The Barkers have been back for a few weeks now and will leave us for UK this Saturday. It has been a long time since Mils and I had a vacation. The last in Hong Kong 5 years ago. I thought it would be great if we could do something touristy.. like a cuti-cuti Malaysia and with the guys. So I did up a plan... something unnatural of me, CAMPING. Ah, but this nature trip is specially designed for City Campers i.e. a place far away in a jungle where you stay in glass sheds with electricity, running water, a fridge, a fan and a caretaker who will start the fire for your barbeque.

YES. That's my style of camping.

Welcome to Sekeping Serendah.

N 03º 22.211 E 101º 37.863

Upon our arrival, we were greeted with views of the kampung. Quiet and quaint, we were automatically swept away by our peaceful surroundings that we have often forgotten. Seeing that it was a weekday, the streets were bare. We must have been the only tourists at that time.

When we got into the resort, we were greeted by the caretaker. He told us where our glass shed was and left us to settle down by ourselves. There were no key, no forms to fill, no credit cards to swipe, no idenfication checks required. Strange because it was something that we were all not used to but nice that certain businesses still are able to instill trust in their guests.

Before crossing the mini bridge above the meandering stream that led us to our accomodation, we d-toured to the swimming pool area instead. I did not take any pictures worth uploading here because I thought I had the sun above me the whole day to do so. Anyway, here are the untanned; one that is on vacation from gloomy UK and one that is back from freezing Jersey.

After settling our stuffs, we took a walk to the nearby waterfall. Here's all of us heading towards the exit of the resort. I don't know why but I like this picture. It is just not unusual to see Elv taking a different route from everyone else. Hehe It's just such a typical scenario.

Back to the story - it was a 15 minutes walk along the 'main road'. It was bare, like I've mentioned earlier, that you could just stroll in the middle of the road like as if your grandfather owns it.

We were drenched with our own sweat when we got there. It was a small waterfall. Better than I had expected. Again, since it was a weekday, there weren't many people there. The water was pretty clear and clean. It was not as cold as Sungai Chiling (I don't think I've ever blogged about this - yes, I've been rather adventurous these couple of months!) but tolerable enough to take away the heat.

Just to drift away from the waterfall, guess what we saw? A lizard so untypical of the ones we find at home. Look at its feet! It was also about 2 times larger than an ordinary salamander. Interesting!

We then decided to go upstream and see what was ahead. We saw a couple making out. Well, actually a guy was trying to coax his gf clad in a tudung (head scarf) to get into some kind of action. I have no idea if he succeeded. Anyway, we decided to head up north and settled for a shady area at the shallow waters. I will continue later because I've yet to upload the pictures. I'll be back soon!

to be continued...

A friend of mine who was visiting just got back from Macau/HK. When I told him that I enjoyed my time in Macau, he looked at me in disgust. OK, we were actually on the phone but from his mere silence and awkward, 'What!' I could tell he had the facial expression of someone who just had 10cl of hempedu juice! Eww!

'Why?!' I asked.

Then a list of complaints started to spill: Rude. Expensive. Horrid. Boring. Poorly maintained. Chinese (well, duh!)

I screamed at him. "Well, you wouldn't feel like shit if you won a couple of thousands on the slot machine like me!"

I got triple 7 on the slot machine! Woohoo!

Hehe

Back to the conversation with Mr. Complaint. So he rattled on and on about the EVERYTHING BAD ABOUT MACANESE and I could only reply with sigh. I've mentioned this many, many times. There's always beauty in a person/place/thing if you know how to search for it. To me, beauty came in a form of creamy egg filling in a flaky tart cup served WARM.

Here's a list of really good stuffs from Macau that I'll definitely go back for on my next trip.

#1 Portuguese Egg Tart

Any time I pass by an egg tart shop, I'm there. Whether or not they are RM2.50 per piece or RM5, I'm there. I even tapau-ed a dozen tarts back home. What? What's so weird? I know of people who tapau-ed Krispy Kreme all the way from Australia to Malaysia.

#2 The Local Macanese Food

Expensive but worth splurging. We had a meal at Madeira @ The Venetian and it wasn't as good as Vela Latina which is located directly opposite Senado Square. Here's mom and I about to pig in. Hungry we were!

A typical Macanese meal consists of African Chicken (spring chicken marinated in peri-peri) and Bacalhau (salted cod fish in a thick and aromatic sauce with potatoes and hard boiled eggs).

Here's a close-up of Bacalhau served in a bread bowl.

#3 The various look and feel of Macau

Only the southern stone facade of The St. Paul's Cathedral still remains strong and sturdy and is the icon of Macau. It was difficult to try to take a photo of the remains on its own as that place is swamped with tourists like us.

