The Singapore Stopover

This is a retrospective post since the events all occurred well before I was blogging :) It was written on 24 April 2008.

We spent a total of 3 full days in Singapore, before and after our Thailand tour. During this time we really made the most of our visit! And we just happened to be visiting while they were celebrating their 40 years of independence. 

05Aug05: The Singapore Zoo
The Singapore Zoo is absolutely amazing ... and I do love zoos in general. It is absolutely huge with the most fantastic signage!We saw (I'm going on my photo's here, so there was probably more!) Elephants, pygmy Hippos underwater (they have a very clever tank!), Tigers, all sorts of Apes & Monkeys, Polar Bears (my favourite from this zoo), Lemurs, Sloths, Bats and plenty of birds! It is so worth the visit. 

05Aug05: The Raffles Hotel
Naturally we had to go and have the obligatory Singapore Sling at the legendary Raffles Hotel with their nut-shell covered floor! 

18Aug05: Sim Lim Square
And we also had to check out the largest Electronics Mall we'd probably ever see! Sim Lim Square is like nothing we've ever seen at home and we walked out with plenty of gadgetry :) 

18Aug05: Night Safari
The Night Safari is honestly one of the most amazing experiences I had in Singapore. I was naturally skeptical and not entirely sure just how many animals we'd get to see in the dark (or even that there were enough nocturnal animals to warrant an entire safari experience!). It was unbelievable. It's like not being in the dark at all, the whole place is lit, but at such a low lumen, the animals still think it's night and you can see them quite clearly. If you are going to visit any of Singapore's many animal attractions, this should top the list!

19Aug05: Jurong Bird Park
The Jurong Bird Park was far more interesting than it sounds and we had plenty of opportunity to see the birds up close as we hand fed them (yes, that's my hand in the pic). There are bird with the most fantastic colours and some of the hugest bird cages I could imagine (like the Lory Loft)! 

19Aug05: Sentosa Island
Sentosa Island is probably one of the most famous places to visit in Singapore. We took the cable car across to the island and enjoyed the birds-eye view of Singapore.

We climbed to the top of their huge Merlion statue and went to the Southern Most Point of Continental Asia. We saw their famous pink dolphins (fascinating!) and went to the Underwater World oceanarium. We also went up the Carlsberg Sky Tower. 

20Aug05: Bum Boat Tour
We even "cruised" around Singapore's waterways on a traditional Bum-Boat! Quite a nice, different way to get a view of the city. 

20Aug05: Orchard Road
Naturally we also wandered around Orchard Road and did a little shopping before we headed home :)