Took the bus from KL Sentral to Malacca; journey took 2hours 15mins and cost 14RM (less than £3). Malacca was colonised by the Portuguese in 1511 and became an important trading port. The Dutch took over until 1795 when it was swapped with Jakarta to the British. The port had already gone into decline by this point due to high trading levies (sounds familiar?) and silting of the harbour. This continued as the British favoured developing Penang and Singapore. The town gave its name to the body of water between Malaysia and Sumatra
It became a UNESCO heritage site in 2008 but unfortunately we coudn’t see where money has been spent other than developing the Malacca river, which is pretty with many murals on the buildings depicting former life of the place. We stopped in a beautiful Chinese building overlooking the river (see inside photos).
Jonker Street is the lifeblood of the town - name from its Dutch roots. Originally a street of antique shops it is now primarily a mish mash of everything from souvenir shops to restaurants, to temples to .......
It is worth going to see for the day, there is not much more to hold your attention despite the heritage sites, many of which are now either museums or a pile of stones.
Went for a walk along the river the next morning, the place was dead apart from the 5’ monitor lizard we disturbed and the rat that swam from one side of the river to the other (it might have been escaping from the lizard!)
Please click here for PHOTOS
