Matt and Kylie

Mersing Photo’s

Returning from Tioman Island, all seven of us managed to squeeze into two hotel rooms for the night.  Upon realising that our only real travel option was to cross back over to the West Coast to Kuala Lumpur (a mere two hours North of Malacca), Aux, Lissa, Sam, Ross and Mok left in the early morning after one night, planning onward travel immediately from KL.  Matt and I however, decided to stay an extra night and head to KL a day later as we were in no hurry to get there, and planned on staying for a while to have a look around.

Palau Tioman

It took six hours on a bus to get from Melacca (on the West Coast) to Mersing (on the East Coast), a wee Port Town that people only really go to to get to Tioman Island.  Due to the bus driver’s (wannabe rally driver?) erm, unique take on swerving round other traffic and corners, I wasn’t the only one feeling queasy by the end.  Anyway, we had time for a quick bite to eat at a gorgeous bistro run by a Swiss Chef and his wife with a divine menu before boarding the ferry.

The seven of us decided to stay at ABC (Air Batang) beach, caught an eighty minute ferry and arrived on the jetty of the primitive, but picturesque Island.  As it turns out, finding accommodation with enough room to house seven people in such a small place is rather unrealistic, so  Matt and I took a small fan bungalow with a private bathroom, veranda and giant mosquito net guarding the bed (and in turn blocking the fan wind) at one place, while Aux, Lissa and Sam shared another bungalow next to Mok and Ross at another guesthouse next door.  At 50 MYR (About NZD $25) we were pretty happy.

We spent three nights out on the intensely hot Island; it was duty free (meaning cheap beer – happy hour = 3 beers for about NZD$5) which kept everyone pretty happy.  Being a Muslim country, alcohol is generally not served in Muslim restaurants, and when it is served in for example Chinese Restaurants, it is pretty expensive.  Matt’s first night on the cheap booze ended in pure Matt style… I headed for bed at about midnight and was awoken by him bashing on the cabin door, looking mournful and helpless claiming he had stubbed his toe (quite badly) clambering over rocks on the beach in the dark.  We sorted that out fine, then the next night when he was in charge of dressing it, he appeared after dinner with it wrapped in silver duct tape.  Apparently a good way to keep sand out and the plaster on.  Note to self:  Do not leave Matt in charge of First Aid.

Our evenings were spent hanging out at a bar (shack on the beach surrounded by plastic chairs and hammocks).  We ate at restaurants over looking the sea and cantilevering over the sea.  One evening I was watching a couple of guys shimmying up a coconut tree to retrieve the goods for a minute, then turned around to take some photographs of the sunset over the sea.  The guy up the tree grabbed an English-speaking guy on a nearby building site and bought him over to me.  He told me that the coconut guy had got me a coconut.  With that coconut guy grinned, held out the coconut to me then scampered back off to get on with the job.  He had cut me a coconut off the tree, cut off the bottom (so I could put it down on a table) and cut off the top so I could drink it.  Made my day!  And was delicious!  I proudly marched it back to the bar where the bar staff gave me a straw and enjoyed it for the rest of the night.

We had been told to watch out for Monitor Lizard, apparently they are quite impressive.  Dear god.  They seriously, looked one generation away from being crocodiles.  Mok went out wondering one day and saw one that he swore was bigger than him, and at least 2m long(!)  We nicknamed him Jurassic, and went back to the little dam a couple of times to try and see him; we think we heard him thumping around in the scrub, but he turned out to be a bit of a shy fella. The funny thing was though, they seemed scared of people; if they were on the path and saw you coming, they would scamper off into the bushes.

The lizards I could quite happily deal with, it was the snakes that gave me the heebie jeebies.  We were having breakfast one day when Ross talked to the owner and produced a photo of a python and a cobra having a scrap on the beach.  Turns out the cobra was trying to bite the python who was immune to the venom.  After a while, tired of being bitten, they python wraps itself around the bigger cobra and starts to squeeze it. 

Cobra: 0.  Python: 1.  Kylie: early stages of hyperventilation. 

