Just two days in Singapore, it’s an expensive country. So, I had a quick visit to Chinatown and the Buddhist monastery there. It had become much focussed on tourists and every business was trying to attract you in. However, some little places still cater to locals but you have to go down the backstreets.
The history of Singapore is interesting as well. Whilst there was a small enclave in the 13th century of Indians and a small amount of Malays who used it as a staging post for fishing it wasn’t known as a country. The British then came and decided to make it a new port on the link between East and West. Plus it was also to wrong-foot the Dutch so that we could make more of the money in the area than they could! It always boils down to money.
Singapore is a country to revisit but maybe when I don’t have to think about the costs of anything! I decided to head back to a city called Melaka, which I had heard great things about. But first was navigating my way out of Singapore and Johor region in Malaysia. Singapore turned out to be easy but Malaysia was somewhat more difficult. As always they have not thought about bikes at all and you have to take your life into your own arms.
The end of Eurasia
After making my way out I headed down to the end of the Eurasia continent. While there I bumped into another cycle tourer aiming to do the same thing, Lars from Sweden. He was an old-time cycle tourer on a folding bike. Lars was well into his retirement taking 3 months at a time for touring regions before heading home. We make it to the end but the place is shut. I managed to find a side gate and we continued through the mangrove to the monument at the Southernmost point.
Planning to camp at the entrance we headed back to an undercover area. However, after about 20 minutes of waiting we were met with security who told us to move on. We tried at a mosque but they said no, not this time. But the person spoke to the local police and helped locate an alternative. We had a perfect view over the water watching the sunset and a pier! To top it off the gentlemen who helped find us our location also brought some food, isotonic drink and water.
Lars had mentioned a place called Kukap, which is a fishing village all on stilts. I was expecting to see a lot of wooden huts on stilts. However, these were all modern buildings on concrete pillars over the water. Modernity had caught up. It was still a nice place to stop for a bit and watch the world go by.
Mosques, hot springs and murals
I was taking a much more leisurely pace on my way to Melaka and only covering 60km a day. Giving me a chance to find some good spots for resting each night and explore in more detail each place. One of the best was finding a hot spring and camping there overnight. Turned out I shouldn’t have done that but they weren’t too worried about it in the morning.
Mosques have always been a great location to camp near built-up areas. Sometimes you can stay on the ground but in this case, there were some raised and covered areas just opposite. However, it did mean being the target of entertainment for the children that evening. The mosques in Malaysia often double as community centres and have badminton and, sometimes, basketball courts.
I passed a sizeable town on my way to Melaka called Maur which is known for its murals and more importantly, a street devoted to them. It was an interesting little place and I was hoping to find somewhere to stay but all the options were a bit on the pricey side. I found a little fishing village pier to camp on. However, the boy racers used it to test the noise they could make from their bikes!
Melaka
I was going to have 4 days in Melaka to relax and take in the place, although the main bit is Jonker Street weekend night market. The market is fun to go along but overpopulated with tourists. As always you get the feeling the market now caters for tourists and the original flare of the night market has disappeared. You only get the original feeling for the markets when you get out of the tourist hotspots.
I spent much of the time debating what I wanted to do after my tour had finished, even though this was a long time off. Not sure if I wanted to go back into business or start a new career. I was a bit annoyed my brain had decided to bring this up when all I wanted to do was enjoy my journey now. But alas, it was an opportunity to think and maybe think a bit more about on a volunteering opportunity I have coming up.
I also met a couple of other travellers in the hostel, Charlotte and Sylvia. For the next couple of days, we would spend time exploring Melaka with our final night watching the sunset over the Selat Mosque. It was not much of a sunset but the cloud formation over the mosque brought out the strong colours and gold dome.
It was a lovely way to finish the days off and then time to head off towards my volunteering opportunity and a chance to spend time in amongst the mangroves kayaking.