29/12/09 - Singapore Flyer

After dropping off the bulk of my luggage at Wade's apartment, we headed into the city to check out the Red Hat offices and get the lovely Athene (Wade's wife) to go out to lunch. We had Japanese and I got lessons on chopstick use.

Then it was time to explore the city! After meaning to catch the train to the harbour front I ended up somewhere in near the river, which turned out to be handy. Manage to get onto a tourist boat and get a short tour of the river, buildings and bridges before ending up out in the bay disembarking near the tourist icon, the Merlion. (Pictured)

Looking over the bay there are thousands of white buoys all clustered up. Had me completely stumped what they were for, but as I found out later, they all have New Year wishes and messages written on them from the locals for the new year celebrations. As I explored more around the bay, there is a lot of preparation work going on for near years eve, with sound system installation, more buoys to be installed and firework platforms being installed.

I'm really interested in architecture and Singapore has it in spades. On the river tour I spotted many interesting buildings, including one that looked like a UFO, but the building, or buildings that have really got my attention was the Marina Bay Sands, that is currently under construction. Imagine 3 sweeping skyscraper with what could be described as a surfboard on top of them connecting and overhanging them. In front are what looks like convention centres and the bottom half of a massive sphere under construction.

After a bit of research I found out it's a Casino/Motel/Entertainment complex, with the towers being motels, and the 'surfboard' along the top housing a pool and deck restaurant.

It's absolutely fascinating me.

I walked around the bay area, over the river and headed to my next eye catching building that I spotted from the river cruise, the Esplanade complex. It features a glass roof with golden 'scales' over it in a basic bubble shape. The piers along here were also having sound equipment installed for new years eve and I could hear off in the distance sound checks on a massive floating stage.

My new destination was the Singapore Flyer, a massive ferris wheel that towers over the city where it is built. It never stops turning so you have to be careful as you board the pods on it. Freaking out a bit as it got higher and higher I got some great city, ocean and bay photos all the while checking out the construction of the Flyer, looking for defects.

Right under the wheel is a fish pond with those colourful fish you can purchase some fish feed for. The Flyer pods are air conditioned, and in order to ensure that the air conditioning condensation does not spill onto anything, it is stored inside the pod and released into the fish pond as it passes overhead. Pretty neat really.

Eventually I walked back into the CBD headed back to Wade's and we went out to Chinese. More chopstick practice! Then we went looking through some toy / collectable shops where I spotted one of the toy transformers I had as a kid. It would just about have been a antique now, but there it was of all places.