This is the wall of a restaurant in The Grand Lisboa. I couldn't help but to take a close shot due to its texture and depth. Very nice. I wish I can have egg shaped surface on my walls next time

From this shot, it reminds of Las Vegas (minus the Chinese characters on top of Wynn). We had a spectacular view of the water fountain display. Less grand that The Bellagio, this one is just as entertaining. The show goes on every 10-15 minutes at the Wynn's entrance.

If only our MPBJ compound had such beautiful blue tiles. This is just a part of the municipal council surroundings and I was immediately attracted to the design of the tiles. Beautiful!

Mosaic pillars at The Lisboa hotel. Yah, I was bored while waiting for our cab to the hotel.

Walking around Senada Square, I entered a beautifully landscaped lane. Everyone was taking pictures of the what's in the middle and never noticed that the windows of the next building was just as interesting. I love the colours and it just reminds me of a default desktop wallpaper in any Microsoft suite.

#4 The pig-out session in The Grand Lisboa

Haha, it goes back to food doesn't it? How did we end up there? YC and I were online and she was asking me about restaurants in Macau since (at that time) she was planning for a pre-Honeymoon with her Hunnie. I stumbled across a website and that's how we knew about this apparently quite famous buffet. It was pretty good actually. I stuffed myself with sashimi. The dessert wasn't much to shout about (like most buffets). They had a stall that served blanched prawns right from the aquarium. Poor thing. Animals don't have souls so it's ok.

Done! Haha.. like homework lidat.

We woke up early to have our breakfast at Aldy's.  After days of local food, American breakfast just refreshes your taste buds. Being such kiasus, we opt for the most elaborated meal!

Me looking all cheery and happy! YaY! Got my sunny side ups

On the way to morning mass, we took a couple of must have tourists shots. There are two famous landmarks here - The Statdhuys and The Christ Church. Big labels on our head: TOURISTS!!!!!

Morning mass at St Francis Xavier.

Many people but it was not pack. Noticed that there were server girls as well (usually li'l boys).

Yes, it does seem like we getting hungry faster over here. As soon as you know it, we're over at Jonker Walk again at the same place where we had our first meal in Melaka. After all the spicy and curry food, I opt for something simpler but just as tasty.

I can't help but to think this makes sucha great shot. Unfortunately, I was too short so I had to be lifted up. I was laughing so hard, you can't see my eyes. I'm imitating Elv when he's wide awake. Hahaha, so mean me!

Overall, I think we all had a fantastic time in Melaka. Too bad we were too early for the Eye on Malaysia. Next month, Shah Rukh Khan will be receiving his datukship in Melaka. What utter nonsense! And that's just because he shot a movie here. Ha ha, WHERE'S THE PRIORITY, AUTHORITIES???

Finallyyyyyy.. I'm done with Melaka

I'm so slow with updating my trip that I've already done two other trips! I was in Macau for a couple of days for good Portuguese/Macanese delights and more of St Francis Xavier's influences in the East and most recently a white water rafting outing at Kuala Kubu Bharu. 

So, let me just continue where I left off..

Here are some night shots of Melaka.

We were on the way to Menara Taming Sari but it was closed at that hour as it was time for their Muslim staffs to break fast. So we went back to Jonker Walk. We were crossing the bridge over the Melaka river and couldn't help but to be in awe of the beautiful sunset. You'd never think you would see sucha a scene in Melaka, did you?

We had fruit juice at the Limau Limau cafe along Jonker Walk to quench our thirst! Mmm yums! Oh, and to take a few bites of pineapple tarts that we got at the night market. Some of the must buys are dried mee sua, cincalok (fermented shrimp sauce.. sounds delish, no?) and gula melaka.

Limau Limau cafe sure does have a character and I really like this place coz of its organized mess.

This is Melaka's latest icon - the Taming Sari Tower that stands 110m tall. It's a 7 minutes ride with 360 degree view of Melaka. Since we were there at night, we could easily spot the heavy density of lights on Merdeka Road where Dataran Pahlawan, Newton's Food Court, Equatorial Hotel are situated along this busy stretch.

Satay Celup for dinner. As soon as you find a place to sit, you can choose whatever they have in the fridge. They have an assortment of food in sticks like fishball, pork ball, fish cakes in cute star shapes and faces (my fav!), kangkung, foochuk etc

1) Select your food.

2) Take picture of your favourite star.

3) Dip your food into the boiling satay sauce and wait till cooked.

4) Repeat steps 1-3 until full.

We were so full that we felt our tummies burn! Must be the 'heatiness'. After searching for the nearest 7-11 for some chilled drinks, we were lost in Melaka. Sigh. Such a small place but yet we couldn't find the road back to our hotel.

to be continued...