Singapore stopover

southern view from merlion park
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When I booked my flights I could only get a flight one day after I arrived in Singapore and I was waitlisted for a flight 5 days later with Singapore Airlines. This waitlist didnt clear b4 my arrival in Singapore so I decided to make tracks to my hostel asap and then out to the famous Night Safari.

This was a 40 min ride by metro and then it turned out about as long again to walk to the hostel. What I didn't realise was just how humid it would be - so I was absolutely saturated in sweat when I got to the hostel. So after taking a shower, getting food across the road at the local 'hawker' chinese food market (lavender square) and then taking metro and bus to the zoo - I arrived at the Night Safari about 10.30pm. This gave me about an hr and a half there b4 closing time - no where near enough time, but it was still well worth visiting.

chinese new year decorations
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You travel round in trams and guides with perfect british accents tell you about the animals all roming freely around the tram as it travels along. There are also walking tracks thru bat enclosures and the like which was awesome (although some american chicks who were there when I was didnt think so when some bats swooped down on them, sending them running and screaming out of the enclosure real quick!).

The buses from the night safari stopped running at 11.45 so I had to get a taxi back across singapore to my hotel. Luckily the taxis are much cheaper than in NZ. Instead of going to bed I thought I'd check out the nearby 24hr muti-level mall in Little India - Mustafa's. I read about the bargains you could get there b4 I arrived, so I had a good look around til about 2.30am! No cheap digital cameras for me there tho, unless you compare them to European prices!

orchid rd - central plaza mall
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The next morning I decided to ring Singapore Airlines just to see if the waitlist had been cleared - and it turned out it had in the night. With that in mind I quickly cancelled the flight in the evening and decided to stay for the extra 4 days I initially planned to.

The first place i visited was Sim Lim Square, another large mall in the heart of the city - famous for its cheap electronics. Its more like a fancy market than a mall, and you can bargain with the shop keepers. Some of the shops are a bit dodgy but I ended up getting what I think is an excellent deal on a digital camera.

chinatown st markets
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The time seemed to fly by and it was getting on in the day when I left, so I decided to go to the Bukit Timah reserve - where you can climb the highest peak in Singapore. You dont get a view from the top b/c of the rainforest which covers it but I had read it was well worth a visit, especially if u like monkeys. There is a road to the top, and lots of other clay tracks coming off this - so I decided to check some of them out, when it started absolutely bucketing down with rain. That made them real slippery, so by the time I finished my treking there I was covered in mud and completely saturated.

lamborgini outside the swissotel
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This didnt stop me then hopping on the bus and traveling to Orchid Road, Sinapore's shopping stretch. Not sure what the locals on the bus thought of this in a city where anything dirty is frowned upon or outlawed, but I only got a few odd looks. Orchid Road is full of big malls, all of which started closing at about 10 o'clock (not like mustafa's!), so I had a good look round there. There was a very impressive thunderstorm in the evening as well and it poured all night - so I got the underground back to the hotel for a early night.

sentosa island - merlion laser lights
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The next day it was still pouring down (I arrived at the start of a tropical cyclone and it was predicted to continue for all the time I was there. The rain had one upside, and that was that it kept the temperatures down in the mid 20's which was nice). I stayed at the hostel until about lunch time to see if it was going to let up at all, but it didnt, so I decided to go out on Lonely Planet guide walking tours of Chinatown and Little India anyway. I'm glad I did, because despite the rain both were wicked.

sentosa island - palawan beach
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Chinatown and Little India are both big in Singapore and have a lot of cool buddhist & hindu temples, street markets, restaurants... It was a big day of walking and I decided on my way home to have a quick look at some of the landmarks in the Arab St area as well and to check out the city skyline from Merlion Park (apparently the most visited place in Singapore for photos of the city - and I can see why).

I woke up to a fine day the next day so decided to make the most of it! One place I saw mentioned in attraction guides was Palau Ubin (Island), between Singapore and Malaysia and still covered in small marine and coconut farms and jungle, like the rest of Singapore was in the 50's. I took a 'bum boat' ferry  out to the island and then hired a mountain bike for the day to travel round it. After a really good day there and a coconut to finish, I travelled back and right down to the south of singapore.

sentosa island - palawan bridge
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From there I decided to visit the other extreme of Singapore - Sentosa Island. Sentosa is down below Singapore and you can travel across to it by a huge cable car, and its their answer to Malaysia with 3 artificial white sand beaches (actually quite nice) and heaps of other attractions. I went for an evening swim at one of the beaches and the water was so warm compared with NZ it was amazing. I had read about the multi-million dollar laserlights and magic fountain show they carry out each evening there so I decided to watch it after my swim. It def lived up to the hype and was quite like nothing i've ever seen before with a lot of the show projected almost in 3D onto water fountain mist (hard to explain what it was like exactly).

sentosa island - siloso beach
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The next day I went back to Sentosa since it was a really nice sunny day (with the temperature and humidity rising correspondingly). While there i chilled out on the beach again then went to Underwater World - an aquarium which is pretty unique in that it has a 50m long glass tunnel in it, with a massive tank surrounding it which is full of sharks and stingrays, amongst loads of other fish swim around in there. With admission to that i also got admission to the nearby 'Dolphin Encounter' where they do dolphin shows which are pretty neat.

sentosa island - merlion
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After leaving Sentosa I had a couple of famous temples left to visit and according to the Lonely Planet all tourists must go to the very exclusive Raffles Hotel and try a Singapore Sling cocktail. So that's what I did since it seemed a fitting way to finish my visit to Singapore - and despite the $22 price tag it was well worth it, if not just to check out the hotel and its bar.