Blue Mountains, Featherland And Sunset Cruise

OK, so as I said at the end of my last blog, I would write a blog for the Blue Mountains, so here it is.

I booked the trip through 'Activity Tours' and it would be a full house with me booking the last seat on the bus. I was to meet today (Friday 30th) at 7.50am at Circular Quay ( I seem to know this place inside and out now). Being situated in Randwick, out of town the tour company the tour company didn't pick up from there, only central Sydney from Hotels and key places. I had an early start, jumped in the shower and caught the bus down to the quay. At 8.10am I was getting a little worried that I was in the wrong place, as I was speaking to the main office the bus pulled up. I hopped on board and took my seat, looking around even at nearly 32 I was the youngest on the bus. The driver, Mark, seemed pretty cool and gave us a little chat before handing the mic round for us all to introduce ourselves. There were India's, Singaporean's, Chinese, American's and as I am increasingly meeting Pom's who have now emigrated to Australia, of these a couple from Cairns and another guy, Mark, from Perth. After introductions and about a 45min ride we arrived at out first destination 'Featherdale Wildlife Park'. As I mentioned in my last blog I really have seen enough animals but Mark the driver had changed my mind a little when he said that we could interact with Kola's, Wallabee's and Kangaroo's quite freely and even feed them. He wasn't wrong, the Park was very more open than the past million zoo's i had seen in the last week or so. I had my picture taken stroking a Kola, which in the 3 times i had been to OZ I had never done, which was quite cool and without sounding like a girl, they were so cute. We then headed into an enclosed but still out door area where many a Wallaby and Kangaroo roamed around. On entry we had chance to buy some food for them, ice-cream cones filled with some sort of what looked like bombay mix. 

I soon had them eating out of my hand, literally, I had seen plenty of Kangaroo's and Wallaby's in my time's in OZ but had never been this close never mind fed them, they were so gentle and not threatening at all and as you can see from the photo, he even grabbed my hand while he ate from it. Again very cute. The rest of park was your normal Aussie wildlife, Taz Devils, Cassowary's, Dingo's and endless birds. After the Wallaby and Kangaroo feeding everything else seemed a little boring. Luckily we had a packed day and only had an hour in the park before moving on. 

The promised sun that Ed had mentioned as yet was not to be seen, thankfully I had dressed in long trousers T-shirt and Fleece, with a pair of shorts in my bag just in case the weather forecast was actually correct. Was I glad with my choice of clothing. We started to drive up into the Blue Mountains, passing through the town of Katoomba (which i think is a really cool town name), and started hitting various look out points. Mark the driver said that he knew a really good one off the beaten track, and unlike a lot of the other look out points shouldn't be so crowded with tourists, he was right we were the only ones there. As we made a short walk up on to the plateaux the valley and Blue Mountains came into view. The view was spectacular, with the sun now coming out to play the shadows on the mountains and Valley looked amazing, what also was amazing was the wind swiftly blowing across the plateaux, it was fierce and cold. We hastily got some pictures in and headed back to the bus. We were now moving onto 'Scenic World' which was north of Katoomba. Scenic World is privately owned tourist attraction which host's a couple of 'Skyways' (cable cars) and a Sky rail, which believed to be the steepest cable driven in the world with an incline of 52 degrees over about 500m. We had around an hour and half to explore and both the Skyway's and the Sky Rail were good, with the Skyway's offering amazing views of the Blue Mountains and valleys that they surround. The SkyRail was very steep but only lasted all of a minute, blink and you missed it, still not bad and I can now say i have been on the steepest cable driven train in the world. 

We were back on the bus and away back towards Sydney for 3pm, we had an hour so drive to the next destination, 'Olympic Park'. The Olympic Park for those of you that remember was built back in 2000 to host the 2000 Olympic games. We weren't actually going to be going in any of the venues, just drive around the park itself and take a few pic's while Mark gave us a bit of history. By 5pm were at the Olympic ferry Wharf were we would leave Mark and the tour bus and grab a 'Captain Cook' ferry back to Circular Quay.

