Marina Bay Sands Hotel

Marina Bay Sands (MBS) is the latest iconic building in Singapore that was opened only two years ago in 2010. When we arrived at the hotel, the check in counters were full of waiting people. Finally, when it's our turn at the counter, we were told that the rooms are not ready and can only check in at 5pm. To appease our disappointment (especially after a long wait in the queue), we were given the card access to the SkyPark. Still, I am not happy that we cannot have our room on time. It is such a waste of time having to queue twice for check in. The only "compensation" we got was a late check out at 2pm the next day.




I felt that the orientation of the bed is kind of odd. The bed is facing the full-length glass window, instead of the television. Wouldn't most people prefer to curl up in bed and enjoy a TV show, rather than watch the static city lights all night?



The bathroom is huge.


The view from our room wasn't fantastic because we were on the lower floors, so what we see mostly was MBS's own convention centre and shoppes.



The SkyPark on the 57th floor is a must-go spot while you are a guest at the hotel. The observatory deck is accessible to public at a price of SGD 20 per adult. Gardens by the Bay (as featured in the photo above) can be seen from one side of the observatory deck and other parts of Singapore can be viewed from the other sides of the deck. The infinity edge swimming pool is also at the SkyPark, but off limits for the public. The pool is so popular that it's always crowded, even at night. Most people just soak in the water and take a lot of photos with the city view as the background.

Mint Museum of Toys

It wasn't very easy to locate the Mint Museum of Toys because it doesn't seem to have any signage on the building, which is in the midst of a row of shophouses. Fortunately, with the invention of Google Maps app on our phones, KB and I eventually found it. This is a place where many vintage toys are collected and displayed. It's like a walk down memory lane, seeing all the toys that we used to play with when we were still kids.



In each floor of the museum, the toys of the same theme are housed in enclosed shelves like these. The backlight made it difficult to take photo of the toys. The objects tend to turn out too dark in the photo.

These vintage toy cars are valued at a few thousand dollars each.

European plastic dolls

Snake and Ladder board game that I grew up with.

Figurines depicting ancient China

KB's favourite cartoon character Mickey Mouse.

Donald Duck

Mickey Mouse clocks and watches

Betty Boop

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Snoopy

Popeye the Sailor Man

Different variations of robot toys

Star Wars characters

Astro Boy

Singapore Flyer

The tickets to the Singapore Flyer is expensive in my personal opinion. However, Groupon recently had an offer for discounted bundle tickets to the Gardens by the Bay and the Singapore Flyer. The tickets are open date, so we just have to exchange the Groupon printout at Sea Wheel Travel for the actual tickets.

Many, many, many high-rise housing estates.

The view of Gardens by the Bay.

Marina Bay Sands and the other city buildings.

View of the Marina Bay Floating Platform.

National Day Parade 2012

Somehow, my mum managed to get hold of two NDP tickets. My parents had gone to the parade before and she gave me the tickets instead. I totally regarded not bring my proper camera and all the photos below are taken with my phone.


KB and I are on our way to Marina Bay Floating Platform.


After an early dinner, we followed the crowd to the venue.



Playing with fish-eye lens, while waiting for the parade to start.


Keeping myself busy with the photo editing apps in my phone.


On our opposition side, under the ArtScience Museum, many people without tickets gathered there to catch a glimpse of the parade.




There's heart-shaped fireworks!


Happy birthday Singapore!

Amara Sanctuary Resort Sentosa

Over the weekend, we escaped to Sentosa Island and had a staycation at Amara Sanctuary Resort Sentosa. The hotel is just behind Resort World Sentosa (RWS). Although it's walking distance to RWS, the footpath (on the side of the road) is quite narrow and it's a walk uphill and downhill. It might be a better alternative to use the shuttle service. There are two shuttle buses, one goes around the island, while the other shuttles between the hotel and VivoCity. Their departure times are displayed at the reception area.


Opps... we started bouncing on the bed before I remember to take a photo.




It's nice that there are quite a few Twinings tea flavours to choose from.


Not only the red wine glasses are provided, the champagne wine glasses are included too.


The hotel placed a push-cart of kacang putih (Indian snacks), mint water and ice tea at the reception lobby.


Peacocks are often sighted at this hotel. I was told that they may "attack" their reflections on shiny cars parked in the hotel's open-air carpark.