail.
I stop in at the Central Markets on my way back to the Red Dragon, and find a fine kris - a Malay dagger. One of the definitive icons of Malaysia. This will round off my paper knife collection nicely.
I say good bye to KL. A modern Asian city with a combination of character and decent infrastructure, but suffering from pollution and congestion, and no consideration for pedestrians or cyclists. But they are at least acknowledging the endemic Asian propensity to litter, and there are plenty of signs encouraging citizens to clean up their act and be conservation-minded.
Otherwise it's a bit like Bangkok - I could live here if pushed, but would relish the opportunity to get out of town to the beaches and jungle.
The bus to Malacca is a pretty smooth affair, and I set off in the late afternoon to see the place. Doesn't take long - Malacca's just a little town on the south west coast divided by a small river. It makes up for it by having a lot of history - I don't think there's another place in Malaysia with so many museums in so small a space.
First stop is the Maritime Museum located in this old Portuguese nau (carrack). Interesting to note that Malacca was a thriving trading port in the 1500s until successively the Portuguese, Dutch then British muscled in. Their greed progressively forced the traders elsewhere, which is why Singapore is booming and Malacca is now a sleepy little backwater.
With a whole day up my sleeve I head back to my guesthouse, the Travellers Lodge. Not a bad little place near the old quarter, but the bed and pillows in my room stink of stale sweat. Leafing through the "Things to do when you have too much time" catalogue I come across the "Melaka On Bike" ecotour - OK! In a millisecond I'm booked in.
Only me, so my guide Alias and I make good time as we visit rubber and palm oil plantations on the outskirts of the city. Malaysia's in the middle of a palm oil crisis at the moment. Not enough supply, so everyone's running out of cooking oil. Quotas are imposed, and the papers are full of stories about people stockpiling.
Interesting seeing the latex being collected. The bark on half the trunk is removed and gravity does the rest. Alias pulls off some semi-dried latex and rolls it in to a ball. Bounces like a superball!
The wealthier plantation owners employ a more efficient method. They pump the tree full of gas to accelerate the extraction.
Alias tosses me a couple of rubber tree seeds. "Here, take these home. Keep you in condoms for life", he grins. Hmm, I don't need condoms, but I do need a new set of tyres for the Forester. I pocket the seeds and hope MAF will let them through.
The afternoon sees me back on the tourist trail. The A'Famosa fort and St Pauls Church are first on the agenda.
The tombstone is dated 1655.
The Stadthuys houses another succession of museums - had enough after them, but I do have a pretty good appreciation of what happened here over the last 500 years now. A walk down the antique shops of Jonker St rounds off the sightseeing. Nothing to buy.
Thoughts on Malacca? A nice little town, particularly if you're in to colonial history. Otherwise it's a bit small, smelly (the sewers haven't improved much in the last few centuries), and the coast isn't utilised at all. The town centres around the small brown river a bit upstream from the coast.
So first thing Thursday I'm off to Singapore. In hindsight I should perhaps have taken the advice I'd received and done Taman Negara National Park and Borneo. But now I have an opportunity to come back to Malaysia. One of the countries on my travels that exceeded expectations - especially Langkawi and the Cameron Highlands.
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