Marina Bay Sands

Alex and I have both always wanted to visit the Marina Bay Sands. Nearly every time we're in Singapore, we have lunch at the top, but we have both always wanted to stay and enjoy everything and finally visit the infinity pool on the 57th floor. His Christmas gift was a one-night stay for 2 people and thankfully he asked for me to accompany him!

 Our early check in was greatly appreciated and the view was incredible! Straight out over the Gardens by the Bay.

Even better, we had Hits Movies! During our last miserable trip to Singapore, Hits movies kept us entertained while Alex recovered from his wisdom teeth removal and I was nursing my foot. And this was a massive TV for a hotel room.

We had a late lunch at the rooftop restaurant Lago and I'm pretty sure Alex got a steak, but this is how the plate looked a few minutes later.

At least the cheesecake lasted long enough for a picture!

After lunch, we were ready for the main event - we suited up to visit the pool! Everyone was coming and going in their white robes so we made sure we had the right uniform.

Incredible!!

And SO cold!! It also happened to be one of the most pleasant afternoons ever in Singapore, so we weren't even hot and sweaty when we got in. We soaked in the views and enjoyed the people watching until we finally had to get out and warm up.

Thank goodness we discovered the hot tubs! They're on the back side facing the gardens and they were lifesavers.

We had decided to enjoy everything the Marina Bay Sands had to offer (except the casino), including  the restaurants and the mall and we never actually left during out entire stay. We found a great burger place in the mall and discovered their milkshakes are a meal on their own! This one had a whole ice cream sandwich on top!

We headed out toward Marina Bay after nightfall to enjoy the scenery.

This has to be the coolest Apple store in the world. You can reach its little island by escalator from inside the mall or take the bridge over the water.

What an amazing, iconic hotel.

We caught the light show in Marina Bay and it's always impressive.

The fun fountain that we lovingly refer to as the toilet bowl. You can see the underside from inside the mall. And fun fact - when the water isn't flowing, the sound resonates so well that you can hear people whisper on the other side.

We also caught the light show at the Gardens by the Bay from our own room! It was really a perfect day. We even found a little grocery store to stock up on goodies like Arnott's to take home.

Breakfast at Spago on the rooftop was just what we wanted the next morning. Alex had asked to wake up at 7am so we didn't miss a minute of fun but I didn't have the heart to get him up quite that early.

We didn't waste any time getting back into the pool to enjoy the sunshine, though! It certainly made it easy to get in the cold water, but not much...

Of course, we spent our last few minutes in the hot tub again and could have spent the entire afternoon relaxing here, but sadly we had to check out of our room.

Our time as guests may have ended, but our explorations did not. We checked out the food court for lunch and found the most incredible chandelier over it.

We decided to visit an interactive exhibit at the Art Science Museum.

Each room had a way to interact with the art, either by touching it and changing it...

...or creating your own and adding it to the collection!

The LED tunnel was magical.

Next stop was the flower domes at the gardens and our timing couldn't have been more perfect. As soon as we got inside, it started pouring outside and it was mesmerizing to watch.

We enjoyed some really lovely plants and flowers, including this mum that was as big as my hand.

These stone plants were unreal.

The beautiful waterfall in the rainforest dome was so tall. There was a whole Avatar exhibit going on throughout the dome so plenty of extra sights to see.

The lines in the back were fake, but the flower is real!

As were these beauties.

The rain stopped, we wandered back to the sands before we had to leave for the airport, and someone decided to spend some Christmas money at the cool Apple store. The deciding factor was that tourists can claim their tax back at the airport!

Alex and I had a pretty unforgettable trip and really enjoyed our time together. Exploring a mega hotel was a lot more fun than having wisdom teeth removed! And thankfully our delayed trip home from Mentawai didn't affect this one at all, but we were happy to put the suitcases away and enjoy the last few days of the Christmas break.

The Surfers

The resort had a professional photographer who would go out on the surf boat sometimes to capture some great shots of the guys having fun on the gorgeous waves.

The surf crew and the guides

One evening the big surfers came in as the surf lesson was finishing at Tikus, so the photographer got a few shots of Ben as well.

Matt and Ben caught one together!

 

Unexpected New Years

We had planned to leave on the ferry on December 30th and be back in Jakarta for New Years Eve with our friends.  Mother Nature had other plans! A big storm came in on the 29th and the ferry was cancelled on the 30th. It doesn't run on Saturdays and it was also cancelled for the holiday on January 1st, so suddenly, we were staying until January 2nd! We did consider hiring a boat or chartering a plane because people were also stuck in Padang trying to get to Aloita as well, but the weather really cancelled every option. We chose to make the best of it and enjoy our 3 bonus days!

The first day was pretty nasty. Storms blew around most of the day, but the intrepid surfers didn't stop from going out...in fact, they actually went to a more remote break in search of bigger waves! The boys and I chose to have fun indoors until the rain quit. After that, we enjoyed all of our extra time, especially when the sun came back out!

New Years Eve was really fun together! We voted to celebrate at 10pm instead of midnight (thanks everyone!) and thankfully still had a few clean things to wear to the party.

Once again, the staff had made a wonderful dinner for us and transformed the dining room into something really special. The front desk staff even joined us for dinner!

Then we took things out to the beach, where they had a bonfire and sparklers. They had planned to have lanterns as well...but they were on the ferry....arriving January 2nd!

Happy New Year! We had a champagne toast at midnight 10pm and wished a fond farewell to 2022.

The whole gang! Our family, the British family, American honeymooners, a German couple, the Swiss/Chinese family, the Italian manager, the Swedish yoga instructor and the Slovenian surf instructors. We spent all 10 days together with no one else coming or going and it turned out to be pretty amazing. When the ferry finally did arrive with two dozen new people, I wasn't quite as sad to leave because our little bubble was broken.

Welcome to 2023! Since we weren't expecting to see the sunrise from Mentawai on January 1st, it seems like this might be a year of being flexible. Looking forward to every day of it!