Johor Bahru-Malacca 225 Km ± 3 hours
We began our journey. It was quite easy to find the north south highway on which you have to pay toll every time. In the Johor Bahru area everybody drove quite placidly. Like driving behind a "learn to drive" car. The highway wasn't busy and always two-laned. One thing you had to watch out for were hesitant drivers. Hesitant to take over. This could take on forever. Another were the very fast intercity buses doing some 130 Km/hour. Max. speed on the highway was 110 Km/h, other roads were 80 or 70 km and in the city the limit was 50 km. The buses usually stay on the right lane. All other drivers were usually driving on the left side of the road, an occassional "hesitant road hog" being the exception.

In no time we reached Malacca. Adventure began. It's always puzzling to drive according to an unknown map into an unknown city. Buying gasoline gave us some opportunity to ask for directions. Buying gasoline was special. You could pay with a card direct on the pump. Without such a card I always had to pay cash first and then settle the bill afterwards. They have two kinds of gasoline, regular and special with regular being outpaced and Vpower, the most expensive being newly introduced. The cars don't have a "cat" yet. Mallaca is quite small and in no time we found our hotel, the Grand Continental, where we had reserved through internet.

We spend the afternoon in the centre where there were Dutch and Portugese historical buildings colored adobe. There was ample space to park your car on the hotel ground. It was pleasant to have a car, we drove around, went to the centre and could easily find parking place everywhere. We could return to the hotel, take a dive in the pool and return in the evening at leisure. We had a nice dinner in a big plaza food court and then took in a nearby sound and light show which we actually should have missed. It was more sound and a little light describing the independence of Malaysia while looking at some dark historical buildings.

Having your own car it's easy to visit spots you passed the day before. We had some breakfast in the hotel and drove to a kedai-kek (cakeshop) which in Malaysia is usually the place to get your cappucino and some nice cakes. Then we visited another shop which sold all kinds of dry food, meat, cookies, sauces etc. It was very busy while we wondered what it was all about. Having lived in asia for some time helps, we could recognize the contents of most packages and bought some. We stayed one night in Malacca and the next day drove off to Kuala Lumpur.

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