Dances with Dugongs in Singapore.
After Thailand, we spent 3 days in Singapore en route to Perth. We'd not really give this leg much thought when we booked it. Our "One World Alliance" Round The World ticket meant that we had to stop in Singapore on the way from Bangkok to Perth. Megan has a friend who'd lived here for a few years and she'd told us what we should see. However, August 8th is Singapore's independence day and as we were there the week before, everything was covered in scaffolding (much like our St Petersburg experience really).
After 2 months in China and 6 weeks in Thailand, Singapore was shockingly expensive. The worst we spotted was a half of Boddingtons Bitter for S$11.50 (£4.10). We chose not to stay in the famous Raffles hotel as there was a building site outside and we thought it might be rather noisy - nothing to do with the S$600 they wanted for the cheapest room for the night [honest!].
We spent a lot of time wandering the city. We went to see the famous Merlion which is a cross between a mermaid and a lion and is the symbol of Singapore. It had been moved and sat in the middle of a building site. We went to see the World's largest fountain. This appeared to be an upended Aqua-Vax cleaner. In fact that's exactly what it was as the actual fountain was closed for cleaning. We visited the picturesque Boat and Riverside Quays where we ate very expensive but equally delicious food - at least the restaurants had the decency to stay open and take our hard earned. Some of the architecture around the Parliament building and Supreme Court is quite impressive. We tried out the Metro which seems to on a par with Hong Kong's although not nearly as frequent.
The main event, however, was our visit to Sentosa. This is an island just off Singapore which has been turned into a theme park [yeuch!]. You can get to the island by bus, walking, ferry or cable car. Once on the island, there's a free bus and monorail to zip you around. Now, we'd already been warned not to bother with most of the attractions, but we did want to visit Underwater World which is one of those sea life centres which are becoming so popular. It turned out to be a very enjoyable trip, the highlight of which was seeing the Dugong. Gracie had been "rescued" by local fishermen after they'd killed her mother with their nets. Anyway, having stood enthralled in the perspex tunnel watching this rather strange smiling creature, we discovered that it was possible to dive with her and also in another tank with the sharks and rays. Needless to say, we booked immediately.
If you've ever visited a sea life centre and walked through the perspex tunnel or stood peering through the glass windows at the fish/sharks, etc, you've probably wondered whether they can see you. The answer is an emphatic yes! In fact, it's easier to see out of the tank than into it. We spent about 20 mins in the tank with Gracie the Dugong. Virtually all of this time was spent hand feeding her sea grass which is her exclusive diet. This Dugong was 1.6m long and only 4 years old. Never the less, she's still quite a large creature but she moved very gracefully. She would come up and snuffle the sea grass out of our hands very gently. Sometimes your hand would end up inside her mouth but she has no teeth so that's OK.
Our second dive was in the main tank which contained leopard, black tip and nurse sharks plus eagle and sting rays, massive grouper and all the usual stuff you see in a sea life centre. We fed cockles to the rays which would come up and nibble at your hand. We also posed for photos as the crowd in the tunnel seemed more interested in watching divers than the fish. Kids would be thrilled to bits to have a "deep sea diver" wave at them and some of the adults were gesturing that they wanted to have a go. Many sea life centres let you dive with the sharks but this is probably one of the few that does it whilst the public is in looking at the fish. It's quite a good idea as it generates a lot of interest. The diving is not cheap (S$130 to dive with the Dugong and in the shark tank) but it was well worth it as Dugongs are fabulous creatures it's unusual to get the chance to be in the water with one.
We liked Singapore. Megan even said she'd be prepared to try living there should the need arise - that's certainly a first in all the places we've visited so far and no mean achievement on the part of the city!!
We spent only 3 days here before catching our flight to Perth to explore Western Australia, but that will have to wait.