Saturday, March 24, 2012

Melaka




Our trip from Singapore to Melaka took around 5 hours. We left Singapore via S&S International Express. Since we are only staying overnight, we booked our tickets round trip which cost us $47 SG. We left at 9AM and we arrived in Melaka at 2PM. From there, we rode the taxi to our lodging which is a guest house named D'Laksamana. It's a three bedroom house complete with kitchen facilities and recreation area. If ever you plan to go to Melaka, I would recommend D'Laksamana for your lodging. Its location is a walking distance to everything that you need to see in Melaka. It's near to the World Heritage site where you can see old buildings like St. Paul's Hill or A Famosa. It was a Fort built by the Portuguese which ruled in Melaka from 1511 - 1641.
The Dutch took over in 17th Century. There are also a few old churches, the Dutch graveyard where you can still see the old tombstone dating back to fifteen hundreds. One famous streets in Melaka is the Jonker Walk. It comes alive at night every weekend. When we came back from our World Heritage Tour, we were surprised to see the activity at Jonker Walk. When we took our walk in the afternoon, it was still quiet. We had so much fun trying local delicacies and enjoying the music and just observing the other tourists having fun as well. We hardly slept at all. We tried to make the most out of this historically beautiful place because our bus will leave at 8AM the next day. We wished we had more time to explore the place more. But we did not regret going to Melaka as it was a different experience seeing all these beautiful old building









Friday, March 23, 2012

Universal Studios Singapore





Universal Studios is not only for kids. When my friends and I visited Singapore, we allocated one day to be spent in that place. I'm glad we went on a weekday. Aside from it's much cheaper having to pay only $68 SG as compared to $85 SG if on weekends, the longest time we've waited on queue was only about thirty minutes. We were able to enjoy around 90% of the rides and sites. What is lacking on weekdays is that there are no fireworks during closing as compared to weekends where there are fireworks display. Nevertheless, our group truly enjoyed the place and most importantly, we all bonded.


When I set foot on Universal Studios, I felt like a kid again. I was so excited. We tried almost every ride. The ride that I most enjoyed was the Transformers The Ride 3D. It was a roller coaster but we had 3D glasses on. We were freedom fighters and Optimus Prime was there. It was the best ride for me. We were all shouting and raising our arms. We truly felt like we were actually there. It was amazing.


There is one ride that I did not dare try. It was
the Battlestar Galatcitca: Human vs Cyclone. Only three of us dared to try it. They said that they screamed like girls during the ride and that they would not go again. At least they were brave enough to try it out. In this ride, your feet will be hanging if you ride the blue roller coaster. The blue roller coaster is the Cyclone. My friends were lucky they queued in BattleStar because their feet would not be hanging. Even if their feet was not hanging free, it was still scary but thrilling according to them. They were proud they had the guts. The three of us just stayed behind and watched their things.

There were really a lot of rides that I enjoyed. I would mention the Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure. Just be prepared to get wet. We were soaked wet after the ride but it didn't matter. I would just like to mention that Universal Studios are really clever in their business. Since we know that this ride will get us wet, they have provided a locker for a fee. Locker prices depends on the size. We paid $4 SG four our locker and we really tried to squeeze all our stuff in just one locker. Then, they sell raincoats which costs $3 SG. We
did not buy for ourselves thinking that we would easily dry. When we got out after the ride and we were soaked, we saw a drying machine which costs $5 SG for 5 minutes. If only our clothes were wet, we could have dealt with it. The only problem was that our shoes were wet as well. I guess you have an idea what it feels like walking on wet shoes. So we had no choice and we rented the drier. I guess that's how it is. Fun sometimes takes some spending on our part. It was a small price to pay for all the fun that we had. This clearly shows that age is only a number. I truly felt like a kid ready to explore everything when I was there. Well, at least almost everything:)

My next post will be our trip to Melaka, Malaysia the next day. Till then:)

Thursday, March 22, 2012

Singapore


I love to travel. Once again, I have been blessed to travel back to Singapore with friends really close to my heart. And the best thing was that my husband was with me. Yes, it was supposed to be our honeymoon and we were supposed to be alone yet somehow, I felt that it was just right that we had our friends with us. At first, I was a bit worried because we had our church friends, my friend since elementary and my husband's friend since high school. I did not really know if they would click. When we all met at the airport, everyone was reserved and sort of feeling the the rest of the group's personality. My hubby and I stood as their parents. We prepared food for them and sort of guided them on what to expect during travel and when passing to immigration. When we got to Singapore, we were met by my sister in law and her fiance and took us straight to our hostel. We stayed at Bunc Hostel in Little India. It's a new hostel and I was impressed by their cleanliness and I loved the design. I have posted some pictures of the hostel. I was not able to get pictures of our room because I guess we were always tired when we came back. During the duration of our trip, we only had about 3 hours of sleep. We just had so much fun. I am really thankful that the group bonded and we are now planning to save up for our next out of the country trip next year. The group actually started bonding the following day after we arrived. We went to Universal Studios and it was where all the fun and the bonding began. My next few blogs will be about our adventures during the trip. I will post more pictures:) If ever you are in Singapore, I really suggest Bunc Hostel. They have a facebook account. Check them out.