This winter break, we thought of taking our kids to Singapore. This was not our first time but we were still quite enthuse about the trip as it was the first time for my mom & our 3 nieces to Singapore. So, we were a group of 8 (5 Adults & 3 kids), travelling to Singapore. The challenge was to create an itinerary that could accommodate a 58 year old & 6 years old too. Not only this, the last time we visited, the trip was packaged deal & was quite hectic. It hardly felt like a holiday. So, this time, we planned to spread the trip over 8 days that could leave us with free evenings or mornings for leisure strolling & to soak in the vibes of the place.
Our rough itinerary was as follows:
Day 1 ( 28th Dec): Had an early morning flight from Delhi & reached close to 6:30 pm (Singapore time). We booked Singapore Airlines as trust me, we were not at all disappointed. Since we hardly had any strength left & never wanted to be extra adventurous, we went to China Town for a quick stroll & Dinner.
Day 2 (29th Dec): Rise & shine! After a full night rest, it was time to stretch our limits & we went & booked ourselves for Singapore Zoo, River Safari & Night Safari. I know it sounds crazy but it was totally worth every penny spend because there was logistic cost & time involved if we kept one of the three for some other day or even planned to visit the hotel for few hours of rest. The parks kept all of us well entertained. It gave the young ones reasons to smile & be excited while the adult kids (24 & 21) had good opportunity to get themselves clicked as much as they wanted. 😉 My mum on the other side, sat by the little pond & enjoying sipping Hot coffee while we had a spare hour to wait before Night safari was set to welcome us.
Day 3 (30th Dec): We booked ourselves for Cable Car Rides to Santosa Island. The plan was to chill by the beach (Silosa). So, we left the hotel around 9 & were at Silosa Beach by 10:30 or 11:00. There was no crowd & we had the beach to ourselves for few of hours. We picked picnic tit bits from 7-11 & were sorted with food & drinks at beach. We all had a much needed break & it was time to move forward with the day. Post noon, we all headed to S.E.A Aquarium. The reason behind planning to visit SEA was to avoid clubbing it with Universal Studios (mistake we did during our last visit) & thoroughly enjoy it. So, after grabbing a meal at Chillis, we headed to S.E.A. It was good, everyone enjoyed it & we were back to our hotel by 9 pm. Later, we visited Mustaffa as our soul was carving for some desi food. The evening was all about couple of beers, Indo Chinese Food, some tadka dal & garam garam butter naans.
Day 4 (31st Dec): Being the last day of year & exhausted from all the touristy things done over the last few days, we were looking for a relaxed day. Going far was no choice because few roads were scheduled to close & due to our past experiences, we never wanted to be stranded with kids & granny. So, the choice of the day was mall hopping. Vivo City was our choice for the day. We did lots of shopping & the day got over with the blink of an eye. With tired body & happy hearts, we headed back to the hotel by 4 PM. In evening, we went to Bugis City Center Mall, which was at a walking distance from our Hotel. After a quick dinner, others called it a night while my better half, myself & my eldest niece planned to visit Marina Bay to watch Firework as we welcomed New Year. Mum pitched in to do baby sitting while we took the ride via MRT to Marina Bay. It was overall an amazing display of fireworks.
Day 5 (Happy New Year): We started our day with the visit to Jurong Bird Park & later to China Town & Bugis Street Market.
Day 6 (2nd Jan): It was the day dedicated to Universal Studios. The entire day was about Crazy Roller Coasters, Games & Candies.
Day 7 (3rd Jan): We gave ourselves a little break in the first half & around evening went to Gardens By the Bay. It was beautiful with all the lights around.
Day 8(4th Jan): It was our last day wherein we covered Singapore Flyer & Merlion Park. Post this, we went to Clarke Quay for a relaxed lunch. We also managed to visit Orchard Rd Malls & Bugis City Center Mall to finish off the last bits of shopping.
