Back to Singapore

We continued our journey on the bus again to Singapore. This was a long day but an interesting one as we passed through many rubber plantations and stands of palm trees. We had to cross back into Singapore at Johor Bahru where crowds of locals were passing through immigration and customs. You get off the bus, carry your bags with you and after leaving Malaysia you do it all again to enter Singapore hoping your bus is waiting for you somewhere outside. Most of the passengers got off at Johor Bahru but a few were left to reach the end of the route, a rather dismal car park and not what you might expect in a city as modern looking as Singapore. Strangely it isn't that well located in terms of buses and the Metro but after a modest walk we found the Metro station and in were back to Sam and David's apartment.

The next to days we spent looking around the City which has many fine buildings. We were also invited to the apartment where David's secretary lived and arrived to join quite a party with a great deal of food, mainly Chinese and Indian. We were made very welcome and celebrated the end of Ramadan in style.

Downtown Singapore has many high rise buildings.

View of the Singapore River.

The Raffles Stamford hotel in the background and then old Parliament in the foreground.

We saw where the Formula 1 Grand Prix will run next September. Part of the track will run over this bridge.

The next day we went into Chinatown and just nearby was a Malaysian temple.

It was very active and outside was the normal pile of shoes, how anyone finds their own pair afterwards is a mystery.

Next stop was the famous original Raffles Hotel.

It occupies a whole city block but the hotel itself is quite small. The rest of the area is filled with very exclusive shops,and many classy restaurants. The doorman is said the be the most photographed person in Singapore.

It wasn't the best of days but a typical one where it rains very hard for a while and then clears up.

In the background you can the second Merlion, the other one is on Sentosa Island.

Water pours out of the mouth into the River at Marine Bay.

The hotel in the foreground is the Raffles Stamford and the two smaller towers in the background form the Raffles Plaza (now the Fairmont Singapore) where David is based.



Our time was nearly up and the last morning we all met up for lunch and took the standard "we were there" photographs.




Then out to the airport to catch the flight to Hong Kong and after one night in the hostel it was back to Vancouver on Oasis Hong Kong.

Terennganu

After two nights in Kota Bahru we took the bus down the coast to Terennganu, the capital city of the Province of the same name. Nothing seemed to be easy as the bus we started out in decided to quit and we transferred to another one, which managed to reach our destination. We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the city which like all Malaysian cities and towns has its Chinatown with typical shophouses.

There are a number of nearby islands with somewhat decrepit ferry boats to get you there.

The town is developing its tourist industry, the East Coast is less visited than the West Coast which has Langkawi Island and Penang as major tourist destinations. A new tourist bus service had just been introduced with a timetable that seemed to be a surprise to the drivers. However, we managed to link up with one of these rather ornate buses which took us, for free, around the city.
On its route were two handicraft workshops and at one there were demonstrations of local crafts.

We were able to watch a young lady making a beautiful batik cloth. In a relatively short time she created a wonderful batik with a flower pattern. The three pictures were taken over a period of about 20 minutes.



Two young men used stamps to create their batik.



Another man was busy making glass animals.

Kota Bahru

We had two nights in Kota Bahru, in the Province of Kelantan close to the border with Thailand. Every town has its markets and the one here was very busy with all manner of things to see and buy. There was a central food hall loaded with vegetables, fish, meat, you name it. The ladies sat amongst their offerings.







There were a number of interesting museums with exhibits reflecting the Colonial past.

To Kota Bahru

On the Monday we took the Jungle Train to Kota Bahru in North East Malaysia. Said to be one of the great train rides in the World, the train leaves from the main station in Singapore, crosses into Malaysia at Johore Bahru and then winds its way up to the furthest reaches of Malaysia on the Easy Coast. This meant and early start (0600) although nothing moved until 0630. By a quirk of history the station is actually in Malaysia, so you clear customs at the station.

The carriage was air conditioned and was quite cold. We had to get off the train at the border and board it again to signify we had left Singapore we think. Then we made continued our 15 hour journey with many stops en route. We knew that there was no provision to eat on board so we had some snacks with us although two fine gentlemen arrived with boxes of food for sale. They had no marketing skills at all and didn't seem to do very well.

A typical Malaysian station. This part of Malaysia is predominantly Muslim

All went well and we may have even been close to being on time until we had an air conditioning failure. An attempt was made to fix it by taking on lots of water but to no avail and eventually they took our first class carriage off and we moved into second class, which looked as good as the one we left behind on a siding. It was all very leisurely.

A Malaysian high street

Eventually we arrived at the station closest to Kota Bahru and haggled with a taxi driver to complete the day's journey. It was raining.

A view from the train. One of the bigger rivers that we crossed

Roaming in Singapore

On the Sunday we first visited Raffles The Plaza (now the Fairmont Singapore) to see a successful attempt to create a Singapore Guinness Book of Records entry with the largest Lasagna. Made by the chefs at the hotel is went right around the city block where the hotel is located, making it 575 metres long. It was a charity event and a large piece was available for S$ 10. We bought our piece and had it for dinner that evening.

All around the hotel

We then went to Sentosa Island just of the main island which is the place to go at the weekend. It certainly was very busy and there are lots of things to see and do. There is a nice walkway with a set of exotic sculptures, on a Gaudi theme.

One of the figures on the walk way.

We were tempted too, because it was such a hot and humid day

There are two Merlions, one in the Business District and the other on Sentosa.

The Sentosa Merlion

Part of the entertainment

Three hot visitors

On Pulau Ubin

Just off the main island is the island of Pulau Ubin. It was Saturday and David was not at work so we all took the ferry to the island. The ferries go when there are 12 people and since the island is very popular there wasn't much of a wait. The boats were pretty old but served the purpose.