This was a pretty large ferry with a number of large outside decks, the Sun was starting to go down so we would be able to cruise down the river while watching Sunset. What a sunset it was, with some great cloud formations and the fading sun reflecting off the water, it made for some great 'arty farty' photo's (as my friend Mr's Milly's put's it). I think i must have taken around 70 pic's, messing around with various settings on my camera. The good thing about this ferry was that they had a bar, so as we cruised into Sydney harbour i enjoyed a nice cold beer. As we approached the Sydney harbour the sun was now down and the light fading, the lights on all the high rises were on and Sydney bridge and Opera house were also lit up. For me, and its one of the reasons I love Sydney its one of the best sights I have seen and I never get bored of it.

I hope you like the pic's just a couple of the few hundred i took today, I will post more on FB soon. In the mean time, thanks for reading as always and please keep reading. Take care everyone and catch up with you all soon. 

Manly, Old Friend And Captain Unco

Hello friends, family and foes, hope that you are all keeping well and for my fellow Englishman and women, i hope your enjoying the current heatwave. I have now been in Sydney for a week and though the weather hasn't been the greatest and I thought i hadn't done a great deal the time has flown by. I last wrote on Monday 26th after visiting Sydney Zoo, its now Friday and as i said the time seems to have dwindled away. So Monday I decided to again head on down to Circular Quay and head out to 'Manly'. Manly is North east of down town Sydney and is popular with not only with tourists but locals also. I caught the midday ferry crossing which was around a 45 minute trip. The Sun was out but a reasonably strong wind took the heat of the midday sun. So nearing 1pm I arrived and headed straight for Manly beach. This was just a 5min walk from the Wharf. As I said the wind was pretty strong and even though i had shorts on i also had a T-shirt and fleece top and to be honest was still feeling a little chilly. I imagined the beach to be quite empty, how wrong i was, it was packed. There were people swimming in the sea, people playing on the beach and sunbathing! Me on the other hand was trying my hardest just to keep warm. Either these people were on holiday from Alaska or Siberia or I was just being a wet lettuce (no comments please) perhaps being in India for 6 weeks sweating my bollocks off every day, I had become accustomed to only high temperatures and humidity. Either way, no way was I going to be sunbathing never mind swimming in the sea. I was hungry so grabbed some sushi and a drink. After lunch i headed back towards the Wharf, there is a small stretch of beach next to it, this side of Manly was covered from the wind and with the sun still out I decided to set myself down here and listen to my iPOD. Before i knew it was 4.30pm, I had fallen asleep. I have been sleeping well but ever since arriving in Sydney i have been so tired and lacking in energy, i think maybe the go, go, go of India has finally caught up with me. The ferry was just arriving on the Wharf, luckily it was less than a five minute walk, within the hour i was back at Circular quay and catching the bus back to Randwick. Rest of the evening I just chilled and watched TV.

The following day the weather was back to being cold and raining. I had arranged to meet my Aussie friend Annie, who shall we say I had become acquainted with back in 2007 when i came to Sydney.  She was familiar with Randwick and agreed to come to me. We had lunch and chatted for a good few hours, since seeing her she had joined the police force and had some interesting stories to tell. It was great to catch up with her. She left around 4ish and again with the weather being rubbish just chilled out for the rest of the evening.

