We had a lovely weekend in Bintan, a small island off Singapore but in Indonesia. we caught the ferry at 9.15 on Monday morning and arrived back onthe Wednesday at 12 midday, in time for work at 2 pm.
We stayed in Nirwana Gardens in small chalets and it was a very reasonable cost.
We went for a walk around the rocks and it was great to scramble up and over them. But we were disappointed with the rubbish we found among the rocks. The day was very hot and we were pleased to get back to the resort for a nice cold drink in the pool bar.
The view we had at breakfast time...amazing aye?
I am not sure how they do this but they seem to be able to have 3 different coloured bougainvillea flowers on one plant and not it does not appear to be grafted.
My favourite fruit over here is Dragon Fruit and this is the what it grows on.

Breakfast In Botanical Gardens

Staff were invited to meet and share a breakfast in the Botanical Gardens adn then enjoy a walka round the gardens. The gardens are beautiful and we saw some areas we had not seen before.
While walking past the lillies we found this from shading from the hot sun.



I was taking a photo of the lilly and Wayne was concentrating on the frog.

A bonsai area was incredible....such amazing plants.

And then this spider was waiting above us in another area. He was huge!


Wayne drinking Asahi beer at our local, Cable Car

Well, where do I start! seems such a long time since I have added to this blog.

Our trip to the UK was wonderful...we had such a great time and saw so much. We will need to go back again and again as we missed so much too.

The highlight was to spend some time with Trevor and Colette and to catch up briefly with Max, Marwin and family.

We arrived and were met by Trev at Heathrow and we never stopped till we got home in Singapore!

Trevor lives about 30 minutes by train from Waterloo...we got quite familiar with the train network in London but were amazed at how much rubbish was left on the trains. Something we are just not use to in Singapore.

We spent the first few days orientating ourselves in London and visiting as much as we could in these days. Leaving Trev's at about 9.30 to get the cheaper train fare in and arriving home after 9 pm. It was so good to feel some cold fresh air...we were extremely lucky in that we only had a little rain the whole time we were away. We had slight drizzle one morning on our rail trip and some in Dublin when we arrived and that was all.

We travelled into Wales, too brief, up to Edinburgh, so old and so wonderful, down to Brighton Pier, stunning! and then to Dover, again to brief, and back to London. Had a night there and off again to Ireland. Three nights in Dublin and then caught train down to Boyle to be met by Colette and taken back to their stone cottage...breathtaking.

We knew how England had history but I was not prepared for how much. It was absolutely wonderful and now wish I had taken history at high school.

Castles were huge and bigger still. We managed to get to Windsor - just down the road from Trev - the oldest working castle, the Tower of London, Carlisle Castle, Dublin Castle(the only one that was a bit of let down), Hampton Court and a few others.

We stayed in an inn that Oliver Cromwell stayed in, we had breakfast where Guy Fawkes was born, we toured Guinness and Jameson Whiskey. Had an English Pub lunch a few times. walked along Brighton Pier, saw the White Cliffs of Dover, walked through Shakespeare's cottage and so much more that I can't fit into this blog. We also stayed in a place in Portsmouth which we would not recommend to anyone!

Below are selection of photos...there just isn't room to put them all up.

Cromwell's Inn in Shrewsbury. beautiful town, lovely quaint inn...think it was made for short people - I had no trouble negotiating the doorways!

Trev and Colette's slice of paradise.

Carlisle Castle. Wayne was putting his camera away as he had run out of battery

Isn't it amazing how the buildings lean out over the streets. We found many alleyways like this.

You couldn't visit London without visiting Twickenham - I think Wayne is dreaming of the what if I hadn't hurt my knee at high school!

We walked around the wall in York...a beautiful city with so much to see and do.

At the beach in Sligo, Ireland. This was such a cool beach and was beautiful to see the sea and hear the waves crashing.

Just the three of us...can you spot the family resemblance?

Edinburgh Castle...built on top of rock. Wayne is taking a tourists photo.

We had breakfast here in York. Slept in the sister hotel to this one.
Colette took us for a walk through a childhood playgorund park! and she couldn't resist climbing into this tree.

We had a yummy soup and andwich at this stone cottage cafe in Boyle.

Pouring your Guinness is almost as good as drinking one! Lucky for Wayne I found a ticket on the floor and when handing it in, was told to kept it and get another free beer!

Follow this link to Wayne's blog and see his photos and read what his thoughts were.

http://www.kopu.blogspot.com/

Hey there thought you might like to see the wonderful pictures of Christmas decorations along Orchard Road. Once again they have excelled.

Logan visiting

It was wonderful to finally have one of our boys over for a brief stay. Below are a few of a selection of photos of his visit. We tried to get him around most of the popular and exotic places of Singapore. The floating platform...always an amazement that this huge stage can float and it still totally amazes me just what sort of activity they use this platform for. Here they are getting it ready for a soccer match.
71 stories up is a very, very long way and everything looks so tiny down below.

This is one of the famous churches that everyone goes to visit while in Singapore...we prefer to look down upon it from this height.

We treated him to a walk through Little India on Sunday night...ask him about how many men were there...and we were early.

Another stop has to be the Fairy Bar...the architecture of this building is amazing...even now it still blows us away. As it was nearly Wayne's birthday we treated him to a bottle of wine...a New Zealand Chardonnay...at the lowly cost of $95. It was worth it just to see the fairy go up and get the wine.

A cool dude at a cool place. Getting Logan to pose for photos was almost impossible, but we did get this one.

The beautiful fairy pouring the extremely expensive wine.

One night we went to Chinatown and did some shopping...a favourite place of mine. This Hindu Temple is on one of the backstreets and as it was Deepavali it was well lit up and many people inside, judging by the scores of shoes outside. Waiting for a train at our MRT to take us into town
Lau Pa Sat is a must place to visit...satay's barbecued on the street. They close this street off at night time and all the bbq's come out and cook and people eat and drink in a wonderful atmosphere.

At last I have seen a Hornbill...all be it at the zoo. We had breakfast with the Orang-u-tans and then wandered around until it was time for us to leave for work. We left Logan there and met up with him later in the day.


We went to visit the white tiger and found this art class from one of the local Japanese schools, they were drawing picture of the tiger asleep on the rocks but funnily all their pictures showed the tiger standing.
A visit to Singapore is not compete without a Singapore Sling at Raffles Long Bar. Each drink costs $22 each but it is an obligatory thing to have. We even got Wayne to have one today!

A wander up the Singapore River is a must. We did this on our way to Check In for Wayne's birthday gathering.
And of course the Merlion is a popular tourist spot.
And then there is the two dimensional buildings. They seem like a quirk of nature and a quite freaky but an awesome sight. For once I am taller than Logan
We did a quick visit to Sentosa. It was beginning to getting dark and the amount of cranes across at Singapore is incredible.
And the Songs of the Sea is incredible...entertaining as well as amazing...it is a laser light show.
After a walk along the beach we found this shop and couldn't resist