Craig and Sharon's Travels!

Friday, April 08, 2011

Singapore

Right, A mere 4 or so months after we got back... here's Singapore!






After arriving by train from Malacca, the next day we got the bus out to the botanical gardens and national orchid garden. The orchids in particular were very impressive, they were so beautiful, and it was nice and shady, and just a really pleasant place to wander around.


In the afternoon we got a combination of trains and buses out to Changi. Changi was a prisoner of war camp run by the Japanese after they captured Singapore from the British. It was a very moving and sombre place, but very interesting too.



The weather in Singapore is fairly regular - scorching heat until about 3-4pm, when it starts pouring with torrential rain. The only thing that varies is the evening - sometimes it carries on raining, sometimes it doesn't. Getting back from Changi involved lots of frantic running from cover to cover, but quite frankly we might as well have not bothered! by the time we'd crossed the road we might as well have just jumped into a bath with our clothes on! In a lot of ways it was quite nice though, as it was so hot during the day it came as a welcome relief.




One of our highlights of the trip was the food. It's hard to find a bad restaurant in Singapore, the food out there is really good. Our only mishap with food in Singapore was when we ordered Szechuan chicken... we were expecting it to have a few chillis in, but it was literally just a bowl full of dozens and dozens of dried chillis, with just a few odd bits of chicken and peanuts!


The next day we went just outside the city to the zoo. Singapore zoo has a "no cages" policy... Obviously the predators like the tigers have to be segregated from the other animals, but they do it using natural barriers like fast-flowing rivers and stuff. Things like the monkeys and orangutans have their areas where they are encouraged to stay, and have shelter and food there, but they can and do leave - so you end up with massive orangutans clambering around directly over your head. Every so often you see a zoo warden escorting an animal back to a more appropriate area of the zoo after they've strayed a bit too far! The whole thing is really well done, there's lots of space, and everything is done to match the natural environment. It was probably the best done zoo I've seen.






After that we stayed on the animal theme and went on a night-safari nearby. As well as lots of nocturnal stuff, they had quite a lot of "normal" zoo animals, but you got to see them being a bit more active at night, rather than just lounging around during the heat of the day. Once again, it poured with rain, and Craig got to wander around in a big neon-green rain poncho thingy, which as it was dark, meant he could do quite a convincing impression of the dementors from Harry Potter! :o)




Next we spent some time in the very centre of Singapore, and went and did the Singapore flyer the next morning. It's basically just like the London Eye, but bigger! It didn't seem very popular though, so we had an entire pod to ourselves. We got some nice views out across the city, also out across the harbour to sea - it's amazing how many freight ships still pass by there. They appear to have a floating football pitch too in the middle of one of the harbour bits! Went and walked across the double-helix bridge after that, then wandered around the colonial district, including the cathedral and the old Armenian church.


Then it was back to the hotel to smarten ourselves up ready for afternoon tea at Raffles! As well as the usual sandwiches, scones and cakes they also had oriental stuff like Dim Sum, and we eat far too much! After that, we went to the "Long Bar" at Raffles, which is where the Singapore Sling was invented. So obviously we had one - at £15 each! The tradition is that you eat peanuts and throw the shells on the floor, so the whole floor is just absolutely covered in shells. It's about the only place in Singapore where you can throw something on the floor and not be fined!




Afterwards we went back down to the harbour area to see it all at night, including the Mer-lion statue that is the symbol of Singapore. Everything was all lit up and very pretty. Then it was off for some late-night shopping - in Singapore every other building is a giant shopping mall!


Our final day was spent largely in Chinatown, which was very busy, with loads of markets and street hawkers. We went to a temple where they claim to have one of the Buddha's teeth, and also the world's largest prayer wheel. Then on to yet more temples - a Hindu one and a Chinese taoist one, which was really busy with worhippers.

Finally we went on to the National Museum, which was really hi-tec, but a bit disappointing - there wasn't really that much in it! They did however have an exhibition on Pompeii!