Comfort Hotel Melaka

... the afternoon swimming in the pool on the ninth floor and playing a couple of games of semi-competitive squash. It started off fully competitive until I hit Neil quite hard with the squash ball, which I did completely by mistake, or as unaware as I possibly could be playing squash.

The next couple of days were spent enjoying the hotel as well as wandering the town. We also came across an amazing restaurant ...

... in Christmas lights pedaled through the streets. Next day in town we returned to the colonial area with it's Portuguese Church, Dutch Church, and fortress remains.

Melaka was a town you can't imagine or understand until you've seen it yourself. The strange and beautiful mix of history, architecture, city planning, and culture made it a cool city for just hanging (something we love to do). We're glad we stopped by.

... Singapore when it was under Majapahit rule. He landed in a fishing village and went hunting. While resting under a Malacca tree, he saw a mouse-deer use it's hindlegs to kick one of his hunting dogs into the river. Inspired by the fighting spirit of the Kancil, he decided to build his kingdom at the place and named it Malacca (Melaka as in Malay). As the Guest House is situated at Jalan Parameswara, it is most befitting to be called the Kancil Guest House!

... frog is then placed on the string through a hole in it's mouth. You then flick the other end of the string, the frog jumps and (hopefully) moves towards you. When it crosses the line your next team member carries on - it's a relay race). So after a lot of practice we were ready and well pumped. What a disaster then as we were knocked out in the first round! The dismay did not last long as the American team next to us who had ...

... a scorcher!! Next we headed to the public swimming pool to find out that they had a 3 day event and wouldn't let us in. Bugger! Bex and I had already traveled the streets last night to try and find a hotel that would let us in for a few quid but to no avail. So where did that leave us? Right next to a new shopping mall and Jonker Street for last minute gifts! I swear Hella is a bad influence on me!! I was ...

... the Sungai Melaka, a small, polluted river. We crossed the bridge over the river and immediately came upon the town square. This is a curious arrangement and we can see why Melaka is unlikely to achieve world heritage status. All the historic buildings have been painted a uniform brick red. As the Dutch were in control of the town for a while, a small fake windmill has been erected. A main road runs through the area including across the bridge and through Chinatown. Some ...

... we've known so far in Malaysia so we dive into a cafe and have some lunch but it doesn't past so we have to face it at it's worst getting soaked where we dry off back at the hostel before going on a mammoth Internet session and again finishing the night with coffee and cake, so predictable.

Hi all, So far Asia has been about what I thought it would be. The weather is quite steamy, about 90-95 degrees with 80% humidity. Ryan and I are drinking a ton of water but we don't have to go to the bathroom very much. The food is a little hard to get used to, for me because of spiciness and Ryan because of variety (not keen on squid, frog, fish head, etc.). Melaka was very enjoyable. It's a bit bigger than a village but easy to get around on foot/trishaw ...

... garden we were fascinated by a stall nearby selling what looked like herbal tea to passers by. It was obviously good stuff as queues of locals formed to get a bowl of the piping hot liquid, which was downed in seconds before they were off again in their car or on their moped. We were tempted to try some but given that weather was so hot and humid already our bucket of cool beer was more appealing. We had decided to spend one more day in Melaka to visit the historic ...