Our Great Adventure: Singapore Day 93 20/12/2014

Yesterday we got the bus from Cameron Highlands to Singapore. We were a bit concerned when a small minibus turned up at the station to collect us but luckily it was just taking us up the road to meet our 'VIP coach' destined for Singapore. The initial part of the journey was quite slow as the bus lumbered up and down the steep roads however as soon as we reached the main road that joins Ipoh and Kuala Lumpur it speeded up. The roads were very good with dual carriageways and motorways for a lot of the journey - in fact we could have been back at home if it wasn't for the continuous jungle that covered the hillsides. We stopped for regular breaks at service stations and swapped drivers (quite unlike our travel in other parts of south east asia where we had one driver for the whole journey with limited and short stops). By late afternoon we reached Kuala Lumpur and saw the Petronas Towers from the coach window. After another 5 hours we finally reached the border with Singapore and quickly went through Malaysian immigration. Singapore immigration took a bit longer, we'd picked the slowest queue and then when we reached the front were told we had to complete arrivals cards. The other passengers were all through and gone and we both hoped that the bus would still be waiting for us. Luckily it was and we continued for another 45 minutes to reached the centre of Singapore. A short walk and we were at our hotel just before 10.30pm - 13 hours after leaving Tanah Rata! We're staying at the Adonis Hotel on Purvis Street in the Colonial District. It's a small boutique hotel and although expensive compared to other places we've stayed recently it's reasonable by Singapore standards. After a good breakfast we were picked up by Georgiana and her son Melvin. Georgiana and family are friends with Gillian & Mark, our friends from home, and had very kindly invited us to join them for the day on a family outing to the aquarium. The aquarium is over on Sentosa, an island just south of the city joined to the mainland by a bridge. We met Lionel (Georgiana's husband) and daughter Michelle at the resort and then headed into the massive aquarium. It's a great place to visit with a vast array of creatures from the seas and oceans surrounding Asia. Despite the variety Diane's favourite was the clown fish (of Finding Nemo fame). After a few hours gazing through the vast number of tanks we headed north to go for lunch at Newton's street food market. Unlike other countries that we've visited all the hawker stalls are located together in a market area. It was great to go with locals who selected the dishes for us to try which were all excellent including murtabak (pancakes), hainanese chicken rice and stingray washed down with sour sop juice. We got back to the hotel and decided to go for a stroll down to the river and quay area. The sky had already turned black and it wasn't long before the heavens opened. In an attempt not to get too wet we got the MRT (underground) back to our hotel. We had planned to go for a walk down Orchard Road in the evening but were both feeling quite tired and decided to have dinner at an Italian opposite the hotel and an early night.