Sentosa Island

Hi everyone, 

Last night after I wrote, we went to Satay Street at Lau Pa Sat hawker market. I was pleased we were allowed to sit in the street at tables just as we did in 2012. There was less tables due to them being spread out more, but the vibe was pretty similar. We bought set A from the ‘Best Satay’ stall. 26 pieces for $26. Delicious! We also shared some garlic naan bread, and finished with an ice cream. Mine was pineapple and coconut (pina colada) - yum! On the way back, we enjoyed walking along the river and seeing the buildings lit up. We unfortunately didn’t sleep very well, Mum in particular, because of some overnight building works no one seems to know anything about in our building. Drilling, thumping etc from 2am onwards. Not good.

Nevertheless, we were up today and left about 8.30am for Sentosa Island, so named as ‘Sentosa’ means ‘tranquillity’ in Malay. Back in 2012 we went to Universal Studios here, but the three of us opted for more of a chilled out day. We arrived so early that there was a robot cleaning the foyer of the monorail station! Firstly, we caught a taxi down to the Sentosa Cove end of the island to check out the residential area. Many rich people live down here and the houses were huge. Some were also very eccentric – e.g. the house that was built like an Egyptian temple that we saw.

Next, we had a quick walk along the beach before riding the Skyline Luge. This is owned by the same company that has the luges in New Zealand. We had lots of fun, but the tracks were much shorter than the NZ versions. We did four rides and zoomed down each, and also enjoyed the chairlift ride up.

Afterwards, we had lunch at a nearby beach café at Siloso Beach. We ate our meals and then swam at the roped off section of beach they had for their customers. I had seen something splash around twice near Mum and Dad. A few minutes later, a lace monitor appeared in the water. Initially I thought it was a crocodile or a snake, but it was a lace monitor that swam ashore and then scurried off. None of us swam very far in after that!!!

Our next stop was Fort Siloso. Here we learned some of the history of Sentosa. Before it was developed and turned into a tourist/adventure island, Sentosa was called Blakang Mati which means ‘island behind death’. This was because a Bugis community lived here and a malaria outbreak just about wiped them out in the 1830s and 1840s. After this time, the British built a few forts in the area, and Fort Siloso was built in 1878. It still stands to this day. We were really impressed with how extensive the complex was, with many cannons, tunnels and vantage points still very much in tact. Despite being built in the 1870s, the fort was also a deterrent for the Japanese in the 1940s. Though Japan were successful in occupying Singapore, they did not attempt a naval bombardment of Singapore, and forts such as these were the reason why. Rather, the Japanese penetrated Singapore by making their way through 200 miles of dense jungle from the north instead. However, once the occupation began, the island was actually used as a Prisoner of War camp for a time. One of the beaches is apparently a mass grave.

After the fort, we finished our time on Sentosa by going to Palawan Beach, where we enjoyed a rope bridge leading from the beach to a small island. It was such a beautiful sunny day and the views from the tower on the island were lovely. We then caught the free shuttle bus back to the monorail, and the monorail back to the mainland to the Vivo City shopping centre. Here we went to the pharmacy and bought another 100 rapid antigen tests for people back home. Crazy times!

We had a rest at the apartment, before heading out to Newton Food Centre to meet my friend Vijay and his mates. I met Vijay here in Singapore on a pub crawl in 2012 and we have stayed in touch via Facebook ever since. We had a really nice night catching up with him and chatting to his friends. They kindly shouted us food and beers too which was so generous of them. It felt like such a normal, pre-pandemic night, laughing and having fun.

Love to all
Claire
Xoxox