Sentosa Island

I am really enjoying Singapore, there is so much to do here and it seems to be the T-shirt capital of the world. So much so, i am going to extend my stay here, and maybe give Thailand a miss - which is a bit of a shame as i fancied having my pic taken with a group of ladyboys....but we can't have everything i suppose. Today, i have been to Sentosa Island, a small island off of the southern tip of Singapore, that you get to by Cable car.
It was not as impressive a ride as the one in Langkawi, but it was interesting to head out to sea in a cable car! I met up with some 'Spanish' chap, who joined me for the ride - he was actually from Catalonia, but was relatively polite about me referring to him as Spanish!!

Once you arrive on the island, there are a whole series of tourist attractions which you can partake in. I opted for underwater world, which gave me the opportunity to see tiger sharks swimming above me in their specially designed tunnel.
These are tiger sharks, it wasvery impressive stuff, although it was clear that this was the signature tank of the aquarium, and the the rest of it was pretty much the same as any other.

As a slight side note, it does appear that Singapore is the land of escalators and elevators. Even the aquarium tunnel had an escalator in it!! mind you when most of you city is built in the skies, i suppose that becomes a necessity.

Anyway, to reiterate, the sharks were very impressive, as was the Japanese Spider Crab, which looks like something from Aliens and the Jellyfish.This is a Japanese spider crab. It might not look much in this picture, but if i said that this was over a metre in size, you get an idea of how large the things were!! Personally, I would not like one of them buggers nipping my toes as I was paddling!!

Once i had finished in the aquarium, I went to see Dolphin lagoon, where a couple of intelligent fish perform tricks for a load of morons who then feed them fish. It was not too bad, although it really did not last long enough to warrant buying a ticket (this ticket was given to me free when I went to Underwater world).

The dolphin is desperately trying to advise this Australian lady that getting into the water in a white dress is not the wisest of moves....she ignores him and gets more exposure than she really wanted.

Then, I went off to see the Merlion - a Sea lion which is the new symbol of Singapore (which means in Malay, Lion City (Singa - Lion, Pura - City). This was a magnificent erection at the centre of the island that you could climb up (or to be more precise, get an elevator up). I have a few photos of Singapore from the lions mouth, which was pretty cool.The thing you can see in from the lions mouth is the port. Ever wondered where all those "made in Singapore" products started out from? wonder no more....

After the Merlion, I came home to shower (I am currently on 3 showers a day, as the temperature and humidity is so great that, even after a couple of hours, you have a film of sweat ) and then popped into a couple more shopping arcades, before returning here to write the blog. It was 34 degrees today and even tonight the temperature has not dropped below 27 degrees. (not that I am gloating at you folks languishing in chilly Europe!)

Tomorrow, i am donning my Safari suit once again and heading off with my elephant gun to bag a couple of tigers from the balcony at Raffles Hotel, while knocking back a Singapore sling. If you read the literature on the island, the last tiger in Singapore was shot in the billiards room of Raffles. Although, what a tiger was doing playing billiards at Raffles is a mystery to me. He wouldn't even be able to hold the cue properly.....

Before Raffles though, i will probably head off to their botanic gardens, and possibly the Jurong bird park and then for my final day, i might head to the Bukit Timah Nature reserve, which is the last piece of rain forest in Singapore. It is now protected from development, and you can understand why, because if you stand still for long enough in this place, they will be laying foundations on you.

This image is for Sam - proof that there are white beaches out there that do not have any litter on them. The Singaporeans are sticklers for tidiness, and this beach was spotless!! :D