Work has been busy busy the last few weeks.. so I apologize for the delay in updates..
SO, SINGAPORE! What a fabulous city!! My friend Casey and I spent long weekend there and took full advantage of this little treasure of Asia. Singapore is so very clean, modern, safe, and overall amazing. The city is extremely organized, so it was a bit of a change from our every day life in India. People actually wait in straight, formed lines for taxis with patience! It is also true that you cannot chew gum or liter, without consequences. Lovely.
Our trip started at 11 pm on Thursday as we boarded the four hour red-eye flight from Bangalore to Singapore. We arrived in Singapore on Friday around 6 am, which was approximately 3 am Bangalore time. Needless to say, we were a little sleepy. As our luck would have it.. our hotel room was NOT ready, so we spent about three hours sleeping at the hotel pool, looking semi-homeless. At the time, I wasn't impressed, but looking back it was hysterical.
Once we were actually able to get into our room Friday, we started our first day off! We spent most of the day shopping on Orchard Road, which is the famous shopping strip in Singapore. The shopping literally went for miles and was above ground, and underground. I have never seen such an intricate structure of shopping, with so many stores. There were designer stores, full sized malls, and American retail. Literally, everything you could think of or want. For lunch, we had our first round of the famous Singapore street food, which included noodles and spring rolls. It was soooo yummy.
On Friday night, we ventured out to the world’s largest ferris wheel, the Singapore Flyer. We took the half hour ride around the Ferris wheel in a fully enclosed capsule. The view from the top was so so beautiful; you could see all of downtown Singapore, which was just stunning.
After the Singapore Flyer, we had our first Singapore Seafood Dinner. We had our eye on the Singapore Chili crab legs, however they were very expensive. We settled on Prawns and Noodles, Hot and Sour soup, and Seafood fried rice. Turns out we didn't settle at all! Fabulous food. Of course, we couldn’t leave without also having Asian tea, in a cute pink glass pot filled with flowers.
Our Saturday began by taking a cable car from downtown Singapore to Sentosa Island. Sentosa is comparable to downtown Orlando with Universal Studios, various rides, restaurants, and attractions.
We chose to spend our day on a few key attractions: the Images of Singapore, the Butterfly Garden, and Underwater world aquarium complete with a Dolphin show. Of course, I can't resist a good aquarium! Oh, how could I forget.. Casey convinced me to take a luge ride down the island. I was kind of annoyed, but it was actually very fun.
The Images of Singapore was a serious of scenes depicting the History of Singapore. It was full of mannequins, and poorly created sets. To most, this would seem semi-lame, but to Casey and I it was the making of a great photo shoot. The ropes that blocked the scenes from the public were very short and we took full advantage.
As expected, the butterfly garden was full of colorful butterflies, flowers, plants, and a few birds. It wasn’t anything grand, but did make us feel like we were in a tropical oasis in the middle of Asia.
Before heading to the Underwater world aquarium, as it was somewhat farther on the island from where we initially started, we made a stop at Siloso Beach. There were tons of people on the beach relaxing and taking in the hot Singapore sun! You could see all of the ships and barges past the island in the ocean.
Underwater world did not disappoint, especially when it came to the Dolphin show! We saw tons of Dolphin tricks and flips. They also had these adorable seals that were part of the show, which we got to see up close and personal because we were in the front row. We were Best Friends.
Outside of the aquarium was the fish spa. Since we had a long day full of activities on the island, we took a quick trip to the spa to relax our little feed. Apparently, the fish spa originated in Singapore. As many know, I hate my feet being touched; so having fish nibbling at them is torture. However, when in Singapore! I couldn’t leave without trying the "original" fish spa.. again…
Finally, before leaving Sentosa, we made a pit stop at the luge! We took the luge down a hill on Sentoa and then took a lift back up. You could see close to the entire island on the way down and up.
Although we had a very adventurous day on the Island of Sentosa, we returned to mainland Singapore to enjoy an evening at the famous Marina Bay Sands Resort. The resort is an 8.5 billion dollars US investment equipped with hundreds of rooms, a roof top pool, rooftop bar, Casino, shopping center, and over five restaurants. It was amazing and had a completely breath taking view of the Singapore skyline at night. We spent some time on the rooftop bar indulging in $20 drinks and then ate a dinner of seafood at one of the Asian restaurants.
Sunday was our final day to take in all Singapore had to offer, so we decide to jump on board with the city bus tours. First, we did the land tour traveling all over Singapore, and then the water tour on the famous ducks boats.
When you take a city bus tour, you have the ability to hop on and hop off. We didn’t make many stops on the bus, however we did get off to see the Singapore Botanical Gardens. They have the National Orchid Garden, which is the flower of Singapore. The one down side was the heat. It was extremely hot touring the gardens, but well worth the scenery.
After the bus it was onto the water tour via the Duck! It was great way to see the city. We were able to see the Marina Bay Sands resort, Lotus Art Museum, Singapore Flyer, and the Singapore Merlion!
66 hours later...we saw almost everything possible in Singapore and had so much fun. It was absolutey gorgeous. I am so grateful for the experience!
