MY SINGAPORE TRIP: PART ONE

 MY SINGAPORE TRIP: PART ONE

 

Hey folks! Welcome back to my blog. I am pretty sure you weren’t expecting to see me so soon. But here I am with another adventure story to tell you. And this time, the country as you may have seen in the title, is Singapore.

This time too, I went along with my mom. But unlike Japan, we did not hire any tours & travelling company for our itinerary. Simply because Singapore is a super-easy country to navigate. English is their official language, it is not a city where you can get lost in because of its small size, and generally the people there are also very helpful. Simply put, Singapore is a global hub which is a fusion of many different cultures and religions, where acceptability rules high.

Our flight left from Mumbai airport on 1^st January, 2026. And we reached Singapore Changi Airport pretty early in the morning. A fun fact about Singapore is that the people who live there often times visit the airport just to have fun and hangout with friends and family. You don’t necessarily have to have a flight to catch. The airport is pretty well laid out with a lot of fun activities to try. Although we did not roam around the airport right when we arrived. We had it planned for another day.

One advice that I must give to the reader is that, in case you plan a trip to Singapore anytime soon, be sure to check out the websites of all the tourist destinations. Many a times they undergo maintenance and are unavailable to the general public. A lot of those places also require pre-bookings as the lines can get super long.

Our first stop was Arab street where we had lunch. Now, I must tell you that Arab street is a place best enjoyed at night. When we went it was 2 PM in the afternoon so the sun was scorching hot, and most of the shops were closed. Regardless the food was still as tasty as ever.

After checking in to the hotel and having lunch, we decided to go visit one of the most famous spots of Singapore immediately – The Marina Bay Sands hotel. And that is the thing about me. Whenever I visit a country, I have trouble holding in my excitement and as a result I always tend to go to the most famous place first. I did the same thing in Paris and I would have done the same thing in Tokyo had I planned the trip on my own.

I lived in Mumbai where seeing tall skyscrapers was an ordinary thing for me. But standing at the foot of the Marina Bay Sands (MBS), just observing its expanse and height, it felt dazzling and magical. I was stunned by it’s enormous structure. Truly, the architects were geniuses.

We took a couple of photos and then decided to visit the Super Tree Grove park. A tip for the reader – in case you are travelling by metro, then get down at Gardens By The Bay or Bayfront station to visit the MBS. The super tree grove is also right next to it!

The whole place was clearly looking artificial yet real at the same time. It was amazing how they had blended nature and urban architecture. The Gardens by the bay had a few places that were interesting. We decided to go to the Cloud forest first.

So basically, the cloud forest was a large dome-like structure which had a controlled environment where different kinds of trees were grown and large animatronics of dinosaurs were installed to create the feeling of nature. The moment you stepped in you would feel a cold gust of wind and at places they had installed machines which would emit cloud like foam onto you. The entire experience was surreal but due to a very large crowd, it also felt slow and boring. You couldn’t fully enjoy the activities because there were just too many people around you.

Next we visited a flower garden which was equally good. If you’re fond of flowers be sure to visit it. There was also a separate ticket to walk on the super tree grove, but we forgot to purchase it beforehand.

By sunset we went back to the bridge that connected the gardens by the bay and MBS, and watched the super tree groves light up. We also took a stroll inside the hotel so that was a great experience too.

The next day, was the big day. It was Universal Studios day. To all my readers, if you ever visit Singapore, do not miss out USS. It is extremely fun and has so much to do that by the end of it you will be exhausted. Although that was not the case with me and my mom as we skipped most of the rides due to motion sickness. But even then we had a lot of fun.

Let me also give you context with respect to the travelling part. During our whole trip we only took the metros and nothing else. So if you want to reach USS you need to go out of the city to a place called as Sentosa Island. Firstly, get to the Harbourfront station via metro. And then inside the Vivo City Mall, you will find the monorail that will take you to Sentosa Island, called as the ‘Sentosa Express’. If you want you can also take the cable car but I will reserve that for the next blog.

USS has a lot of areas that you can explore such as the Sci-Fi city, Hollywood, Minions, etc. Firstly we decided to go and try the infamous Transformers ride. It was around 10 AM in the morning so there was little to no line. And that was our best decision. The waiting area itself for the ride was so big that one could easily expect at least 2 hours of waiting time during peak.

The ride itself was very innovative. I shall not spoil it for you but for my Transformers geeks out there, you will definitely have fun. It builds upon the base created by Michael Bay and then adds its own lore to it. You are basically being hunted by Megatron and you have to escape before he blasts you. It was also really unusual for me as we could carry our bags with us. No one told us to remove our accessories.

Next we visited the Mummy area where there was a super fast ride which we had to skip. The other ride was for children but we still waited in line for about half an hour. If you don’t have a problem of motion sickness and can do the bigger rides then it is my advice to you to skip the smaller rides as they are not worth it.

Next up we went to Lord Farquaad’s castle where there were a couple of rides of the Shrek universe. We sat in the 4D theatre which was pretty good and had a few laughs here and there. We also had lunch right there.

Later on, we were just roaming around the park here and there. We went to the Minions place but by then peak hours had started so there was a really long queue everywhere. So we just purchased a slushie, took a few photos and went elsewhere.

I wanted to try out Hollywood because obviously. So we went to a Steven Spielberg themed attraction. The line was long there too but in the waiting area we were patiently admiring all the movie posters of films produced by Universal such as Fast & Furious, Van Helsing, A Beautiful Mind, The Bourne movies, etc. The attraction in itself was a small amphitheatre wherein a virtual Steven Spielberg would set the stage for a disaster sequence. And then the whole room would show us how practical effects are generated for a scene. There was fire, water, fire on water, extreme wind, loud sounds, fluctuating lights, etc. I felt as if I was almost transported to the ending sequence of Cape Fear by Martin Scorsese. For a movie buff such as myself, it was magical.

And then finally in the late afternoon we decided to go Jurassic Park. There was a famous waterboat ride there whose waiting was 2 hours! My mom was dismissive about water rides so I went and stood in the queue for 2 hours for a 10 minute ride. For any of you who have been to Imaagica, the ride Rajasaurus is just exactly what was present in USS. If Jurassic Park was a 10/10 then Rajasaurus was at least 6/10.

Another tip for the readers – USS rides generally have a separate line for singles. That means if you are alone you can go in that line instead of regular people and get admitted to rides faster. Although that day unluckily for me, the singles line was closed.

After that, we bid farewell to Universal Studios and went for the cable car ride. Just FYI, the cable car station was a little far away from USS entry/exit and you have to climb up a lot stairs to get to it. And if you have a round trip then do NOT get down in the middle (like we did accidentally). But if you want you may exit at Harbourfront cable car station, take the lift, go downstairs and the metro station will be a stone’s throw away. Else, you may choose to get down at Mount Faber, enjoy a few snacks and drinks and complete the round trip.

Later on, we went to Chinatown to have dinner. That was a surreal experience too. I have always wanted to go to a Chinatown in any big city. Singapore was my first and it did not disappoint. I hope New York can live up to it one day.

Thank you folks for reading. This article covered 2 days of our trip. The next 2 will be covered in the second one and the last 2 in the third one. See you again!