Before going to Singapore, I also booked Singapore Flyer tickets online through the website. Because there was F1 race that weekend, apparently only those who had a pass to watch the F1 race could go up on the Singapore Flyer on Friday, Sat, and Sunday. That was why I decided to book the tickets for Thursday. I figured that hubby would be able to see some parts of the F1 race track from the Singapore Flyer cabin.
I got 10% discount by buying the tickets online (only had to print out the tickets and bring them with us and exchange them with the real tickets at the entrance). The price after discount was 29,70 SGD/person. There was also an option to dine out inside one of the cabins, but I didn't want to spend too much time there because we still had places to see/visit.
Anyway, here's the Singapore Flyer link.
It was a bit tricky to find the place because that day they had started blocking the roads in preparation for Friday's F1 race. However, that was also interesting because we could still walk across parts of the track and see what they were doing he he he he...What I loved about the Singapore Flyer experience was that the cabin was big and it has air conditioner and they didn't make us wait for many people to jam into the cabin, so we only shared the cabin with two other people. It was nice being able to walk around the cabin to see different views and take photos from different angles.
Here are some photos taken from inside the Singapore Flyer. You can see part of the race track as well as the F1 stand. Notice some chairs and table in the cabin below us? That's the dining cabin.
Notice the two domes at the far back? The taller one is the Cloud Forest Dome, whereas the shorter one is the Flower Dome. We were planning to visit that place next.
We walked across the Helix Bridge towards Marina Bay Sands. Here's a photo of the Marina Bay Sands Hotel (the one with the boat-like shape on top) and on the left you can see the Helix Bridge.
We found a lift towards Gardens by the Bay, which actually overlooked the Marina Bay Sands Hotel. Here is one photo taken from that bridge (when we were still inside the building).
Now here are some outside views from the bridge towards Gardens by the Bay. Before finding the ticket booth, we had to walk past lots and lots of different themed gardens, like the Chinese garden, the Malay garden, etc. However, we didn't really stop to take a look at them because I knew it would too much time.
In the pic below, you can see that we were walking along the outer bridge from Marina Bay Sands Hotel (the building on the left) and there's the Singapore Flyer on the far right.
We hadn't bought any tickets yet because we weren't sure how many places we wanted to visit (at first I was thinking of only visiting one of the two domes), but when we got to the ticket booth, we found out that we could buy tickets to two conservatories for 28 SGD/adult, so we chose to buy them (there wasn't a long queue at the ticket booth). First we visited the Flower Dome and then the Cloud Forest Dome. It was worth the money! I'm really impressed at how well they designed both places. But best of all, inside both of the domes was cool! After walking around in the heat, it was lovely to be able to enjoy the beauty of the plants/flowers without having to sweat ha ha ha...
Click here to find out more info on Gardens by the Bay.
Here are some photos from the Flower Dome.
Here are some photos from the Cloud Forest Dome.
We went up to the fifth floor and walk along the walkway. I felt kinda woozy when walking along on the side of the walkway because you could see what was below and it kinda wobbled if many people walked on it at the same time, so I tried sticking to the middle part because it felt more steady walking there ha ha ha...
Here's a view from the fifth floor walkway...and notice that in this photo it looks like hubby was photobombing the almost-kissing couple HA HA HA HA HA HA...
Then we went down to the third floor and went back down to go out. The photo below shows the walkway on the fifth floor above hubby.
Funny thing was that when we had finished the tour in the Flower Dome, we entered the souvenir shop (the souvenir shop is in the middle of the Flower Dome and Cloud Forest Dome exits), a girl chased me because she wanted us to buy the photo(s) that they had taken of us. When we first entered the Flower Dome, a photographer took a photo of us (just like what happened before we entered the Singapore Flyer cabin), but I managed to say to her, "Ah, we're going to visit the Cloud Forest Dome first."
The truth is, I didn't want to shell out more money to buy photos like that because I had bought some photos of us from the Singapore Flyer souvenir shop already. I chose 4 wallet photos of us (we could choose 2 different backgrounds) and it cost 30 SGD. Good thing she didn't chase us again after we got out of the Cloud Forest Dome HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA...
Before I forgot, let me just write down some tidbits about our trip to Rome.
