World Cruise: Singapore

Singapore island is located 85 miles north of the equator and has a population of about 5.4 million people, most of whom live in Singapore City. The City-State Republic of Singapore is made up of over 50 islands and islets, but the main tear drop shaped island is about the size of Martha's Vineyard in the U.S. Singapore City is crowded, but is still a "spic-and-span" garden city and is the financial center for all of southeast Asia.

As we arrived on Saturday, March 29th (Friday, March 28th, Florida time), the first tall buildings that came into view were glimmering in the sunlight. The air was clear, the water was clean and the port area was orderly. We could immediately tell that this City was different from the other southeast Asia stops. Also, on the way into port we passed lots of giant container ships and barges loaded to full capacity anchored off the bay waiting their turn to come into the industrial side of the port. There is a tremendous amount of commerce going on here to fuel this island's booming economy.

After doing our research we decided to spend the day on our own exploring the City. Armed with street maps, we headed to the train station known as SMRT (Singapore Mass Rapid Transit) and bought all day passes so we could hop on and off the train to get around town. Our first stop was Chinatown where we spent some time looking around and shopping for souvenirs. Unlike any other market district we have been to in southeast Asia, all the streets were clean and the vendors kept their inventory orderly inside their street stalls. We were impressed by the beautiful Chinese baroque buildings. It was a pleasure to shop for bargains in this historic area.

Next, we took the train to famous Orchard Road to walk along the street of tall buildings and high end stores. It was very busy with Saturday shoppers and tourists, but orderly and clean.

We walked to the Singapore National Museum which is housed in a beautiful colonial building. We spent about an hour and a half in the Museum enjoying the history exhibits (and the air conditioning). It was a great museum, but we could only spend a short time there.

From the Museum, we walked to the famous Raffles Hotel where we were on a mission to fulfill one of our bucket list items - drink a Singapore Sling at The Long Bar in Raffles. Famous writers including Rudyard Kipling, Somerset Maugham and Joseph Conrad drank Singapore Slings at The Long Bar so we just had to do it, too. The vintage colonial hotel opened in 1887 and is named after a British colonialist who had the foresight in the early 1800's to recognize Singapore Island's strategic location and potential as a thriving port and trade location for Asia. Anyway, enough about history and on to The Long Bar. We walked around the hotel and took a few pictures including Brian's picture with the doorman (see below), then proceeded to the second floor to The Long Bar. We ordered an original Singapore Sling each and a basket of french fries and enjoyed our refreshments like all the other tourists in the bar. Our bar bill totaled a whopping $77.00!!!! It was definitely worth the money to have that experience at the home of the original Singapore Sling invented in 1915.

From Raffles, we took the train to another cool area of the island called Marina Bay. The Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Casino is a huge hotel consisting of 3 spectacular towers rising about 600 feet into the air topped by a platform representing a surfboard which can hold up to 3,900 people. The tip of the surfboard extends out about 200 feet in the air. It is an incredible site to see. Unfortunately, we ran out of time and could not go up to the top for the panoramic view, but enjoyed the chance to see the massive complex of the hotel, casino, shopping mall and entertainment district before we had to take the train back to our ship.

It was an extremely fast paced day of sightseeing for us. We only scratched the surface. One day in Singapore is just not enough. Hopefully, we can come back here some day and spend more time exploring this exciting city.

We returned to the ship for a sail away deck party. There was a big turnover of passengers in Singapore so there are a lot of new people to meet. The ship is full. Everyday is so exciting for us, we can't believe how much fun we're having and all of our fellow "Worldies" feel the same way; no one complains of being travel weary.