Singapore Day 7

Singapore Day 7

A day a sea, which means trivia contests, working on the applique I brought a little, and generally doing nothing much.

Deb Roberts, our tour agent, gave us a bottle of wine as a gift. Since tonight was a formal night, Tanis and I decided to eat at the Sterling Steak House and use the bottle of wine. All of the dining rooms on the ship are included in the price except the Sterling, The Crab Shack, and Sabatini's, and Italian place. So, for $25 you get a very nice steak, wonderful sides, and a great meal for a price you could not begin to match in the States or Canada.

On to Jakarta tomorrow...new for the Princess, too, as apparently the ship has never been to Jakarta, so we are kind of a test run.

Singapore Day 6

Tanis and I decided to take a bus tour of Singapore to orient ourselves (a complete map might help, too). We boarded the bus at the Marina Bay Cruise Terminal, one of two cruise terminals in Singapore. This was just opened last year, and is built on reclaimed land. Singapore is very crowded, so making new land was a priority. This a full kilometer from the former shoreline, and is rapidly being filled up with buildings. There is actually no more room to expand further south, as Indonesia is very close and some of the small islands that Singapore uses for manufacturing and oil refining are “in the way”.

Our first stop on the tour was Mt. Faber for the view. Since many many of the towers in Singapore are higher than Mt. Faber, it was definitely a cityscape view. Virtually all Singaporeans live in government apartments (which they buy) or condominiums (privately funded apartments, also owned) as the land is so dear. From there is was on the the Botanical Gardens.

Tanis (R), orchids (L)  ;-)

At the Botanical Gardens we visited the National Orchid Garden, the world's largest collection of orchids...and what a collection it is! I knew that the orchid family was diverse, but I never realized that it is the largest plant family. We saw orchids no wider than a pencil to ones that were bigger than our hands, and in colors ranging from grey to the more normal yellows, maroon, purple, green and white. Truly worth the visit.

From there we drove east on Orchard Street, Singapore's top shopping street, to Chinatown. Chinatown is no longer residential, but all commercial. We stopped here and walked down the street, just looking. While there we saw the Sri Mariamman Temple, built in the south Indian style, with lots of statues of people and animals on the outside, but did not go inside. Since your skin is permanently moisturized here (lots of humidity, with an 83 deg temperature) we decided to go back to the ship for lunch.

Lots of people finished the cruise here, to be replaced with a totally new bunch. This will be us in ten days. Off to a day at sea tomorrow, then Jakarta.

Singapore Day 5

At sea today heading back to Singapore. Didn't really do much today...wish this were a quilting cruise. If it were we would have had classes and have had a directed activity to attend. Both Tanis and I needed a day at sea to recover from two very busy days in a row ashore.

It turns out that this cruise is actually divided into two parts: the five days where we have been to Thailand, and then ten days where we go to Indonesia. Most of the passengers are ending their cruise tomorrow, with only about 600 of us remaining. Chaos tomorrow as about 1500 passengers leave and 1500 more come on the ship. Tanis and I are going on a bus tour of the city in the morning and so will escape most of the mess.

Singapore Day 4

Nora Resort view

Great day today, but not without its fraught moments. Tanis had gone back to the room to get her pills, and left her ship's card there. Without the ship's card you cannot get on or off the ship. She discovered this as we were going to board the tender to be ferried ashore. I went ahead and she went back to explain. Tanis never caught up with the bus (which was actually ferried to Ko Samui for the tour, as buses are not allowed on the island), so I was feeling especially bad on the 45 minute trip to our cooking class site. When we got there, Tanis was already there, as she had come by private van! All is good.

Ready to cook!!

The cooking class was held at the Nora Shore Resort & Spa. Well done, as we made pork and crab stuffed crab, and pad Thai. Both were fun and easy to make, guess I have to treat the family to homemade pad thai now. No dried shrimp in the pad thai, thank you, but we did have dried turnip which I thought was yummy, but Tanis was not too sure about.

After eating what we cooked, with additional chicken with coconut milk soup, and fresh fruit for dessert, we went swimming in the hotel's pool, and generally lazed around until the bus ride back, then back on the ship again. Day at sea tomorrow, then Singapore the day after.

Stuffed crab shell ingredients

Yummy stuffed crab, by me

Pad thai ingredients, pt 1

Pad thai ingredients, pt 2

Tanis' pad Thai

My pad Thai

Singapore Day 3

Sunrise in Thailand

Woke this morning feeling like I was over my jet lag. Watched a beautiful sunrise while having breakfast in the room. Then off to the Wheelhouse Bar to catch our tour to Bangkok.

Turns out that Bangkok is 2 hours away, traffic willing. There was a lot of construction near the port—what our tour guide called a “seven-generation highway” because that is how long it seems to be taking to get it completed. This reminds me so of India, with trash all over, and houses built right next to each other. It is not brick construction like India, more tin and wood than anything else, with all tin roofs, and satellite TV dishes.

