HERE WE GO

Arrived in Singapore at the appointed time, got to the hotel, & immediately found out why it was so cheap. It is located in the absolute epicentre of the red light district, & the room was so small I had to go outside just to change my mind. The streets are jam packed with hookers, & business is booming.Wandered off down the street looking for something I recognised to eat. Gave the pigs liver, bullfrog porridge & fish head curry a wide berth, but generally the food is cheap & plentiful. The weather is very oppressive, & you cant move without breaking out into a serious sweat.The traffic is manic, & the stench from the piles of garbage & the open drains does not help. This part of town is well off the package tour radar. Nevertheless, as confronting as it might sound, I was pleased with the way it worked out, as the most popular parts of town are so sanitised it seems like Disney World.

Now to collect the bikes. It took a full day & a half & umpteen taxi fares to various agencies to get the papework sorted out, & this was very inefficient & frustrating. This is what we had heard, but we thought we had it well covered. The best advice I can give anyone planning a similar trip is do yourself a big favour & DO NOT ship to Singapore, its just not worth the hassle. The experience with the carnets was interesting. Everyone seemes so focused on filling in the forms, that no one actually checked the bikes or the luggage. We could have been driving the Batmobile with the boot full of heroin. Anyhow, we got it sorted, & not without some trepidation, finally left for the border. About ten minutes later, we reached the border. A whole lot of buggerising around for a lousy few k's on the Singapore road network. Over the bridge, & into Malaysia, easy as that. Nobody checked the bikes on either side of the border here either.

The first impression of Malaysia is very good. The freeway system is first class, its easy to use & well maintained. We got a good few kilometers under the belt, then turned off onto some trunk roads heading for Melaka. At this point, things changed. Oncoming traffic frequently intrudes onto the wrong side of the road, people pass you on the inside, the hundreds of little scooters don't mind driving alongside you in the same lane, and every blind corner is a complete lucky dip!!

In Melaka, as far as I can make out, there are no road rules whatsoever. Traffic coming straight at you when you are in a one way street takes some getting used to. Melaka is a very historic city, & our hotel was quite handy to all the historic buildings, museums etc, including the Museum of Malaysian Independence, shown below.

When it rains here, its a serious business. Fortunately we were able to watch this cloudburst from the comfort of a very good bar.

From Melaka, we headed up to the Cameron Highlands. The road into this area is all curves, which would normally be a bonus on the bike. However, this turned out to be even more nerve wracking than driving in Melaka. Linemarking is interpreted as a rough guide, double lines have no meaning at all, there was loose rubbish on the road surface, & it started to rain.

However, it is a lot coooler up here, & the outlook is fairly spectacular, lots of tea plantations & rain forest. This is somewhat spoiled by the amounts of litter, especially plastic, around the roads & creeks.

We are staying at the Equatorial Hotel , & they have allowed us to park the bikes at the front door, which is handy.

The food in the nearest town of Brinchang is remarkably inexpensive sofar, although I can't help thinking I'm one meal away from disaster when I look at the food handling techniques, & the ever popular open drains & piles of garbage. The hotel is a much safer bet.

Tomorrow morning (Monday 7April) we leave for Georgetown, Penang.