Wild Encounters from Borneo to Bali - 1

September 12 – 18, 2014

Singapore

Waterfall at Shangri-La

After spending a great evening in San Francisco attending “Beach Blanket Babylon” and the next day taking the “Duck Boat Tour” with Mary and Charlie (Paul’s sister and brother-in-law) we caught our flight to Singapore, via Hong Kong, just after midnight.

We went to Singapore three days ahead of our expedition cruise. That cruise would later take us from Singapore to Borneo, ending in Bali. When we arrived at the Singapore airport, a driver met us and took us to the Shangri-La Hotel. The weather was hot and humid, as we knew it would be. The hotel was lovely, and we spent day one just recovering from the long flights and jet lag.

Outside Raffles Hotel

The next day we decided to take the “Hop-on Hop-off” bus tour of the city. The first place we got off was in front of Raffles Hotel, established in 1887 by two Armenian brothers and named after Stamford Raffles who established modern Singapore. We walked around much of the hotel complex but never discovered the main lobby, which we understand was luxurious.

Singapore Flyer

From the hotel Paul decided to walk on to see the famous Singapore Flyer, which is a giant Ferris wheel. We could see it easily but getting there was difficult because the main streets were blocked with traffic barriers.  Singapore was busy getting ready for the Formula-One race held that weekend. The Flyer stands 541 feet high and contains 28 pods, each holding 28 people. It takes about 30 minutes to make one revolution. By the time we got there we decided not to take the ride. The sky was so smoky and hazy the view was not good. Instead we walked to the next spot to “Hop-on” to the bus and continued our tour of the city aboard the double-decker bus. The tour was narrated. We sat on the top deck and by then it was very nice to just sit.

 

Singapore is a lovely large city that is immaculately clean, and everything is very orderly. We found our way back to the hotel area, stopped for some lunch, and went back to rest before going back out for dinner at the local Hard Rock Cafe.

Singapore Zoo

The second day we spent the morning visiting the famous Singapore Zoo. It was nicely laid out in the rain forest, but in the end, it was a zoo. We both decided we prefer to see animals in their native habitat. We did have our picture taken with the resident Orangutans, however.

On the third day Lindblad staff members, including our photographer friends, Jack and Rikki Swenson, met us. Before taking us to board the ship they gave us a city tour. It included the Orchid section of the Botanical Gardens and a Bum Boat ride on the Singapore River.

By 4:00 we had cleared immigration and were checked in to board the National Geographic Orion, which was our home for the next eleven days.

That's it for now. Grace and Paul