The following day I rose early and headed down into the City with Lorna who took me to 'Paddy's Market'. She had told me about this the night before and thought I would have a wonder round. On getting to the market I soon realised that I had in fact been there the last time I was in Sydney. Lorna had to shoot off to work and left me to my own devices. I wondered around the market, not really in the shopping mood, so headed to find breakfast. I was soon heading towards Darling Harbour, again I had been here before but remembered I liked it, the sun was trying to break through but with no success and soon it was pouring with rain. With this I decided to fork out $60 to see the Sydney Aquarium, Wildlife centre and Sydney Tower, an apparently 'superb' deal. If i am honest I had seen enough animals, with Singapore Zoo and Taragon Zoo earlier in the week but as the weather was not on my side and these were all in doors I thought fcuk it. The Aquarium and Wildlife centre were actually not bad with the highlight being a 5m, 750KG salt water crocodile, that was one big Croc. After my animal fix I headed for Sydney Sky tower, i was looking forward to this. The tower stand's in the Centre of the CBD and is the highest building in Sydney as well being the second highest observation tower in the Southern hemisphere. The rain had now stopped and the sun had made an appearance, so I was looking forward to some good views and pic's. However this was not to be the case, enter 'Captain Unco', (cpt unco is the name given to me by Kate from India, as I kept doing stupid things, 'Unco' short for uncoordinated) from the time of leaving the Wildlife centre to getting to the tower, which by the way is all of a 15min walk, I had lost my bloody ticket, I searched all my pockets and emptied my rucksack, it was no where to be seen, I had dropped it or I like to think that I had been pick pocketed, even though i had still had my wallet. Another ticket was going to be around $30 and by this point i just wanted to go home, so angry with myself for having another 'Unco' moment i stormed to the bus stop and headed back to Randwick. I grabbed some food from the shopping mall and decided that a run was needed to elevate some of my frustration. I did the same route as before down to Coogee beach, though i must have been so tired as it felt like i was running with concrete in my trainers. All week i had been saying that i wanted to go to the Blue Mountains. lack of motivation and rubbish weather, I had put it off. Ed had said the night before that Friday was supposed to be nice, so when i was down at the harbour, booked a day trip to the Blue Mountains, which included 'Featherland Wildlife Park' (more animals), 'Scenic world' which was a tourist haven spot for views of the Blue Mountains and a River Cruise back into Sydney Harbour, all for $90, I was looking forward to it. In the evening after Lorna and Ed had got home from work, myself and Lorna headed to Bondi Junction, Lorna needed a few things and i needed to return a T-shirt i had bought at the weekend. On returning we just watched some TV and had an early night.

So, it would seem i have done quite a bit this week and also had some chill time on an evening. I guess with Asia coming up in a few weeks, were I really think I may turn into a Alcoholic for a few months, i should welcome the chilling time, and also with feeling so tired since getting here in OZ, I am catching up on sleep. I have decided to write a separate blog for the Blue Mountains as this one was getting to be epic, which i guess your all used to be now. I'll post the Blue Mountains after this one. Thanks for reading as always.

Sunshine, Feeling Good And Lion's

G'day followers.. I must admit since arriving in Sydney i have been mildly depressed, mainly due to being so tired and of course the rain, wind and coldness. OK, i know that its still only spring and living in England for 32 years i should be used to it, I guess hearing of 30 degree heat before i arrived i was expecting more. I didn't get to sleep until 3am this morning, no reason other than i didnt feel tired, i some how even though the time difference from India is only 4 hours and Singapore being even less at 2 hours, seem to be suffering from Jet lag. However, i believe i am now all sorted and body clock back to normal and i rose this morning around 8ish. After breakfast of eggs and weetabix and a shower i was full of beans and ready to face the world.

