Hey guys,

We are just on yet another bus on our way to Singapore and I just thought we would give you a quick update on our adventures in Melaka. First off, Katie's phone appears to have decided it wants to work again after its brief dip in the ocean, which we are quite happy about (even the precious torch function is working!)

So anyway back to the trip; we arrived in Melaka mid-morning after a couple of very long bus journeys and interesting change in KL and checked in to our lovely guest house. It was a great location, with the front end in the centre of Chinatown and the rear backing onto the riverfront - the owner was so friendly too and spoke really good English. He gave us a couple of maps and pointed us in the direction of most of the sights. As our room was not going to be ready till midday we set off on a bit of a wander through the Chinatown district to find some food and visit some of the many arts and craft shops. We had lunch in a really nice dim-sum place (in this instance pointing and guessing what we wanted paid off!), then went off to explore for a bit.The Chinatown here is one of the most interesting we've visited, probably due to the sheer abundance of Chinese that live in this part of Malaysia, and it was lovely to wander through the streets looking at all the old shop fronts and wandering in and out of craft shops.They have some lovely stuff in some of the shops but nothing that would come within our weight limit (especially the 1 metre high wooden giraffe that Katie had her eye on!)With the midday sun however, our walk didn't last too long before we decided to head back to the hostel to hide in the AC.

In the afternoon we set off out again to the other side of the river, where most of the historic sites are located.Thought it might be a bit cooler - how wrong we were! Even at half 4 it most have still been mid 30s but we persisted and explored all the old Dutch heritage sites, that have popped up from many years of Dutch colonial rule there, before getting on a boat cruise that runs up the river. This was a really nice way to see the city (plus it only cost us 2 quid!); the way the river is set out here gives it a feel of a canal with the bonus being that all the main sights are along it saving us the walk! Katie said the city had changed quite a bit from the last time she was here; the city was awarded World Heritage status in 2008 and lots of money has been pumped into it to attract tourists, which clearly worked as the place was packed full of them (mostly Chinese on package tours).

In the evening we walked along the riverfront from our guesthouse to watch a water light show that Katie had seen on her last trip and take in the atmosphere of all the cool little bars that run along the waterfront, all of which are lit up by fairy lights at night. After watching the show for a few minutes and me taking far too many pictures as usual, we walked back into Chinatown. The main street, Jonker Street, in Chinatown, which had previously been a traffic sprawl is transformed at night into a massive street market selling a mixture of cheap tourist tat, lovely crafts and lots of food.We found a great Chinese restaurant at the far end; where we had mango prawns and deep fried squid (gonna look like a squid soon).Seeing as it was Saturday night, there was a massive karaoke competition taking place in the main street, which we watched (rather amused) over a few beers - might not sound like everyone's cup of tea but the microphone was so loud it was easier to watch than ignore!! The karaoke consisted of a ridiculously large stage taking up the street with bars and cafes serving up food all around. It still amazes me how into karaoke they are over here; there were hundreds of people watching despite every single act being terribly out of tune, but good fun all the same.

We should be getting to Singapore around midday and will be there for a couple of days so will update you all as we go.Hoping it might cool down for a bit more easy sightseeing - maybe that's wishful thinking!!

Lots of love Martin and Katie