Singapore continues

Toys R us VIVO city 

So.much.lego.

 Singapore surprised me. I was not expecting to enjoy it as much as I, I wasn't expecting to be so busy, honestly the only thing I had planned to do in Singapore was eat... and yes we ate so much I could probably do a blog on the food alone.
Here are some of the things we enjoyed doing in Singapore:

Shopping for toys 

The kids loved shopping in Singapore

It was the week before Christmas, so the kids were allowed  to buy a few more toys than they would have if we'd been travelling at a different time (I lie to myself). Staying in Sentosa we made our way over to VIVO city with the intention of catching the MRT to the city to go shopping, but we ended up distracted and spending hours at the set of shops. We also had a taxi driver drop us off at shops near Orchard road, but we never found our way to the road with all the shops we can't afford/the kids aren't allowed in. We just ended up lost in these shopping centres. We probably spent a couple of hours in Toys R Us alone, they had ice cream/popcorn for when you got hungry and entertainers with balloons. I generally avoid going to the shops here the week before Christmas, but I don't think our shops are this extra at Christmas time.

 Staying on Sentosa 
 Our hotel (W hotel) was my sons favourite part of the trip and while I felt like it was a bit far from the CBD, the kids loved Sentosa and everything about it. It felt like a little bit of a tourist trap to me, and next time I would like to stay 'on the mainland'.

So what did they enjoy on Sentosa.

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A smile from Arch!

The Cable Cars 

They run from the Harbour/VIVO city to Sentosa. The kids enjoyed this as a means of heading back to our hotel.

Madagascar the ride 

Universal Studios

Immy's favourite place in Singapore was universal studios. 10/10 would recommend. Especially with younger kids, although with our kids being tall, especially Archie, I wouldn't base your judgement on whether your child should go on a ride or not by height alone. He found the Transformers one a little bit intense (it was awesome, definitely go on it), it was like no other ride I've been on. But I've been out of the going-on-rides thing since Immy was born in 2011.  The only thing Arch was too short for was the water rapids in Jurassic park and I felt so much guilt, as I had only checked to make sure he was tall enough for the transformers ride (at the time I booked the holiday Transformers were his thing, but since then he'd developed an obsession with dinosaurs). So of the three rides in the dinosaur area he could only go on one. 

She made me wait until Australia was in view

 We completed Elf training at Universal Studios, and this is one of three attempted Santa photos

The least "worth it" thing on Sentosa Island, I think, was the butterfly and insect house. For starters they have a free butterfly house at the airport, which is better and has more butterflies. Holding a Macaw was cool, but it was another $5 on top of an entry fee that was already too high.

The butterfly and insect house 

  

The zoo

magic

 Let's leave Sentosa
Singapore Zoo
Was my favourite place by far, but also the most annoyed I got in Singapore.

We wanted to do the Orangutan Breakfast, and so using TripAdvisor I bought what I thought was just zoo tickets, breakfast and transfer direct from the hotel to the zoo.


The pick up was 30 minutes late, in a nice little shuttle bus, unbeknownst to us this little bus took us to a central point where we had to get into a giant bus (not easy for me)... where we waited for an additional  30 minutes.

DO NOT BOOK TOURS. This has always been my hard and fast rule and I regret it every time I break it.

>I felt a little bad for the "tour" guide (I say "tour" guide because there isn't any tour involved, they pick you up -late- have you wait in a bus - give you a ticket for the zoo and the breakfast and then say 'meet back at the bus in two hours')... by the time we got to the breakfast I'd reach demanding better seats so I can actually see the orangutans level of annoyed. I'm not usually like that. But I had not had breakfast yet, I get so hangry, and our second set of seats were great. I'd recommend buying the tickets straight from the zoo website (Ri did a search after our day and found that when you looked it up on Google there are at least five tour sites that come up before the zoos site, so I didn't feel completely like a muppet). Get get a taxi there.

feeding rhinos!

The rest of our day was magical, the animals were kept in amazing spaces. As the tour only included two hours at the zoo after the breakfast, we left the tour as soon as breakfast was done. I don't know how anyone could be happy with only two hours at this beautiful zoo. 

It's one of those magical zoos were you feel like your children and getting an appreciation of animals. 10/10 would recommend.

feeding giraffes

look up!

