Australia

We landed in Sydney in May 2003. We were quite relieved to get off the plane as we didn't have the most smoothest of flights! Our landing was delayed because of bad weather and we had to go back out to sea to circle until the runway at Sydney was reopened. The turbulence was quite bad and our seat belts did come in use! Nevertheless we landed safely in the end.

Australian customs is quite strict with what you bring in and we had our polo mints confiscated, but we were sure that we would survive without them!!

We hadn't booked any accommodation in advance and found that we hadn't needed to. Sydney airport had what I would describe as an accommodation library. There were loads of advertisements for hostels and hotels. We chose our hostel and were picked up by them.

Our plan was to explore Sydney and then buy a camper van which we would use as accommodation and to eventually get us to Cairns.

Perkins Trophy Night

Last Friday was the Perkins FC's presentation night. All the players recieved a medal with an engraving saying 'Perkins Club 06-07' as next season they are playing under their new name Reman FC.

The usual category trophies were handed out with a 'jokey' one for one player. He's nicknamed 50p head, as his headers are all over the place, so he was awarded a figurine trophy with a 50p stuck to the figurines head!

All in all it was a successful evening.

England Floods

England has been hit with the worst floods for a long time recently. Although Shrewsbury hasn't been as badly affected with the new flood defences, other parts of the country have.

Gloucestershire and Worcestershire are two of the counties that have been hit the worst. Pictures from the BBC show just how severe the flooding has been.
Residents are getting food, clean water and aid through, but when the floods have subsided, there will still be the almighty task of cleaning up ahead of them. We hope that the insurance companies are swift in paying up!

What's Next?

The next trip that will feature is Australia. I spent 2 months there, landing in Sydney and working my way up to Cairns.

Two months is not nearly long enough for such a huge country, but I did my best in the time I had there and enjoyed every second of it. Maybe I'll go back one day with Andy!

Night Safari and Farewell

One evening was spent at the Night Safari in Singapore. This was really enjoyable and a good experience to see the animals at night. A lot of animals are nocturnal anyway, so it was good to see them more active than you would do in the day.

At the safari, there are three walking routes you can take, Fishing Cat, Forest Giants & Leopard Trail, we walked them all. There are safari vehicles to take you around if you so wish and shows that you can attend.

There are lots of animals to see ranging from Elephants, Giraffes, Leopards, Wolves, Giant Anteaters, Hyena's, Rhino's, Deer, Tigers, Vultures, etc...

The Bat Mangrove Walk is an experience in itself with free flying Malaysian bats. The bats fly around you hunting for food. Its quite dark and your eyes have to adjust, so you don't see the bats straight away, so it can make you jump!!

If you visit Singapore, then we reccommend the Night Safari highly.

In my opinion, Singapore is an enjoable place with plenty of attractions to appeal to all. While we were there in April and May 2003, the weather was hot and humid with the odd downfall of rain. When I mean downfall of rain, it literally sprung on you within seconds and finished just as quickly as it started!

For food in Singapore, try the local eateries, the prices are less and the food is excellent also you get to mingle with the locals.

The Singapore trip was a really enjoyable experience, even if you only have a few days, its worth the time.

Merlion and Walk

One of Singapore's symbols is the Merlion, the legendary creature is half lion and half fish. In this case the Merlion is story teller and viewing tower. At the top of this 37m high Merlion is a fantastic 360 degree view of Sentosa Island and some of Singapore.

As you go up the tower there are animations of the legends surrounding the Merlion. In the grounds of the Merlion you can walk around the Gaudi-inspired mosaic path. All in all its a great little feature of the Sentosa Island experience.

Sentosa Island, Beaches

Underwater World

Underwater World is pretty much like most aquariums you can visit, but nevertheless, we still enjoy visiting them and Sentosa's Underwater World was of no exception.

There was plenty to see and learn about, sharks, baby sharks, turtles, stingrays, sea horses, etc...
Underwater World has a touch pool where there are harmless aquatic life to get to grips with, excuse the unintentional pun!

The main attraction is walking through a see-through tunnel and having fish swim all around you. This main pool has sharks, eels, sting rays and schools of smaller fish.

For the brave, there is even the chance to swim with sharks, we were not brave, quite happy with just looking!!

If you like this sort of thing, then its well worth a visit, but if you think you've seen one aquarium, you've seen them all, then it won't be a major miss.

Sentosa Island, Dolphin Lagoon

Sentosa Island is just off mainland Singapore connected by the causeway bridge. There are various modes of transport you can take, we took the bus.

Sentosa Island is where some Singaporeans spend their weekends. The island is full of attractions such as Dolphin Lagoon, Underwater world and The Merlion and Merlion Walk. Each attraction has admission fees, but group tickets for several attractions can be bought. There are also three beaches, Palawan Beach, Siloso Beach and Tanjong Beach.

The first attraction we visited while on the island was the Dolphin Lagoon, home of the Pink Dolphins.

The show educated you on the abilities of the dolphins and their tail-walking, which I was told is a natural capability of the dolphins. Obvious as it is, the demonstation by the dolphins was entertaining and interesting. The trainers looked liked they loved their work and their dolphins.

Raffles Hotel

We'd heard previously before departing for Singapore about the famous Raffles Hotel. The hotel was established in 1887 and is named after Sir Raffles Stamford who also founded modern Singapore City. The hotel itself is probably most famous for two instances in its history. The not so nice one is that Raffles hotel is apparantly the spot where the last wild tiger of Singapore was shot, the more pleasant instance for its fame is the cocktail drink the Singapore Sling. It is known that the Singapore Sling was invented/created in 1910 by barman Ngiam Tong Boon. Raffles has played host to many a famous and prestiged guest over its time.

The hotel itself is in colonial style and very grand looking.

We decided to visit and sample this famous cocktail in this famous hotel. The bar known as the Long Bar had loads of little sparrow type birds flying around, but to our surprise there was no bird mess!

The Singapore Sling has many recipes and I'm not sure to which is the original as used in Raffles. The recipes vary, but generally contain gin, cherry brandy, grenadine & soda.

The cocktail cost approximately £7.50. It quickly became a favourite of mine, but I didn't have too many considering the price!!

Singapore

In this picture of Singapore, you can see where old meets new.

On April 29th 2003 I flew from London to Singapore.

Our Quantas flight was (our, meaning me and my travel companion Fiona) practically deserted. Singapore had just began recovery from the SARS outbreak and I guess few travellers were still heading that way. Even though we had to remain in economy, were given the treatment of business class passengers and left the flight with a free bottle of champagne. We were also handed face masks (our choice to use them or not).

Upon entering Singapore's Changi International airport we were met with a machine to take our temperature (a procedure to prevent any more SARS outbreaks). There were still people walking around the airport with masks on.

We hadn't booked a hotel in advance, so we just made our way out and met a friendly taxi driver. We told him the price we wanted to spend on a good hotel and we negotiated our fare with him. He was true to his word and our price and took us to a lovely, but basic hotel.

On our way to the hotel the driver reccomended sites for us to visit. From the car window I could not help but to notice how clean Singapore was.

We were jet lagged! We went to bed and straight to sleep!!

Coming Soon

I'm about to start the process of transferring my travel APS films to CD. I'll be posting a few pictures on this main blog and then the rest will be in the photo albums (under the blog archive).

The first trip will be Singapore...