Week One

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This is our first real Travel blog. We left Brisbane flying out at 2.35 am on Monday 25^thMarch. No one in their right mind does anything at that hour.

Our journey to Singapore was very good because the plane was almost empty and Gillian stretched out over three seats and sort of slept. We arrived at 6am.

Our hotel was the Changi Village Hotel which was as far away from the city centre as you can get, but it is close to the airport. It was the site of the infamous prison which is in the process of being demolished.

We were able to rest until 10am and then went into the city and travelled on two buses and saw almost all of the city. The most spectacular structures were the Marina Bay Hotel which has a ship on top and the Marina gardens. We went on the largest Ferris wheel in the world.

The second day we toured the entire island by bus and saw the Tiger Balm Gardens. We were particularly impressed by a statue representing the importance of looking after your mother in law before looking after your family. The visited the site of the battle at Kranji where the war memorial has 20,000 names of soldiers killed in the battle for Singapore.

We visited the chapel and museum at Changi prison.

We are now at Ed’s place in Bristol after staying a few days with my cousin Michael. It snowed on our first day here. We have toured Bristol and walked over the Clifton suspension bridge and toured the SS Great Britain. Today we went to look at Chipping Sodbury which is a town about two km away. We returned home because we could not even find a parking spot.

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