They tried to reassure me that this was ‘python country now,’ and the locals told me that pythons would, for the most part, leave you alone.  They then followed that up with ‘but be careful if you do see a cobra, they are very aggressive.’  Neat.  We found a couple of pythons in some trees above where Jurassic lived.  It became a ritual to go and see everyday if they had moved and where to.  You know, just to keep tabs and make sure they weren’t headed towards our bungalow.  Turns out I have a snake phobia. 

When the time to leave came, we were told by the locals that the boat would leave at 12 so we arrived a wee bit early just in case.  Nobody said these things were prompt, and it finally arrived at 2.30. In the meantime, Matt and Aux had time for a quick dip in the sea, jumping off the jetty and into the water for a quick snorkel.  The salt water did Matt’s stubbed toe the world of good and it healed up in the next few days.  We had a brilliant time with friends in a wee piece of paradise.

And thanks to Aux for the brilliant spider photo and the first two lizard photo’s below!

Malacca…

We took a four hour train from Singapore up to Malacca, a historical port city on the West Coast.  We are still a little uncertain about our passport status… we were never stamped into Malaysia, however our arrival cards (that we still retain) are stamped, we’ll see how that pans out with immigration when we try to leave.  We’re pretty sure that we are allowed to stay in Malaysia for three months anyway.

We arrived in Tampin, the closest train station (38km North) to Malacca and hopped in an awaiting taxi.  The train guards had arranged for an English speaking taxi driver to pick us up, who kept us entertained the whole journey, pointing out rubber trees, local car brands, housing prices and fruit trees with great enthusiasm and sweeping hand gestures.  Arriving in the evening, we searched rather fruitlessly for a clean, cheap-ish guesthouse to settle in, instead settling for an expensive-ish clean guesthouse for the first night, hoping to move to something cheaper in the morning.  The owner was good though, pointing us in the right direction for dinner and breakfast.

The following day, we met up with some friends from Wellington; Lissa, Aux, Ross and Mok who spent the previous couple of months touring through Thailand and Malaysia.  Now our group is mob-sized, we are entertainment for the locals!  We moved into their guesthouse, a cheaper place with a nifty roof garden and set off exploring the town. 

One of the first things to notice were the strange manner of which the buildings are painted.  As it turns out, the heritage protected buildings are all painted the same colour – a reddish brown tint, making them all seem rather uniformed.  At night the place lit up, reminding us a wee bit of Hoi An, Vietnam.  We wandered around and took in the sites – historic Churches dating back to the 1500’s, malls, and cyclo’s to boot.  The Cyclo’s were impressive at both during the day; elaborately decorated with Mercedes symbols, wind wands and adorned with flowers, and at night, when there fairy lights would turn on and they would glitter and sparkle their way through the streets.  The blaring music from their ‘built in’ sound system however, blared both day and night, at decibels that even impressed Matt(!)

While in Malacca we sampled the glorious satay sticks (cooked on a BBQ hawker stand while you wait), scuttled through the markets, visited a 17th century Dutch graveyard, explored a (genuine!) Fort, visited a Kite Museum (and noted the NZ shout out), gawped at the Museum of disfiguring in the name of beauty, patted (and Matt held) a rather large, reasonably friendly-looking lizard (i.e. it wasn’t hissing and biting), sweated it out (literally melted?) in the searing 30 degrees plus heat and played many a-card game on the roof.  Glorious!

On one of our last days, as a group (along with Darren, an Irish backpacker we picked up from our hostel), we decided to hire bicycles and go and see the outskirts.  A sound plan.  So we tottled off, found some bikes and set off to the beyond.  We arrived back at the guest house sweaty little heaps where the guesthouse owner/bike renter took great delight in informing us that ‘It was 38 degrees outside.  Very hot.  Not like New Zealand hey?’  The ride was good though, we went out to a Mosque, over a large bridge and out to a sandy path next to the beach.  For future reference, sand is hideous to cycle on, and one should always put sun block on the backs of one’s hands to avoid them getting seriously burnt(!)

After a few days in Malacca it was time to move on:  We decided we were in need of some Island relaxation… next stop, Tioman Island.