1. R2 was planning on walking everywhere, but after the first day we realized that it would be impossible to do so while still wanting to visit as many place as possible, so we bought 3-day tourist tickets that allowed us to use the metro or buses without any limit. I bought the tickets from a newspaper stand seller. Here's a pic of our tickets:
2. Here's a pic of R2 in the metro station:
On the last day of using the metro, there was a pickpocket. We were already inside one of the metros when in one stop, a group of young women came inside followed by two teenage girls. The two teenage girls ran inside and ran as quickly outside, then I heard the young woman standing next to me scream something in Italian while grabbing for her wallet inside her bag. Her purse zipper was open, but thankfully her wallet was chained into the inside of her bag, so the teenage pickpocket couldn't get anything. In fact, while trying to get out of the metro ASAP, the end of her jacket got caught in between the doors, so the doors opened up again and she ran out along with her friend.
After that the young woman told her friends about what had just happened animatedly in Italian and even though I don't know the language, I know what she was talking about 'coz she pulled out her wallet and I noticed that there was a chain connecting the wallet with her bag (she was standing right next to me, after all). Well, glad to know that her wallet was safe! :-D
3. Indonesians would probably laugh upon seeing this photo. "Galak" chocolate bar LOL!!! Galak is an Indonesian word. It can be translated roughly into "fierce or hot-blooded" he he he he he...
4. On Tuesday April 2nd we had a plan on which places to visit, but alas we got caught up in the middle of a heavy rain which even turned into a hail at one point. We had a small umbrella with us, but it wasn't enough to cover our legs. We got wet up to our knees and our sneakers were wet, as well, so we had to go back to the hotel to dry ourselves. We tried drying out sneakers using the hotel's hairdryer LOL LOL!!! We used the time to relax and rest our feet he he he he he he...
A funny thing happened during the heavy rain/hail. We were at the side of the road and an umbrella seller came to offer us another umbrella (a bigger one). We said no a few times, but then when the hail started and R2 was afraid that the umbrella we had would have holes in it, the seller came by again to offer the big umbrella and yes, we did buy a bigger umbrella at a high price due to the situation HA HA HA HA HA HA...And of course we didn't bother bringing it back, so we just left it at the hotel (we brought back the small umbrella, though!).
After we got back to the hotel, I was laughing so much 'coz I told R2 that the umbrella seller may have been telling himself, "Ha, those two stubborn tourists disregarded my first few attempts to sell them a bigger umbrella, but after a while they finally gave up. Silly tourists!" LOL LOL!!!
Wanna know what happened after the rain? Here goes:
And this is the picture we took before the heavy rain - notice the sidewalks?
5. When we had lunch at a restaurant, we were served two slices of cake for free afterwards and I LOVED it! I didn't ask what it was, though, but I found out about it on my own when we were in a souvenir shop selling chocolate and foodstuff. This is the cake that we had and I just had to bring back a big bag of it 'coz I can't stop myself. (side note: I browsed online and found out that this Colomba cake is a traditional Easter cake).
Even though it was rather inconvenient to bring something like that 'coz I couldn't put it inside the backpack (too big) or the luggage ('coz it could get crushed), I'm SO happy to find a store that sold them at a 50% discount. In fact, all the Easter eggs and cakes were sold there at a 50% discount LOL!!!
OK, I have a test coming up (theory test) next Monday in Finnish, so I've gotta get back on reading up the materials. I wrote this post to have a break from studying he he he he he...I'll write more about our Rome trip later.
I've never really been a sports fan except for some types of sports, but I know that there are so many fanatic sports fan that would go halfway across the world just to watch their favourite team(s) play live. My brother and father particularly love watching soccer and World Cup series. I used to have a little fight with them whenever World Cup season was on air 'coz then I didn't get to watch my favourite TV series.
My hubby isn't really a fan of sports. The only thing he watches regularly is F1 series. If someday in the future I have enough money and opportunity to book us tickets to watch an F1 live, I bet he's going to be so thrilled! We shall see...maybe someday in the future I can buy him this as a birthday present, but for the time being I should just keep on saving money.
Anyhow, for those of you who love watching sport events live, you can find cheap tickets for many different events such as NCAA Mens Final Four Tickets, Jersey Boys Tickets, Kentucky Derby Tickets, Masters Tickets, New York Yankee Tickets, and many more. In this site as well you can find a LONG list of concert tickets to buy if you happen to like watching music concerts live.
