Around Town

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The Internet is much improved from Phuket. We spent an hour or so this morning checking email and so forth. The included breakfast buffet was the least appetizing of the trip so far. They did have “bacon” but it was a very unappealing gray colour. We quickly found a Starbucks.

Avery planned most of the day. We started out at the National Museum of Singapore, which has just opened after a three year renovation. It was excellent; probably one of the best museum experiences I have ever had. The exhibits are well laid out and each visitor gets a handheld multimedia device which provides supplemental information for the hundreds of exhibits. We could easily have spent the whole day. The history of Singapore, while relatively brief, was fascinating.

In the afternoon, we headed over to Sentosa Island. This is a recreation area that is quickly filling with various attractions. We took the MTR (the local subway) to a cable car system which took us over the harbour. Astrid was not thrilled by the heights, but so long as everyone stayed perfectly still, she was ok. We all rode down the Sentosa Luge - a sort of gravity driven go-cart track, then headed off to Fort Siloso. The fort guarded Singapore harbour for almost 100 years. It saw limited action in World War II just before the fall of Singapore to the Japanese in 1942. Many of the tunnels and one of the original guns remains in place. For a war buff, it was worth the side trip.

We took the obligatory walk through Underwater World, which is an aquarium facility of sorts. Its main feature is an 83 metre long acrylic tunnel under a reef tank. A moving conveyor belt transports visitors through the exhibit. We happened to arrive at feeding time, a good time to view it. Unfortunately the space was a bit tight, the ventilation a bit weak, and some of the visitors evidently were cheaping out on the deodorant. We had to come up for fresh air sooner than we would otherwise have wanted to.

We finished the day off with a show at the Fountain Gardens. Here a light show is played out on a screen of water. It was a little hokey, but it was short. Tomorrow we are back to Hong Kong.

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Photos

The Santosa Luge
Helments on before hurtling down the hill