A Last Minute Trip to Melaka Malaysia

September is the month of holidays in Malaysia. Three straight weekends of holidays here. This weekend had two holidays tacked on for the kids. Initially we hadn't planned anything, but on Saturday morning Janet and I decided to book a couple of nights in Melaka, a city 150km from Kuala Lumpur.

Here is our travel log. 

Sunday afternoon we packed the car and drove down. On the way down we listed to John Bytheway talks for spiritual nourishment as we drove. Highway traffic at off peak times can be really heavy, but with the exception of an accident that slowed things down for a while we breezed down along. We made fast work on the side streets until the last two kilometers from the hotel. The last two kilometers took 45 minutes.  

We got to the around 6:30, but the hotel guy already left for the day. After calling him, he rushed back through the same traffic to get us all checked. He took 45 minutes. The place exceeded out expectations. It was cheap, clean, recently renovated, and had a good dose of charm. Janet was really proud of her find. Unfortunately we didn't get pictures of the place. It turned out to be a shared apartment with 5 bedrooms. We had three. Fortunately we were the only guests so we didn't have to share bathrooms.

We finished the night with a couple of pizzas at the nearest restaurant on the Melaka canal. After dinner I took the kids to the hotel and Janet found a convenience store. She bought the best food she could find for breakfast. White bread and Nutella. She said there was some good looking rolls but figured the kids wouldn't touch them since they were Sardine flavored.

Monday morning after drinking water and eating Nutella bread we donned our swimming costumes and drove to the Melaka Sand Dunes. These are man made, I suspect they are left over from a land reclamation project or was sand for a concrete. The dunes are a mile from the car parking. We played in the sand for an hour. Once back at the car I found some sand to drive on and did a couple of donuts, making the whole family car sick in the process.  

Then we ran to a barb McDonald's drive thru for a little more substantive brunch. While waiting for a food, Maddie started asking for hot chocolate from Starbucks. Following an intense negotiation, she agreed to cease complaining for the rest of the trip. Thinking that was a fair deal, we drove through the Starbucks drive through. Later she began complaining again and I informed her our our agreement. In response she said, "I'm not complaining, I'm whining." Kids are so literal.

Then back to the beach. The beach was a blast. The tide was fairly low and we saw some fun sea life. Then within 5 minutes the tide receded some more. It was really dramatic since the bottom was flat for a ways out. A six inch drop in water exposed 50 extra feet of ocean floor. While exploring around on the bare ocean floor I took a dramatic step into waist deep ocean mud. On the surface it just looked like a sand bottom. Underneath it was thick black stinky mud. I was holding my phone in my hand as I sunk, but managed to save it. Janet saved the phone first, then me. I was caked with thick black mud. The locals got a great laugh. They knew the beach better and really didn't play in the water. We were the only ones with swimming suits. Since the water was gone I had no easy way to wash up. When I tried to find a safe spot to wash, I fell into another mud pit. Janet, being a smart cookie dug a couple of holes further up the sand and let cleanish water fill them so I could clean up a bit. After making a partial attempt to clean up, I asked if we could go. Fortunately there was a splash pad next to where we parked. I rinsed down there and was able to get into the car feeling respectable.

After showers and a short break we went out to lunch. James wasn't feeling great, so we had to help him down the street.

 We went very local, to the Hard Rock Cafe.

On the way to lunch we got a refreshing watermelon to drink.

After lunch we explored Jonker Walk for a while.

All the kids that were interested got cotton candy. Then they showed off their rainbow of colors.

Tuesday morning we got only the road at 6:30 to beat traffic. Overnight James had a fever and in the morning he felt like throwing up. We gave him the third row to himself convalesce. He managed one good purge before getting home. He suffered in silence and was glad when we pulled into home at 8:30.

In all it was a great couple of days out of town. As I write this post I see that maybe we need to experiment a little more with food options. Maybe next trip.

A World Champion Experience

When I heard that the mountain bike world championships were going to be in Norway I really wanted to go.  However, like the Birkbeinerittet race last weekend I hadn't planned on attending because Nora was expected to come sometime in September. Thanks to Nora's early arrival I have had two awesome weekends. This weekend was a dad/kids weekend.

We started driving up Friday night. About halfway up we stopped at a rest stop and set up our form of a camper. For the most part we were all pretty comfortable. At 4:00 I turned on the car for some heat which turned out to be a mistake since it woke up the whole crew. After potty runs and a resettling Lucy, we got up at 7:30 and drove the last hour up the Hafjell which is just north of Lillehammer.

It is just absolutely beautiful country here in Norway. At the resort we got our tickets, looks at the stands, got some free bike caps, and watched a few downhill racers jump their bikes 30 feet.

Once that was done we went on the ski lift to the top of the mountain. The kids really liked it but were hesitant about climbing on the lift.

At the top we found a nice play ground and let the kids play for a while.

The Pringles were well received by all, but especially James.  If you want to hear the full story you can call me.

Coming back to the start line we saw all the women's elite racers warming up.

From there we hike up the ski slope to a prime spot on the course. This is Lucy and my preferred carry method.

Being a world championship the racers are in their national colors instead of team kid. That made it easy for the kids to have someone to root for.

The kids were awesome fans and awesome sports. As things warmed up and lunch approached we hiked back down to the start line and got some hot dogs, hung out under the shade of the GoPro publicity truck and watched the race on the bigs screen.  As the women came in for the finish we walked down to watch a Canadian win and an American take third. Maddie was thrilled that an American got Bronze.

I tried to convince the kids that we needed to stay for the men's elite race, but to no avail. I have never seen my kids so adamant.  Leaving out we took a couple of beautiful parting shots. The kids were especially impressed by the helicopter.

Apparently it was a long day.

Janet was thrilled to send us off as it was as close to a day off as she'll see for the next year. I know I have some awesome memories and so do the kids.

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Birkebeiner: 

For lack of a better place to post this video, here it is. This is at the start of the Birkebienerittet. I got a  Garmin Virb, but didn't manage to get a mount for my bike in time for the race so all I could  film was the start. I had hoped to show off the ski jump down hill section coming into Lillehammer last week.