Arriving at the Pulau Ubin

Ferry boats at the pier head

Ruth, David and Sam

The island has quiet beaches and is as unlike modern Singapore as you can imagine. There are mangrove swamps and old granite quarries. We walked across the island in humid heat to the other side to a pleasant beach.

A popular way for getting around

On our return to the mainland we walked on Changi beach near the airport. David had a taste of a local treat, ice cream wrapped in coloured bread.

A Day at the Singapore Zoo

The next day we went to the Singapore Zoo. There are two sections to this, the Daytime Zoo and the Night-time Safari Zoo which we went to on our previous visit to Singapore. said to e be one of the best zoos in the world, they have arranged things so that there are very few barriers in front to the animals but it is all safe enough!

The were numerous shows during the day and we started off at the Elephant Show where four elephants were out through their paces.

It rained quite a bit, not unusual for Singapore, so photographing became a bit limited.

A white tiger having a snooze

Singapore and a day at the Bird Park

Oasis Honk Kong had special deal at the time we booked. They were offering a free return flight to Singapore form Honk Kong, you just paid the taxes. So we did just that, flying with a new discount airline Jetstar owned by Qantas and provided two flight a day to Singapore. We took the morning flight that flew over Vietnam on the way. Good visibility on the way down and we arrived at the large, modern and efficient Changi Airport to by met by Sam who had come to meet us. We took the MRT (subway) to the city. David and Sam live just a short walk from the station.

On our first full day we took ourselves off the the Jurong Bird Park. Many thousands of birds of all shapes and sizes, many in large covered aviaries so that they had lots of flying freedom. there were the usual bid shows.

Herons on stage

Scarlet Ibis

In the Australian Aviary

Not sure where he came from in a bird park

A pool of flamingos

Recent trip to the Far East

We are recently back from a trip to the Far East. We left Comox and reached Hong Kong through Vancouver. After three nights there we continued to Singapore in time for David's birthday. During our stay there we took off for four nights into Malaysia using the train and buses. One night on the way home in Hong Kong and we returned to Comox. The next few pages will give you an idea of what we saw and what we did.

We used Pacific Coastal to get from Comox to Vancouver. This saves a great deal of time in getting to the airport. For the big flight we had chosen Oasis Hong Kong, a relatively new airline based in Hong Kong who runs a six days a week service to Hong Kong from Vancouver. They are still quite new and only have four Boeing 747 aircraft and the only other route they serve is Hong Kong to London Gatwick. The advantage they offer is price, they are much cheaper than Air Canada and Cathay Pacific but run an efficient service that had been well received. They have the usual two levels of service and we choose their Business class which was only a little dearer than the competition's Economy. So we had bigger seats, better meals and lounges to wait in before the flight. The very young flight attendants were very attentive and we were very satisfied with the service provided. Having a quiet lounge to stay in before the flight is a definite plus in these days of busy airports.

We left on time and arrived early.

We had two full days in Hong Kong staying at the same hostel we had used in 2005. This was small but spotless. The young owner was always more than helpful and the location in Mong Kok very convenient.

On our first day we chose to go to Lantau Island. To get there we first took the Star Ferry to Hong Kong Island and then a second fast ferry to Lantau. Lantua is home of the Po Lin monastery and the Tian Tan Buddha statue. On arriving at the pier head we took a rather hair-raising bus ride to the temple. The roads were never straight and rarely flat so it was a bit like a ride at the fairground. Much swaying around the corners all done at great speed. We survived.

To get to the Buddha you climb up a long flight of steps, so there is a good view at the top.

The Buddha is a relatively new construction and it certainly is big.

The Buddha is actually much much bigger than it looks here

Inside the temple at the Monastery

As part of the deal with paid entry is a visit a vegetarian restaurant. Not all the food available was easily recognizable but we were well fed.

We then carried on to the old fishing village of Tai O which has some very old houses on stilts.



We took a boat ride past these houses and also a bit out to sea. We didn't see dolphins but did see a whole host of flying fish, quite remarkable. There was the usual market and this was well stocked with all kinds of interesting and unusual things Plenty of fish, both live and dried.

Fishing boats in the harbour

Fish out to dry

Squid for lunch

Another exciting bus ride got us to the end of the MTR train near the airport. We had used this line before. As is always the case there is always a cheaper way to from airports to city centre. This line is almost as quick as the fancy airport train and in many ways more interesting.

Hong Kong has a most efficient transportation system. It is fully integrated and they have a pass system (Octopus) where you can buy a pass, load it with credit and use it on every form of transport that have. At the end of a visit you can cash in the card and get back a deposit and any unspent balance, and the fares are ridiculously cheap by our standards. Singapore has the same idea and now London too. It saves fiddling around for change.

That evening we met up with Yolanda, a friend of Sam who works for Nike and we had met at Sam and David's wedding. We had a pleasant meal together at a Thia restaurant. We had come to like Thia food after our previous trip.

On our second day we again took the ferry across to Hong Kong Island and then the bus to Stanley which has a famous street market where we bought a very nice linen cloth for a new round table we had recently bought. Very good value. We then travelled to Aberdeen where we took a sampan ride around the harbour with a rather old lady boatman who spoke no English. She dodged in and out of the many boats in the harbour.

Our lady boatman

Another sampan racing by

In the harbour there is a famous floating restaurant and we did a circuit around it. It was quite massive and impressive from the front but a bit tatty around the back.

The fancy front

The ugly back

All around us were the usual high rise buildings that house the people. They certainly cram a lot of people into a small space.

Fishing boats and high rise buildings

Back to the hostel to get ready for the next leg to Singapore.