After an extremely early morning wake-up call at 1:45 am, I packed and got ready to leave Cairns. By the time I was ready to leave, the Uber price was higher than normal due to demand as all the clubs were closing at that time. As I waited for the price to go down on the stairs in the hostel I was greeted by lots of late night revellers wishing me a good night to which I replied that for me, this was the morning!
I eventually got to Cairns airport at about 3 o’clock in the morning only to find it completely empty, not even anyone cleaning or a security guard around. It was apocalyptic in style and it felt very weird. I had to wait around for over an hour before the check-in desk opened so I could have had 25% more sleep but I’d rather that than have another Detroit situation!
I was flying with Qantas and was very pleasantly surprised by the quality of their service even though this would’ve been the cheapest flight at the time of booking. One issue though, they didn’t load my vegetarian meal onto the plane but they made up for this by giving me a business class meal instead and plying me with lots of snacks while I had to wait for it.
In the hostel and 12 hours of sleep later, I got up and showered but it was near impossible to dry off because it was extraordinarily humid. After sorting out a new SIM card, I went to the Gardens by the Bay with the Super Tree Grove wandered around, catching up on some of my daily podcasts that I hadn’t listened to in a while. I eventually found my way to the sky park, as seen in the BBC series “Race Across the World”, which was the inspiration behind a lot of this trip (anyone want to sign up for season 2 or 3 with me?!). For lunch, I had the first of many hawker centre street food meals and found a vegetarian pay it forward booth. I had a very delicious stew type of thing although I don’t really know what it was and donated some money to the charity they were collecting for that day.
My second day I went to the botanical Gardens via Little India and another Hawker Centre for lunch. I had a prata with cheese and onion (a fried pancake of sorts) and my first green coconut which required a machete to open. The coconut water was really cool and refreshing but the flesh was still a little squishy and not quite as flavoursome as the water.
The Botanical and the Orchid Gardens were amazing, filled with brightly coloured flowers and other tropical plants. After my wanderings around the gardens, I had to stand in the shop for a long time to cool down.
Next on the list of things to see was the Haw Par Villa which is distinctly odd. It’s a villa filled with life-sized (and sometimes bigger) statues and depictions of Chinese folklore. However, by this point, after lots of walking around outside in very hot and humid conditions compared to what I’m used to, I called it a day as I was feel very heat exhausted.
On my final day in Singapore I got a “DuckTour” which I was told was excellent from a photo-taking point of view, even if the tour guide isn’t fabulous. From the boat you can get some magnificent photos of the surroundings without the way being blocked with other tourists.
After getting an amazing stir-fry veg meal for lunch, I then finally made it (on land) to the Merlion. However, there was no wind, only seriously high percentage humidity and heat that even my phone kept freezing from overheating. So once again, I had to seek shelter in the shop for the AC and for my phone to recover from the heat as well! When my phone and myself had recovered, I got some photos of the baby Merlion just behind the big “Mama Mer” before heading back to the hostel to freshen up a little before heading out in the evening for some light/laser shows.
The light and sound show at the Gardens by the Bay was great in a really cheesy way! As that one finished, I headed over to the Marina Bay light show this was much more impressive light show with lasers shining through fountains of water. However, I missed the first half as I was only just leaving the first location as the next show started at another location about 7/8 minute walk away.
On the way back to the hostel, I was so energised by the evening’s activities and I had had such a great evening that I was almost skipping down the road! This was an amazing stop on my trip and I’m very glad I’m coming back to Singapore in order to fly home as I’d love to go to the light shows again as well as head over to Sentosa island which I didn’t manage to fit in this time.
