Entries Tagged 'Travel' ↓

So I’m now back in Perth (for almost a week) but I’m still keen to try and record the trip and it was great fun, so with the help of my photos (which helpfully record the date and location) I’m going to try and record the best parts of the trip (at least that I remember).

Monday was day one of Sentosa. After breakfast we caught the MRT down to HarbourFront and purchased tickets for the cable car to Sentosa. One return ticket let you board the cable car once at each station. We first caught the cable car up to mount Fabre and then back down across to Sentosa. The cable cars weren’t as comfortable as I remember and they definitely weren’t as good as the Disney Skyliner. They didn’t have air conditioning either so they weren’t super comfortable. (All of our trip was hot & humid, but this day seemed especially that way). It probably also didn’t help that both Elise and I were feeling decidedly queasy and needed frequent trips to the toilet. We’re not sure exactly what it was that caused it but we both felt unwell for a period which didn’t make the day a whole lot of fun.

We went down to Fort Siloso and did the skywalk there, which gave a good view. There was also some interesting information about how Singapore was used as a defensive base. It would have been good to do more of it, but we didn’t really feel up to it and certainly none of the longer walks without easy access to a toilet! We then went to a Seven Eleven, partly to escape the humidity and have air conditioning for a while, but also to looks for drinks. They didn’t have Powerade of Gatorade, but we managed to find a Singaporean equivalent which helped to make Elise and I start feeling better. We then took a long loop on the Cable Car and then took the monorail down to the beach station where we had booked tickets to watch a night time light and water show.

We had about 3 hours to kill so we sat around, watched a water canon show accompanied by music which was good light 5 minute entertainment. Andrew and the kids ordered dinner and I had a lot of chips after finding they didn’t cause any further stomach issues. By this time we were both starting to feel a lot better. Wings of Time is a laser, light, projection water show that was fantastic. It foes for about 15 minutes and has a story line as well as looking fantastic. We jumped on the monorail as an easy way to get home and went to bed.

It almost the middle of Day 2 (or the third day of travel – at least when I’m starting this post. Edit: It’s now Friday, so I’m way behind but not giving up yet!) The flight was uneventful, I dozed a bit, food was fine. I was pretty tired so I didn’t make any really progress in getting things done or watching TV. I read a little bit of my book and listened to some music. We landed on schedule and it took a little while to get through immigration, but nothing too bad and our luggage was already on the carousel by the time we got out. We had organised a transfer to the hotel, but unfortunately they never showed up. We spend a fair but of time waiting but in the end we got frustrated and decided to just take a taxi. We then had the issue that there was 5 of us and Maxi’s can take a while to arrive. In the end we split into two taxis. They took two different routes to the hotel, but they arrived pretty close together and the fare was less than a dollar in difference.

The hotel is nice, without being amazing. It’s almost $250/night so it’s not cheap, but then again no accomodation in Singapore is. My experience so far is that Singapore is fairly expensive, probably more so than the US. Although, this trip is slightly different – travelling with friends I’m probably less likely to cut corners on cost. Anyway checked in with no issue. We were all pretty tired and had agreed on room service for dinner. I’m on level 9 and my friends are on level 25. My card won’t let me up to their floor so we met in the lobby and then headed up to their room for dinner. Then it was time for a bath & bed!

We agreed on a relaxed start for Sunday and met on floor 4 for breakfast. The hotel that we’re staying at includes a (buffet) breakfast which is pretty good. We then headed off to do the Flower Domes and Cloud Forest at Gardens by the Bay. They were great – it was cool to see indoor flowers. The biggest thing I noticed when we walked in was the lovely fragrant scent of them all. They were beautiful to look it, but I can’t write a lot about it – they were flowers! We had lunch athwart is probably a typical (Singaporean) fast foot joint. Then we saw the cloud forest, it was avatar themed which was a bit of fun and there was an amazing indoor waterfall.

After that it was on the MRT (Singapore public transport) back to the hotel. I must say Singapore public transport is great. You can scan on & off with your credit card, so no extra card needed. It also covers the whole city really well. (Though that’s probably easier when you consider Singapore is the size of Bunbury and there’s not a lot of urban sprawl).

Edit: Oops – I forgot the other thing we did until I started adding photos to this post. After the cloud forest it was actually the MRT down to the water where we had a bum boat tour booked. We organised that then ducked into a nearby bar cafe to have a cold drink and some cooler air and a break from the humidity. The boat tour was good, we got to go up and down the river and hear some history about the areas we were passing by. We also got to see the Merlion (which was good – more on that later) with some decent photos. After the boat tour we headed back to the hotel!

We decided to have the buffet dinner at the hotel. The food was good, but it wasn’t cheap. We also realised it was a halal hotel which meant no port at all and also no alcohol with dinner. 14,694 steps later and 10.33 km it was time for bed.

Here are some pictures from Day 1 – you can expand them to see the full photo by clicking on the image!

OK, so I officially sucked at documenting the travels. I’m again on a plane in business class, but this is also a month after I started this post. As an aside, I’ve really got to stop upgrading to business class – I’m getting used to flying this way and it sucks when I don’t! Anyway, let’s see how much I can recall of my trip (with the help of hastily scribbled notes and credit card statements).

As I mentioned at the start of the last post, it was an early start on Monday but I didn’t have any issues. I’m glad I paid the small fee for priority on AA, especially since these flights were my basic economy fares. Unfortunately, Hartford was the one airport that didn’t have an AA (or any one world) lounge so I had to spend the time waiting for my flight in the standard lounge area – isn’t life tough!

I’m struggling to remember, which is why writing this so late is bad, but I think the flights were uneventful. Read whatever I wrote about my last AA flight – I’m sure it was pretty much the same. However, I would like to reiterate that flight across the US seem to have a lot more turbulence than in Australia. (Though given the flight I’m currently on, I’m starting to reconsider that statement). We changed planes in Miami and when I boarded (as one of the first thanks to priority) I was slightly concerned. Though nobody else seemed to worries about the smoke that seemed to be coming from the ceiling… Turns out it wasn’t smoke – have a look at this article (https://www.theweathernetwork.com/en/news/weather/forecasts/what-is-this-weird-thick-fog-filling-airplane-cabin-before-take-off) for a description of the phenomenon, but it was certainly something unusual that I hadn’t seen before. Despite all that we made it safely to Orlando. (and yes I forgot to mention it, but there was a brief stop in the Admiral’s club at Miami airport. This one was middle of the road as they go. Had decent stuff, but not Chicago level!)

At Orlando, after a significantly long wait, I picked up my car at Orlando. This time, it was. Mitsubishi Rouge – it still amazes me that this is a so called ‘compact’ car, but I did love the car more on that later. But here’s a picture of it to finish off this post.