Day 4 – Sentosa Birthday Celebrations

17,433 steps taken – 12.17 km travelled.

Today was Drew’s 30th birthday, and to celebrate we spent the day at Sentosa Island! We had a little bit of a slow start – the last few days have really caught up to us, we’re exhausted! We left the hotel at about 10.30 and managed to get to the island just after 12. As we approached our stop, you could catch a glimpse of a huge statue of the Nation’s Symbol, the Merlion! The magnitude of this sculpture became more apparent as we made our way towards the steps leading to the base.

After a little bit of exploring, we made our way through the water features and headed down towards the beach. It was at this point we realised we didn’t have towels with us. We definitely needed to rectify that and get us into the water! First, we headed to a suspension bridge that lead us to a small island which is the Southernmost tip of Continental Asia. We were able to slow down for a minute here after climbing the watch towers and enjoy the views and breeze! Being so close to the water it was feeling rather humid today, so the breeze was a god send.

From there we did actually find a towel at the gift shop and headed back towards the water. We grabbed a drink at a beachside bar called Ola and jumped into the water. Now this was magical. The cool water seemed to almost reset us, and the day seemed to look a little brighter after an hour or so floating in the South China Sea.

After dragging ourselves from the cool embrace, we made our way to the Resort section of the park. This is where you’ll find more of the family orientated attractions such as Universal Studios, a huge lolly shop, a VR Amusement park and an aquarium. We were looking to spend some time indoors, so opted for the aquarium option, which turned out to be brilliant. This centre houses some weird and wonderful animals. As we were walking through, one thing that stood out to me was the cleanliness of everything! The tanks and exhibits were meticulously organised and planned, which made the enclosures themselves sometimes the main attraction. My favourite moment of the day was when we rounded a corner into a large theatre-like room to see the biggest tank I have ever seen. The room itself could have held a crowed of 500 plus, but the tank was breathtaking! After some googling we found that the tank holds over 18,000,000 litres of water and was home to over 50,000 animals. Have a think about those numbers for a second. That is like having a fish sitting in every second seat in the MCG. In this one tank. Bonkers. As difficult as it was to walk away from this room, we moved on to see the jellies and bottlenose dolphins, which was quite enjoyable too!

We had a few tokens left on our ticket, so we settled on using them at the TrickEye Museum. Drew and I had a ridiculous amount of fun playing with forced perspective murals painted on the walls and floor. The artwork was amazing and the whole experience was one I’ll have a hard time forgetting.

Last appointment on our list tonight was the light show on the beach, so we jumped back onto the monorail to the last stop on the line and made our way to our seats. From where we were sitting you could see a display out in the water made up of about 7 triangular screens. It didn’t look like much – until the show started. The show told a story of the Wings Of Time, and followed two young humans and a large god-like bird who was flying back through time to his home. It started off small, with images appearing on the triangular screens, then onto some water which was spouted up behind, and then ramped it right up with lasers and fire! I didn’t know what to expect going into this, but it definitely wasn’t the magnificent show that we received.

With our bodies slowly giving out on us, we decided to try and have an early night and called it there. It’s hard to think about our time being nearly over, as I’ve come to realise how much I love this country, it’s culture and it’s people. Tomorrow is our last full day here, and we’re going to cram it chock full. We’re going to check out Arab Street, which is full of some delicious foods and scents, Fort Canning which is known for it’s stunning gardens and architecture, Little India for some more food (can’t get enough), explore these gorgeous streets near the hotel and discover any other interesting things that call us along the way.