Bangkok is a city of flyovers, taken to a whole new level. We were at times 60 feet high, with minimal side rails, going 80 kph. Literally miles and miles of flyovers, all seemingly toll roads. Where the roads were good, they were very good. Obviously not too much fear of earthquakes here, and such a good way to build a road.

Following the tour guide!

We went to the Grand Palace and Temple of the Emerald Buddha. Crowds and crowds of people, and then more crowds. Do you get the feeling I thought it was crowded? The Temple of the Emerald Buddha is very ornate, with mirror mosaic and painted tiles, and the statue very high over us. Had to take off our shoes, usual for a temple, and by then it was sprinkling, so not so nice putting the shoes back on. We then walked by the Grand Palace, again, very ornate with gold (paint or leaf) but no mirrors. Still sprinkling, I got out my umbrella.

Pagodas in the temple area

Inside the temple area

Guardians of the gate

In the market

Reclining Golden Buddha

We then proceeded through a crowded (there's that word again) market, no time for shopping, to the river. The Chao Phraya River is the major river of Thailand, and a very busy place. We boarded a boat and toured up and down the river, seeing things like the Reclining Golden Buddha and the Royal Thai Navy Headquarters, ending up at the Bangkok Menam Riverside Ramada. Buffet lunch which included selections in Chinese, Japanese, Indian and Continental, but no Thai food. Oh well, Thai food tomorrow as Tanis and I are taking a Thai cooking class in Ko Samui, which is a large island in the south of Thailand.

Singapore Day 2

Vegetable decoration demonstration

 As mentioned yesterday, I did not have a great night's sleep last night. I am trying to stay up all day long today to re-adjust my body to the new time zone. So far it appears to be succeeding. Today is a day at sea. Wish this was a quilting cruise, then I could be doing something structured. I did go to a introduction to Bangkok and Koi Samui, which will be our next two ports of call, tomorrow and the next day. Tanis and I have signed up for a tour of Bangkok, and the next day, a cooking class. Looking forward to this.

Death by chocolate

Tonight was a formal dinner night, so Tanis and I dressed in our finery (such as it is) and had a very nice dinner. I chose to have the Celebration of 50^th Anniversay dinner, which featured choices from the Sixties to today...basically a representative dish of each era. How tastes have changed, and am I glad. For instance, the choice from the Sixties, the Nouveau Classic era, was Duck Terrine, Apricot Preserves and brioche with Pocini Mushroom Cappuccino Soup with pesto and garlic chips. Dessert was Moist Chocolate Dome with Raspberry Crème Brulee and Bittersweet Chocolate Mousse...death by chocolate.

Singapore--Day 1

Instrument of torture for 14 hours

Sapphire Princess

 Remember all the times your kids have asked “Are we there yet?” That was me on the airplane. What a miserable time: the plane left at 12:05 AM (that's five minutes past midnight) from San Francisco. Since I had been up on Tuesday the 6^th all day, then caught the airport bus for a 2 ½ hour trip to SFO, then waited to check in, by the time I got on the plane I had already been up and going for 17 hours. Tanis had it even worse than me, as she had to fly to SFO from Bellingham WA.

Tanis and I ate chicken udon at the airport, so I was not hungry, but Singapore served a meal at 1:30 in the morning. I totally skipped this, as I was covered with a blanket and trying to sleep. Trying is the operative word, as “sleep on a plane” is an oxymoron. Miserable and could not get comfortable, and the seats only reclined about two inches, really. My head kept falling forward and that would wake me up. Unending flight where I had to suppress the desire to scream. Nighttime to whole way too, until Hong Kong, 14 hours later. After about and hour or so in Hong Kong it was back on the same plane and off to Singapore.

We had to take all of our stuff off the plane and walk to a security check so we could get back on the plane. Reminded me of the trip to Croatia and Poland with Surani and Patrick in Frankfort Airport. Interesting that we passed through a checkpoint from one place to another were our temperatures were remotely taken. Really on the look out for bird flu, swine flu and Ebola in Hong Kong. Toilets in the airport are pristine...cleanest toilet I have even seen.

Queue

Back on the plane for another four hours to Singapore. We are at 36 hours now without proper sleep. I was extremely happy to see a man with a card in Singapore with our names on it. This was the transfer to the ship that we paid for, and it was worth every penny, as he took our luggage, put us in the private car, and drove us to the port.

Safety drill

Checking in for the ship was somewhat painful, as there were long queues. It was also hot and humid...81 degrees and about 100% humidity. We finally got on the ship about 3 PM and discovered that we had been upgraded from a room with an obstructed view to a room six levels up with a balcony. Wow, what an upgrade. By now we were at 39 hours, so we laid down just to stretch our backs, and thus fell asleep, missed the sailing, and woke when were were already at sea.

Bed made every day, pj's folded :-)

Our luggage finally showed up after the safety drill, we went to dinner, came back and went straight to bed, not to sleep well, because our internal clocks are so screwed up, but at least to lay flat!