Immy reminds me of a young disney princess 

 I'm getting tired and I still haven't finished Singapore!! Who knows when I'll have 'time' (I didn't really have time to do this now).

Immy's favourite ride at universal studios 

 Above is Imogen's highlight - a ride in the Mummy section of universal studios that gave her the change to drive a car (along a track) she had an accelerator and a steering wheel. I love how seriously they are taking their mapped out road trip.

Singapore - first two days

At the start of this year I raised an idea with Ri, let's leave the country for Christmas,  we've never left the country for Christmas before! His Nan's birthday was just before Christmas, so we would usually stay in Brisbane, especially after the kids were born. Nan, sadly, passed away at the tender age of 100 last year (we've missed her a lot this year). So before everything went so wrong for us this year, before our new home flooded, before we needed to live in an airbnb for 3 months, before my RA/liver went out of control, before two contracts on our house failed. I booked a two week holiday to Singapore and Hong Kong. AND I AM SO GLAD THAT I DID.

photo from booking.com

We left on the 13th and arrived on the 14th of December. Our flight left at 11:35pm and I honestly ended up wishing that the flight had been longer. By the time we had our first meal and switched off the lights that only left 4 hours to sleep before they switched the morning meal lights on.
We arrived in Singapore drunk from sleep deprivation - I'd slept for about half during an iron man movie, and Ri had had a blanket over his head for about 2 hours. We arrived at our hotel - W hotel Sentosa Cove, at around 6am, check in wasn't until 3pm, but they were sure they'd get us early check in. They offered us coffee and we followed the offer into their breakfast area, which had access to the pool. So after breakfast we went into the pool area... about fifteen minutes later (because our togs were somewhere between the door to the hotel and the room and there was no guarantee that if Ri left the pool area to try and find said togs, that he'd be able to get back in again without a swipe card) we just got into the pool in the clothes that we'd been wearing on the plane. It was an effective way to wake up. In interesting move in a dress.
We were able to get our hands on our key at around 10:30am, so we headed up to get our room sorted and then decided to stay awake by going for a walk around Sentosa Cove, we found a place called big fat mama's - we ate here at least three times. We spent the afternoon zombiefied by the pool. We ended up ordering room service and curled up in bed by 7pm.

On our first full day in Singapore we ventured to resort world to visit the aquarium, which was very impressive. I liked how they had education stations pushing the 3 r's, reduce, reuse, recycle plastics. The kids found some fish stamps and put one of their fists, Immi held out her fist to Arch saying "fish bump!"

When asked Immi reports her favourite animal was the jelly fish and Arch says the lobster. We had lunch at Slappy Cakes, which we'd been to before on Maui.
After lunch we made our way to the rainbow candy store. After the kids went mental in the candy store, which is where we bought their stuffed merlion that they named Reece's pieces, we decided it was time to leave Sentosa. We hoped on the monorail to vivocity and then tried our hand at the MRT, after staring at the map for a minute I confidently said to Ri "we need to get on the circle line" Ri asked "in which direction" I replied "we're at the end of the end" Ri: "wait... what?" (Singapore we need to discuss the definition of 'Circle'.) We managed to get on the wrong circle train, so we decided to abandon ship at the botanical gardens (just in time for the rains). We waited out the rain at the gardens,received some great advice on where to grab dinner from a guy who worked at the gardens. After the rains we checked out the children's garden then went straight back to the MRT to try again. Our destination was satay club lau pa sat. We managed to get on and off the right trains, but crossing a main road in Singapore city - you need to either go over the road, under the road or walk a mile to a crossing. The food at Lau Pa Sat was soooo good. We were a bit conservative in our selections when we we on our own...

Papeete

Land! 

 Waking up to see land after five days at sea was a strange experience. We'd made it to our first destination. No vomiting, no fighting between friends, and no major damage done by our sea legs.
Izzy did run full pelt into a wall handle, but go up straight afterwards and kept running. They continued to call me dramatic for noticing that waves made the boat move :P.

