.jpg)
We arrived the first night at the Classique hotel, accommodation was a little pricey & even this 3 star was more than most european hotels. It was nothing great, but comfortable & relatively clean. We arrived in the early afternoon so took a walk down to the Bugis market, a bit like Camden, had some hawker food & onto the famous Orchard Street which is like Oxford Street on steroids! It is lined with shopping mall after shopping mall, featuring everything from Louis Vuitton to Gap. It is not the easiest place to shop as it was extremely busy & until you get into a particular mall, you don't really know what is inside. The Christmas decorations were everywhere & very over the top, massive snowmen & arches across the road, light etc etc. After battling for a while we decided enough was enough & got the tube back to the hotel, empty handed ... until we came across a Mackey D's & tucked in!
We didn't get the best nights sleep as they were doing roadworks on the road below the hotel & Jacqui got quite a few bites, don't think they were bed bugs but they were no mossies so not sure what they were! So we decided to check out as we hadn't paid upfront & look for something better, and boy are we glad we did, we managed to find a very sweet 4 * for just a little more than our current place as it was so last minute (website was wotif.com). It was a mystery deal so all we knew when we booked was how many *'s & an approximate location. The hotel turned out to be the Furama Riverfront, the location was not ideal, but ok, the hotel itself was very fancy & a fitting end for our trip.
After moving house we arbed around the hotel, checking everything out before heading up to Orchard to catch the hop on, hop off bus, remembering to stop at the Hard Rock for Keith of course. As there are not that many sites to see & it was extremely hot we just kinda sat on the bus the whole way round enjoying the A/C. We visited their China town which deserves as mention as the cleanest, safest, nicest China town we have ever been to, and there have been many on this trip, in SA & in London! We tried some satays at their food stalls before walking to another major hawker centre (Lau Pat) but the food was nowhere nearly as appetising as Malaysia had been, but we did stumble upon the satay club which was just stalls & stalls of satay, so like it or not that was dinner, & we liked it. It was a long walk home as there were no direct buses but I guess we needed to sweat out all that satay sauce.
The next day was a relax day so we just spent it sleeping late, making the most of the buffet breakfast & then retiring to the pool. Although the peace & quite was somewhat interrupted by building works in the room next to ours, although a quick complaint to reception & we were whisked away to the 17th floor for a change of rooms...the executive suites! A much nicer room with all the extras, kinda like being upgraded to 1st class on a plane....although that's never happened to us before so not sure what its like really. It was a little overcast but it was more more than warm enough. Jacqui had enough energy to spend an hour in the hotel gym....i had enough energy to lift up my book to eye level for half an hour before having a nap. We had booked to go on the night safari in the evening so had a bite to eat at the Cafe Cartel, best ribs I have had in a long time. Try it out if you are ever in town. The night safari was pretty good, a part from our bus seemingly full of South Africans, much like everywhere we went. They basically chuck you on a 'tram' and drive you through a massive park / zoo full of nocturnal and not so nocturnal animals from every continent. So tigers, lions, giraffe, buffalo etc etc. Everything is lit in a really dim light so you can see quite easily & all the animals are 'free roaming', well free inside their paddock. Only downside is it's absolutely packed, lots of kids & very commercial, however the Ben & Jerrys shop made up for it.
On our last day we again went for the relaxing option of chilling by the pool, gym, shopping, eating finished of with a trip to Swensons which we heard did the most amazing ice cream, they were sold out of the ice cream fondue which was a pity but we were able to find something to tickle the tastebuds. After that it was off to the hotel to get spruced up & to the airport for our arduous 21 hour flight home. Will definately consider paying the extra next time & flying direct.
The trip home was long & uneventful, and we were greeted in London by sub zero temperatures & snow, ah, it great to be back!
Thanks for reading, we had an amazing trip & would definately recommend South East Asia to anyone out there.
No comments:
Post a Comment