Sightseeing in Singapore on a stop over

Previous page - Heading to Singapore

 

We head off for a quick bit of sightseeing

After a claustrophobic and restless night we crawled out of bed wanting to make the most of our few hours in Singapore.  We walked out of the backpackers to find it had been raining. It was incredibly humid. We wandered down to Clark Quay searching for somewhere open to buy food.  We found a Subway but didn’t feel like anything stodgy so we each bought a take-away salad and wandered outdoors to eat on the water’s edge.

 

The Buddhist monk wants our money

We were accosted by a Buddhist monk wanting us to give him some money for some beads.  We really didn’t want beads but he was quite persistent so we gave him $10. He was horrified – apparently $30 what he was after! We took our $10 back and shoved his beads back in his hands.

 

Hippo boat tours

Across the water we could see there were boat rides so we investigated. They were called Hippo boat rides and for half an hour we could be taken along the water and be shown some of Singapore’s highlights. The cost was $15 SGD each. It was a lovely relaxing half hour.  We saw the Merlion and also a beautiful colourful building with 911 windows. This building was once a police building. We were shown a 73 storey building and were told how a man from Frankfurt can run up it in 6 minutes and 20 seconds! There were lots of other buildings and statues of interest.

 

 

Check-out time at Rucksack Inn

It was mid morning and we knew we had to pack up our gear and vacate our room at the backpackers so we headed back there and checked out.  They kindly let us store our luggage there for a couple more hours until we were ready to head back to Singapore airport.

 

 

Singapore Flyer

Each of us was keen to go for a ride on the Singapore Flyer which is the equivalent of the London Eye. We thought we would go there first and then afterwards find our way over to the building with “the boat on top of the hotel” which is really called Marina Bay Sands.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It had fascinated us since we first arrived and we felt it wasn’t far from the Singapore Flyer.  We figured that by the time we had done both these attractions there would be time for a late lunch and then a visit back to the hostel to get our gear before heading out to the airport for the next leg of the journey.

 

Taxi ride to the Singapore Flyer

A quick taxi ride costing us only $5.20 SGD and we were at the front of the Singapore flyer. It cost us $29.50 SGD for each ticket and shortly after paying we were ready to hop on board. Our cabin had only a total of 12 people in it but they can hold twice that many on a busy day!

Although the sky was hazy it was a fabulous ride and the views from 165 metres above ground can be seen here in some of our photos. Whilst up in the air we could see a road that would take us to the Marina Bay Sands and it looked to be a reasonable walking distance.

 

Next page - Singapore sightseeing continued

 

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