Mallacca

We jumped on the bus from Kuala Lumpur and two hours later arrived in Malacca. It's the famous port that gave it's name to the straits between Malaysia and Indonesia. It was very nearly a nice trip out, but it was ultimately ruined by the chronic traffic problems that seem to afflict the centre of the town.
There are some nice old colonial buildings in the old quarter of the city. They were mainly from the period that the Dutch ruled the roost, but there were some remains of the old Portugese fort alongside the river. There wasn't really much to suggest the Brits had been here other than a few monuments and plaques celebrating Queen Victoria's Silver Jubilee. Even thought the buildings were nice, you were always peering over the roofs of cars as the ever present traffic jam crawled noisily and smellily past. To add the the traffic noise, the locals had taken the time and effort to fit large stereo systems to their previously silent bicycle rickshaws. They used these systems to pump out dreadful 80's Euro-pop at ear splitting volume. Bum-sniffers the lot of 'em.
The day was rounded off nicely by the two hour return trip ballooning to four hours as the coach trundled it's way back into Kuala Lumpur in a huge holiday traffic jam. The driver had a peculiar staccato technique with throttle and brake that he skillfully used to thoroughly piss off every single passenger on board.

I think I need a nice cup of tea and a sit down. And I think I know just the spot.....

Kuala Lumpur

Now just to get it out of the way at the start, let me tell you that Kuala Lumpur has rubbish street signs. Absolutely, useless. There, that's better.

We're staying right in the middle of the city in Chinatown. It has a real hubbub. Here's the view from our window. It was a top location for food and beer ( expensive though ! ) and for buying even more dreadful tat in the famous Petaling Street Market. It also drops us in the middle of all the disparate Malaysian transport systems, that almost link up....

What have we been doing in Malaysia's capital city ? Well, first we took some advice from our agent on the ground (cheers Anu). The Petronas towers are very impressive. I'm not usually one for shiny objects, but these take the biscuit somewhat. We went up the KL Tower ( a big communications tower in the middle of the city with a big viewing gallery ) and had a great view across the city. It's a real mix of low rise, high rise and greenery. We also schlepped across the city to the City Mosque (very busy with prayer time so didn't actually go in) and to the National Museum which gave us a nice insight into Malaysian history, right up to the present day.
The local buses are good and cheap, so a quick hop on the No 11 dropped us out to Batu where there are some vast caves. They are used as a Hindu shrine these days, but are open to the public. Very impressive and I was especially delighted by the indigenous population of cave chickens doing battle with the cave monkeys for the rights to bananas.

We only spent two days in the city, but seemed to have filled them. It's very, very hot and humid here which tends to make life for us pasty faced Europeans a bit of a trial, so we're knackered again. I think a day trip to the seaside might be in order.

Did I mention the rubbish street signs by the way ?

The Temples of Angkor

Where do I start ? I'm not going to attempt to describe what we've experienced here. There is simply no way I could do it justice. This is a place that exceeds even the highest of expectations.

Briefly, the area north of Siem Riep is a huge archealogical park sitting in a beautiful, verdant forest. The jungle adds greatly to the experience, giving a feeling of vitality and mystery to the temples and also providing much need to shade to sweaty tourists. The temple sites cover a vast area. Some complexes are thirty kilometers away. The earliest date from the ninth century and latest, from the the thirteenth. They are considered to be the finest examples of Kymer culture and technology and come from the period when Kymer culture dominated South East Asia.

Here's a few photos and notes to give you a bit of an over view of some of the highlights.

Angkor Thom and Bayon
( a 9km square fortified city, complete with vast moat - previously the Kymer capital city )

























Angkor Wat
( the world's largest religious building at 1km square - We had to get up very early for the sunrise photo ! )

Ta Promh
( a temple partially taken over by the forest )

Preah Khan
( more temple versus tree action with impressive stone carvings )






















East Mebon
( nice views across the forest from the top - might just be able to see the tips of Angkor Wat in the distance )

Banteay Srei
( amazingly deep and intricate bas relief stone carvings )

Siem Riep

Siem Riep is about the size of Oxford and is just as touristy.
It's a great place to buy God-awful tourist tat in lieu of proper Xmas presents. There's loads of options for food and drink, both local and western. So far we haven't got bored with the excellent local nosh. Today's favourite was a spicy chicken and mango salad ( plenty of fish sauce as usual). We've travelled around the surrounding area a fair bit on tuk-tuks and the countryside is lovely. Seeing as I've failed to take any photos for the town itself, here's a shot of the view just up the road.Good deed for the day - Picking up a tiny frog from certain death on the road and plopping into a pond.
Bad deed for the day - Dropping the frog into the safety of a pond, only to see it chased and devoured by hungry fish.....

Anyway, the reason we're here is nothing to do with the town itself, nice that it is. It's what's just up the road that we're interested in....