On Saturday, I got up bright and early to visit the Patronus towers. I was there by 7.30am to line up for a free ticket to the observation bridge, and found there was already a growing queue. As it is the main tourist attraction in town, you have to get there early to claim one of only 2500 tickets for the day.
Lucky for me, after an hour and a half of queuing, I managed to grab a 9am ticket (score!)
As you can see from the pics, it’s a fair way up! It was the tallest tower in 2003, but two have since passed it. It is now the tallest “pair” of towers in the world. Not a bad view, but I was somewhat disappointed because I thought (for some reason) that the floor of the bridge was glass… that’s your fault dad!
Anyway, after that checked off my list (I mean, you can’t go to KL without doing the towers), I power walked the 30min trek to my hostel, and another 10mins past my hostel to the bus terminal I had to go to for my ride to Melaka. After finding help in the jungle that is KL bus terminals, I found the right counter and the right platform, and managed to find my bus. A two-hour luxury bus ride later (for RM24), I was… not where I thought I should be. I was in Melaka mall… shit. Turns out there is a local bus that leaves the mall for another 20min drive to the historical part of town that I was looking for (thank you to the only white people I found in the mall, for that tip).
Melaka is pretty cool. Once you get past the searing heat (I arrived at midday) and the men trying to get you to ride their ridiculous trishaws, or hold their snake round your neck for a photo. “Hey tall lady, where you from,” was one of the lines a busker used on me when I walked by. He got a smile, but no money. Haha. Luckily I found a map, that told me in 25 words or less about each monument, so I had a vague idea of what I was looking at – will definitely be doing a little more reading up before I go next time.
The history of the place is pretty cool. Next to the water, the town was occupied by the Dutch, Portuguese and the British before it became independent (with the rest of Malaysia of course). So there are churches that were built by the Portuguese, and modified by the British, there are Dutch graveyards, which the British later used for their dead, ruins of a battle fort built by the Dutch and torn down by the Portuguese (I hope I got these the right way round!) Anyway, you get my point. Check out the pics.
So leaving at 4ish, I made my way back to the giant mall, and waited by the bus terminal, only to discover 2 minutes before my bus was due to leave that I was waiting at the domestic bus terminal, not the big bus terminal. Thank god a lovely local woman saw my ticket in my hand and ran me to the right one, just before the bus left… thank you!!!
What I have noticed (only 4 days into my travels) is how willing everyone is to lend you a hand (especially all the local men on the side of the road… just kidding), but other travelers, and local women. Again this morning, making my way to the monorail to get to the airport, I was waiting on the wrong platform again (what is wrong with me, it just didn’t even occur to me to ask), a lady pointed me in the right direction, aka, the other side of the tracks, and I was able to run on, just before it left.
Of course I’m only new to this, and I’m not naive enough to believe everyone will be so kind, but if I manage to pick the nice ones from the bad ones, I think I’ll be ok! It seems someone is looking out for me anyway.
p.s. sorry guys, i had a heap of trouble downloading these photos, but they're finally up now... http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2020828&id=219300161&l=acd566cb83