The view from our room

black sand!

clear water :)

 I think Papeete and Moorea were my favourite stops. Papeete for the time that we had (it was like 9am-11pm), so we could take our time. Erin and Dave learned that Immy and I require constant feeding.
For our first stop we found a lovely little French place to have lunch, Chez Loula et Remy. ah it was so good. And we met a cat that eats pasta.
We stopped at two beaches, the first one was too shallow for me to snorkel at, but the kids loved it (the photo of the fish was from the first beach, a white sand beach). The black sand beach was just gorgeous to swim at, it was near Venus Point. Only thing - no fish! But Chlo and I did enjoy a swim out into the black looking (but clear) water.

white sand beach

For dinner we went to the food trucks that were at the harbour next to the cruise ship. We had crepes. Rhys and I were pretty pleased with about our French food reading abilities hahaha, speak it? no, Read it? no. Read menus, why yes. hahaha. Shows our travel priorities right there, 

Hawaii 2016 Oahu

We left Henari at home. Devastated, he has been with us on every holiday since our first overseas trip in 2007, I remember the day we bought him in Osaka. But with two kids and just over three weeks to pack for, he was left at home. Boo.

This time we have travelled with another family of four, a friend of mine, let's call them "Erin", her husband "Dave", their 11-year-old "Chloe" and their five-year-old (who is just five days older than Immy) "Izzy".  

A year ago we went to a cruise expo and decided to go on a 17-night cruise from Honolulu to Sydney. So we booked, procrastinated, planned and discussed (mostly procrastinated) and finally we found ourselves at Brisbane (BNE) international airport. Our eldest is now five and baby Arch was two and a half the day we left. We had some dinner and mentally prepared ourselves for a flight with a toddler. But there were no tears during take-off, for most of the flight Arch slept, ate or played happily. My baby is all grown up and ready to travel. It was a bitter sweet moment, my babies are growing up too fast.

Immy, arriving in Hawaii like a boss

We left Brisbane at 5pm and arrived at Honolulu at 6am that same day. This was our third flight to Honolulu since Immy was born, and it’s the most sleep I’ve had, with about 4 hours of broken sleep (usually we are landing with 0 sleep).

Somehow (it’s a bit of a blur) we retrieved our bags, the boys picked up the rental cars and we were on our way to Waikiki. Taking a friend to one of your favourite travel destinations is like showing them your favourite movie, but way more stressful. You keep looking at them to see if they love it yet. Do they get it? Because it’s awesome.

Four days in Hawaii is not enough. I’ve decided you need at least two weeks for Hawaii.

But we did our best. Back to the first day, we had eggs from eggs’n’things by the beach and then went for a swim/passed out on the beach from exhaustion/got sunburnt. The kids and I feel asleep in the car on the way to the hotel and that night was a write off, Ri managed to get a cranky wife and two kids up to the room, before we all passed out.

My boys

Waiting for eggs n things

On the second day we grabbed our walkie-talkies and drove up to the North Shore, stopping at Haleiwa for shave ice from Matsumoto, on our way to Waimea Valley (where they were shooting the 2016 version of Jumanji – Dave and Erin totally saw the Rock heading down to the set). Code names were important, they were Pink Panther and we were “Purple and Pink Tiger with a friend who is an elephant.”- what happens when you let your kids pick the code name.  

Walkie talkie fun 

We saw some beautiful rainforest and the movie locations for the Hunger Games (a big deal for Chloe). They were filming a new Jumanji, Dave and Erin are now mates with The Rock (I swear).

That night we went to a Luau at Paradise Cove.

Luau

The third day was our shopping day with time spent at Ala Moana and the Outlet shops, ah I LOVE shopping in Hawaii.

The fourth day, there was more shave ice (from the general store this time), on the way to the North Shore food trucks (10/10 would recommend). We tried snorkelling on the north shore and couldn’t see a thing. Chloe and I ended up swimming out as far as we dare, Chloe humming the Jaws theme. My kids are still too young to snorkel, so Ri and I have to take turns, it was nice to have a snorkel buddy.

My boy behind the wheel on the WRONG side (he loved it)

At the food trucks

Cheese cake 

The fifth day (cruise day!) Ri and I took our kids to Hanauma Bay for some snorkelling at the nature reserve, I almost drowned (not really) I headed towards some big waves to check out what they were breaking on, the waves filled up my snorkel and I couldn’t empty it before the next wave came up. I swear the ocean is out to kill me (something I say a lot). Despite aspirating salt water, I still had an amazing time, it’s a gorgeous spot and we saw lots of beautiful Hawaiian fish. We went to the Zoo for lunch. And then it was cruise time. 

Hanauma Bay - those waves... still beautiful though

Deciding to turn 30 in Japan and travelling as a family... with a new member!

