When we were ready to leave Kuala Lumpur, we ordered a Grab to take us to the main bus station – Terminal Bersepadu Selatan. This was the largest, nicest bus station we have been to; it felt more like an airport. There were several ticket windows, so we quickly and easily purchased two bus tickets to Melacca for the next bus (we arrived around 1:30 pm and next bus was 2:00 pm). The bus station had escalators down to the bus gates with ticket scanners at the top that only allow you to enter if you are ticketed. We located the correct escalator for our gate and arrived shortly before boarding. Boarding was easy and the bus left on time! After about 2.25 hours, we arrived in Malacca bus station where we ordered a Grab to take us about a 5 to 10-minute drive to our hotel (and the center of the old town/main tourist area).
In Malacca, we stayed at the JonkeRed Hotel. It wasn’t quite as nice as our hotel in Kuala Lumpur, but plenty adequate. The rooms were clean, and the modern bathroom was about the same size as the room itself. The best part was its location, right in the heart of town and the tourist attractions, across from the river.
Our time in Malacca was limited as we wanted to see Singapore next before our flight in a few days to Melbourne, Australia. On the first afternoon, we wandered around the old town, specifically down Jonker Street. It seems as though Malacca comes alive on the weekends, so it was relatively quiet during our walk (on a Wednesday); many of the shops and restaurants were closed. Unfortunately, our timing was such that we did not see the cute town during its liveliest (visited from Wednesday to Friday). Eventually we found Pak Putra, an Indian restaurant, for dinner. The food was okay, but nothing special. After dinner, we strolled along the river for a pretty walk as the sun set. There is a relic waterwheel and fort infrastructure with signs and information along the river. Once the sun went down, we stopped at Gravy Baby, a nice lit-up bar along the river for a couple drinks and a milkshake. The restaurant feels like a bar you would find in the United States, but the views of the river are nice.
Gravy Baby milkshake 
Malacca is known for its numerous museums; it seems there is a museum for ever particular niche! Therefore, we dedicated our full day to visiting some of these museums. First though, we needed some breakfast. We started with a Chinese pastry shop (Eng Che Seng) which was just a storefront where a group of women and one younger man sat at a long table sculpting piles of dough into small pastries. We stood there for several minutes looking confused before the nice young gentleman explained what things were. We purchased fresh sweet and savory biscuits (four in each pack) for 6.80 rm. Both of us preferred the savory biscuits. Afterwards, we headed to a coffee shop – Vintage Green Café – just down the street. They had a brunch special (toast with cheese and egg and a coffee for 10 rm). The coffee shop also doubled as a vintage shop; everything in it was for sale (mostly small trinkets, books, and old photographs). Malacca has many vintage shops, so it’s fun to walk by and window shop (or actually shop if that’s your thing!).
Vintage Green Cafe
There appear to be two main museum all-inclusive tickets. We accidentally purchased one of the all-inclusive tickets (the “On the Hill” museums) without realizing there were two options. But, no problem for us, it just meant we would visit the museums on that ticket for the day! Our ticket was 12 rm for five museums, including the Education Museum, Literature Museum, Democratic Government Museum, Governors Museum, and the Admiral Cheng Ho Gallery. The second ticket was 10 rm for ten museums, including the Sultenate Museum and Maritime Museum (both ones that we had initially wanted to visit). A Formosa, an old fort and St. Paul’s church, sits on top of the hill with great views overlooking the city and out to the ocean. It is free to visit and well worth climbing to the top of the hill. We started by climbing to A Formosa and then worked our way down through the museums. All five had plenty of information in English. We liked the Admiral Cheng Ho Gallery and Democratic Government Museum best.
By the time we finished visiting the museums, it was late afternoon and we were hungry. We found Baboon House, which had good reviews. It’s a cute little spot with a greenhouse-like plant area in the middle of the building next to the tables. The menu was mostly burgers, so we each got one and an iced tea, pineapple cider (homemade), ginger lemon beer, and Carlsberg. All very tasty! We ended up being the last patrons since it closed at 5 pm. Since we ate a very late lunch/early dinner, we relaxed for a while back at the hotel and got a late/second dinner at Restoran Tim Sum How Her Siang (dim sum) around 9 pm. It was open until midnight and new patrons were sitting down as late as 11 pm! We ordered a bunch of dumplings (pork, shrimp, crab), pork bao buns, fried wontons, Chinese iced teas, and a Tiger big beer all for 60 rm ($15 USD). Not the best dim sum we’ve had, but pretty good.
The next morning, we opted for a breakfast of dim sum at Low Yong Moh Dim Sum. The people who worked here were extremely friendly, but we preferred the food at Restoran Tim Sum. After breakfast, we checked out of our hotel and headed back to the Malacca bus station to get tickets to Singapore!
