singapore - bangkok
14. - 15.04.2017
Friday, April 14th 2017 - Singapore
Today´s agenda was a sightseeing tour through Singapore:
We started our tour with the bus which waited in front of the hotel.
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Our route through Singapore |
In the beginning, we drove through the Bas Bash Road which is in the museums and downtown quarter. Our first stop was close to the opulent Marina Bay Sands resort complex.
From there, we had a perfect view over the Marina Bay Sands. The observation deck “Sands SkyPark” and the world's largest rooftop infinity pool are located on the ship at the top of the hotel, which means 57 levels above the heart of the city. Only guests are allowed to use the infinity pool, but anyone can visit the observation deck. From our location, we were able to see the innovative double helix bridge, the port, the Gardens by the Bay and the impressive skyline. While up there on the top of the city, guests can grab a snack or coffee at the rooftop restaurant. Frankly speaking, this building was one of the most beautiful buildings that I have ever seen in my life!
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Marina Bay Sands |
After we took ‘thousands’ of pictures in front of the building, we moved along the Jubilee Bridge to the Merlion Park which is located at the One Fullerton, near the Ventral Business District (CBD). Merlion which comes from Mermaid and Lion, is one of the city’s symbols.
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As you can see it's very popular to take pictures in front of the mermaid-lion |
Afterwards, our tour guide took us to China Town, where we visited the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum.
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Bernhard, our tour guide tells us the difference between the male and female lion |
When everybody had taken lots of pictures of the beautiful venue China Town, we drove to Mount Faber Park. From the top, we had an amazing panorama over the city and the old harbor.
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Beautiful view of the harbor |
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Another view from the Moint Faber Park |
On our way back to the hotel, we passed behind the Marina Bay Sands via Sheares Avenue and had a totally different view of the city. Furthermore, we could see the Singapore Flyer a Ferris wheel to our right handside. Along the famous Beach Road we made a short detour through the Arabic quarter, where we saw Singapore’s biggest mosque - the Sulton Mosque. Beach Road is one of the early roads developed in Singapore and which was actually a coastal road along the sea in the early decades of the British colonial city. After this, we drove directly back to our hotel, where the tour finished.
For the afternoon, we planned to go to the zoo and then visit the night safari. But first we had to grab some food and went to our trusted restaurant where we got delicious noodles for little money.
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A dish with noodles, vegetables and minced meat |
Unfortunately, there was a thunderstorm and we decided to skip the normal zoo and only do the night safari.
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Here you can see the heavy rain |
When it finally stopped raining, we got ready in the hotel and took a taxi to the zoo.
For the night safari there are four admission time slots available: 7:15pm, 8:15pm, 9:15pm and 10:15pm. 7:15 and 8:15 were already sold out, so we bought tickets for 9:15. The admission fee was $ 45 and if you flew with Singapore airlines you got 10% discount. Unfortunately, you do not get this information at each cash office ... therefore, only two of us were lucky.
To reduce waiting time, we watched the night safari fire show at 20:30 in the entrance courtyard.
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The queue was veeeery looong |
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Fire show in front of the entrance |
Finally, when it was our turn we first visited the Creatures of the Night Show. This 20-minute animal show brought together a collection of nocturnal animals that showed natural and unique behaviors and skills.
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The sea otter shows the people how to recycle |
Then we went on a guided tram tour. This exciting 40-minute expedition was a delightful way to travel deep into the domain of the animals and six geographical zones. Afterwards, we explored the four different walking trails: Fishing Cat Trail, Leopards Trail, East Lodge Trail and Wallaby Trail. In the deep corners of the Leopard Trail, we found two walk-through habitats housing some very interesting high-flyers of the night. Within the Mangrove Walk, we were in the flight path of the Malayan flying foxes. Just as we wanted to visit the giant flying squirrel habitat, we were unfortunately slowly driven to the exit.
Even if the animals were close to what you see in almost any other zoo, it was a great experience. Walking in the dark on the narrow paths, created a completely different atmosphere. Although it would have been definitely worth pre-ordering the tickets and saving on waiting time. The enclosures were sufficiently illuminated, so that we could see the animals well. But it was too dark to take good pictures.
Singapore is without any doubt the most developed, urbanized city in Asia, if not in the world. We stayed 3 days, which appeared to be not enough to fully discover this unique city-country!
Saturday, April 15th 2017 - Bangkok
We had to leave very early on 15th April, actually at 10 am we were already at the airport. All of us checked in for our flight, and we had some time (and some Singaporean Dollars) to spend there.
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Albert and Moises are ready to explore Bangkok |
I must admit that I agree with our travel-guide, it´s one of the best airports I’ve been to; after a quick search in Google, we saw that the Singapore Changi has 4,6 Stars, a very remarkable rangking. The Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok has less, only 4,2 stars, but it has also a good assortment of shops.
Just before the arrival at our hotel, Rembrandt Bangkok, Prof. Dr. Schellhase had warned us that today was the second day of the สงกรานต์ “Songkran”, the New Year in Thailand. Upon our arrival at the hotel, they gave us a glass of fruit-cocktail as a welcome gift.
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It's great to start the afternoon with a
delicious fruit-cocktail. |
In this day, it’s very typical to pour water on Buddha statues as a ritual of purification from sins and bad luck. Tourists and inhabitants of Bangkok stood on the streets to throw water on people passing by. After throwing water they threw some kind of talcum powder.
I knew fine well, that there were some people waiting at the door of the hotel to get us wet. But as it’s said, “Been there, done that!”, I went to them and let them splash me with water. I took my GoPro and took some videos. They were indeed very nice, after pouring water on me, they gave me a glass of whisky and a bowl in order to wet the other people.
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Later, we headed to Terminal 21, a mall close to our hotel in order to have dinner. There were many food options (Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Mexican…). Each floor was dedicated to a famous city in the world, but we decided to eat in a Thai restaurant. Of course almost every single dish was spicy, but we managed to find some choices that Europeans could eat without burning their tongue. In my case I ordered a “Chicken in Lemon sauce” that was quite tasty.
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People enjoy Songkran everywhere - even in the mall you could see people with their waterguns |
After eating, we went to Soi Cowboy, a very popular street in Bangkok, which is full of bars and night clubs, visited by tourists and local people.
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Soi Cowboy looking like our Reeperbahn in Hamburg |
As we mentioned before, they were celebrating the water festival, but something caught my eye, there was a drunken man spraying a hose in all directions, close to the high voltage cables (in Bangkok they are only meters above the street)… I suppose safety regulations are not the same in each country.
In the evening, we met at our hotel’s rooftop bar to have some Thai Chang beer while enjoying the stunning view.
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Bangkok at night – view from our rooftop bar |
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Relaxing at the rooftop bar with some Thai Chang beer |