Trying to get a passport photo of a smiley baby isn't easy! They need to have an expressionless face with their mouth shut.

Travelling was not part of our plans this year, 2014. 
We had our second and final baby in March and thought that ruled out travelling anywhere this year and possibly even next year too... which is fine.

BUT then my 30th birthday was looming, and I was having a hard time deciding what to do to celebrate. I am a big believer in BIG birthday celebrations and I was about to turn 30. 
Medical professions had told my parents that I wouldn't live to see my twenties, so I felt like turning 30 was a big deal. (I know that sounds so dramatic, but I have had more than one doctor tell about that amazing RA patient that they had just loved who had died at 16/19/some other really young age, so it happens).

Arch's very first flight! Brisbane to Cairns

Friends had convinced us to go on a cruise, and we were just in the process of booking the cruise when we found out that babies under 12 months cannot go on cruises with that company. The same day that we discovered we couldn't do the cruise one of those same friends shared a Jetstar 2 for 1 tickets to Japan link on Facebook... awesome! and we had a week to decide (until the deal finished). 
I think after 2 days we had decided that yes we would go to Japan IF we could get my mum to come too. I think mum said yes after thinking about it for all of five seconds. I think she could tell how badly we would need someone to come for help with - everything!  We ended up agreeing that mum would get a day off to train it down  to Kyoto.

This was all booked at the end of July, so it wasn't a long wait. All of a sudden it was time to pack. Then the day before we were due to leave we received a text message from JetStar saying that our flight leaving from the Gold Coast was cancelled. We had picked the flight leaving from the Gold Coast because it was direct to Tokyo. After our flight was cancelled we were presented with three choices 1) Leave from Gold coast on the same day fly to Melbourne - FIVE hour stop over in Melbourne and the 10 hour flight to Japan
2) Take the direct Gold Coast to Tokyo flight the next day OR
3) Leave from Brisbane fly to Cairns 5 hour stop over and then 7 hour  flight to Tokyo.

We took option number 3.

In Cairns

I remember our first flight with Imogen, she was seven months old and we were beside ourselves with worry. Will she cry? Will it hurt her ears? Will EVERYONE HATE US? 

Arch's first flight was certainly very different in that regard. We were more relaxed by a mile. 
He had a bit of a feed during take off and landing and during the rest of the flight he was happy to play with the safety instructions. 

The plane that would take us from Cairns to TOKYO

We had about five hours to waste in Cairns. We just sat around and had coffee, ate some terrible airport food. My mum took Imogen for a run around. We checked in to our flight as soon as we could and waited the rest of the time at the gate. Gave Archer a feed of baby food, using me as a human feeding chair. I ended up with baby food all over me, so I got changed just before we got on the plane.

Imogen's first international flight was when we went to Hawaii, when she was 17 months old. So this was our first long flight with a "little" baby, and it wasn't so bad. We passed him around between the three of us. 

We had ended up with six seats on this flight, three next to a window and three in the middle, which we put to good use! It was nice to be able to spread out and it gave Imogen plenty of room to have a rest lying down.

On Nanny's lap

During all of our other travels, before having the kids, I would just sleep during every flight, train ride, bus ride, boat ride/ during pretty much any time I'm on transport. It's a good strategy, you get where you are going faster.
 I think I managed about 15 minutes on this flight then Rhys had to wake me to feed him. 

On Mummy's lap

On Daddy's lap

We did it! We've just landed it Japan

But that's ok. It was a day flight anyway, so sleeping wasn't really necessary.


Imogen was such a good little traveller too. She kept herself busy with pens and pencils, the colouring books I brought and the blank drawing book my mum brought. She used the iPad and watched Rio 2 with Rhys on the in flight entertainment.

When we landed in Tokyo we all hoped on a train to Tokyo station and from there we caught a cab to our air BnB apartment. Our "Tokyo Home", as Immy called it, for the next 8 days.

I brokes Skypeses..... furious

Mum, Dad, Addie... the microphone on the laptop stopped working!! So I can't get Skype to work!

(photo is of Mykonos cat)

Ri : Yeah despite my best efforts I cant get the speakers or headphones to work so Might be a while before our next call everyone so if not before will talk to you in just over a month.

Happy Fathers Day Dad

Hey Dad.
Hope you had a tip top Fathers dad.
Love always the one who made you a dad.
Your one and only baby girl.
xoxo Tori