Malaysia - Malacca

15th August 2015

My mum came across this eDM on Wechat regarding a property tour to Malacca organised by the Hatten Group (developer), and it was only $150 inclusive of coach, hotel, and all meals! Lc and I decided to spend our weekend there since I haven't been to Malacca before.

We were supposed to depart at 9am but the van got stuck in a traffic jam so we waited till 10am. 2 others went together, a guy around 30 and an old lady of about 70?? Both of them had previously purchased a property with Hatten Group so they were actually going over to check out the progress of the construction.

We went via the Tuas exit which had no jam at all, so it was a pretty quick drive to Malacca. We reached at 1.30pm, and headed straight for lunch at the Hatten Hotel. We were a little late though, so not much food left.

After lunch, we quickly checked into our rooms and had a brief rest before departing for the city tour. Our room was quite big and nice!

We were brought around to visit a few of the Hatten Group's project sites, several temples/mosques/churches, as well as a river cruise.

Masjid Selat Melaka situated on the Pulau Melaka.

This is the area at the foot of St. Paul's Hill.

There was a fortress called A'Famosa that you would definitely not miss if you decide to climb up the hill.

View from up the hill. The building on the right is the Hatten Hotel. Centre down is the fortress.

At the peak!

So at the top of the hill sits the St. Paul's Church, about 500 years old. It was pretty much destroyed during the wars involving the Dutch, and later the British. Outside the church, there was a guy holding a scary lizard that you can take photo with for a bit of money.

As part of the Malacca Museum Complex, the Malacca Sultanate Palace was also situated at the foot of the hill, which was supposed to be very interesting to visit and would show you more about the history of Malacca. The building is a reconstruction of the 16th century palace, which somehow looks a bit Chinese/Japanese to me. Unfortunately we did not have a chance to enter due to time constraints.

We moved on to the Sam Po Temple (三宝庙), which had a giant well in its courtyard. Something special about it is that it has never dried up before. Ever. This temple was built in commemoration of Zheng He. Inside there are quite some old photos of VIPs (generally Chinese political leaders) who have visited this place in the past.

Next up was the river cruise! Had a good look along the river. Apparently they're trying to create something like the Clarke Quay over there.

#fakevenice

I liked the colourful shophouses along the way. We alighted near the Stadthuys, where the red Christ Church was extremely eye-catching.

There were so many trishaws decorated with cartoon characters. 

We also passed by the Jonker Street, but didn't have much time to explore, so we decided to go back after dinner.

We had a great seafood meal near the Portuguese Village. I loved the salted crabs (盐焗蟹)!

Whole stretch of seafood restaurants. We ate at No. 1!

Big juicy crabs :P

We got back to the city area and did some shopping but I realised that the clothes there generally aren't very cheap. But I bought bras from Wacoal as they were quite significantly cheaper than Singapore, and again, I spent almost all the money I had brought lol!

As we were leaving for Jonker Street, it started drizzling, so we had no choice but to get back to our hotel.

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16th August 2015

We woke up quite late for breakfast, and went to shop for some local snacks along the streets. I bought some durian snacks for my mum.

To take full advantage of the little time we had left, we decided to get a short massage :P It was really convenient, 2nd floor at the shopping centre next to the hotel.

It was cheap and good!

Had our last lunch over there at the hotel before leaving. The host was really nice as she ordered some special stuff for us directly from the kitchen.

Yumyum!

Super nice lamb racks!

It was quite a relaxing and fun getaway. Hope that we will have more opportunities like this in the future :P