I decided i would head over to Taronga Zoo. I caught the bus down to Circular Quay which is right next to the Wharf where i would catch the ferry over to Taronga Zoo, a short 15minute crossing. I had the day before purchased a 'MultiTicket' travel card. This is a god send and at a $41 dollars a bargain. It allows me unlimited travel on Buses, trains and ferry's for a whole week, which means i can pretty much anywhere within Sydney, i think for a Tourist its as i say a bargain and very handy. So i was just about to board the ferry when i went to turn my camera on.. nothing.. dead.. cant be i thought i had charged it all night, then of course it dawned on me, i opened the battery compartment and it was empty, 'captain unco' strikes again (private joke from India, will explain another time) i had of course left the battery in the charger. As the Ferry crosses the harbour straight in front of Sydney bridge and the Opera house as well as great view's of the CBD (central business district) i really wanted my camera. So about turned away from the Ferry and set looking for a camera shop, one, luckily was not far away. 10mins later i was on the Ferry, $40 dollars down and in possession of a brand new canon battery. The weather was around 17degrees not cold but still no sun. As i sat on the outside of the ferry looking at the Sydney bridge, Opera house and tall high rise buildings i soon remembered how much i loved Sydney (for those of you that dont know this is my 3rd time here) there something about it that makes me feel good, happy and content, i really could easily leave here. Everything is accessible and getting around seems to be a breeze, perhaps spending so long in India, anything is easy now. I arrived at the Zoo purchased my ticket for $44 and set about exploring the zoo. WOW. OK, its just a Zoo but its by far the best Zoo i have been to. Now i may not have visited every Zoo in the world and i am sure that there are some amazing Zoo's around the world but for a city Zoo this was pretty awesome. It had every animal you could think of, all the Australian animals of course, Wallabies, Kuala's, Kangaroo's, Tasmanian devils and so on. Its also had, Elephants, Crocodiles, Alligators, Giraffe's, all kind of reptiles, Gorilla's, Sea-lions,  you name it, Taronga Zoo had it. Now i haven't mentioned Lions, Tigers or Leopards, the reason being is that i wanted to give them a special mention. Big cats are my favourite animals, they had 4 Lions, 3 females and a male, of course they were behind protected glass but they were not shy, and came right up to the glass, they were beautiful and magnificent. I know i maybe making a big deal of it, but they really are beautiful creatures, i think so much so for the first time in my blog's i have added one of my photo's, as you can see above. (alright, alright perhaps i just realised you could do it, so you'll be seeing more from now on). So after taking a million photo's of the Lion's i headed for lunch at a cafe which overlooked the harbour. After lunch, at last, finally, thank god, the sun made an appearance, this added to my already relaxed and chilled mood and thought 'yep, life is good today'. I wondered around another hour so, seeing a Snow Leopard and  an enormous bear, which was cool and many other animals, however i didn't get to see what i really wanted to see and that was the tigers, they seemed to be a little shy today and though I waited for what seemed an eternity (maybe 10mins) they didn't want to play ball. I headed back to the ferry, now with the sun out, managed to take some great pictures of the Sydney Bridge, Opera house and down town Sydney, as sad as some of you may think i am for getting another battery, i was glad that I did.


I headed back home, picking up one of my favourite snacks on the way, Suishi! YUM!. The rest of the evening was made up of chilling, sorting and deleting the 300 odd photo's i had taken and watching TV, not before though going for a 30min run down and along Coogee beach, very nice beach and will hopefully be attending this again with sun lotion and beach towel!! Oh yes i was feeling good again.



(thought i'd add another picture in, now that i know you can and how to do it).

Seeing all the animals today at the Zoo, especially the big cats made me think about my next big trip, and when i say think i mean not left my mind, i have to go to Africa, maybe next year or should i say definitely next year, the old cliche, 'The world is my Oyster'

Just want to say thanks to all of you that read my blogs, i get stat's for each post and can see the numbers are still the same as when i started, I hope you enjoy reading them, i know i do babble sometimes but good to see people still following me. Just to let you know, if your new i only post on FB the latest post, if you want to read post's from the past you can select them on the right hand side of my blog page or just visit http://ruffysworld.blogspot.com which will take you to the start, come on peeps i know you all now going to hit that 'add to favourites button' ;o).

'If you put your mind to it, you can achieve anything and everything'

Sydney, Bavarian Cafe, More Shopping and Bad Weather

Hello from Sydney. Hope you are all well and good? So i last blogged on Thursday having spent the day on Sentosa island in Singapore. I decided after a heavy night the night before that i would have a quiet, chilled night in the hostel as i had to be up at 6am the next morning for my flight to Sydney. It was a quiet night but ended up being a late one. Lots of backpackers arrived that day due to the Singapore grand prix starting the next day, there wasn't a bed free in the whole place. I ended up chatting to a bunch of Aussies, sharing travel stories, they were especially intrigued to hear about 'incredible India'. So after many a laugh, piss taking and pom bashing i hit the hay at 3am! I had found 2 other girls also leaving for the airport at the same time so we agreed to share the taxi fare, bonus, especially with the amount of Singapore dollars I had put into the local economy in my short stay. I rose at 6.15am, showered paid up and was at the airport for 7.30am, still in good time for my 9.40am flight to Sydney. It was all going too swimmingly, of course this was about to change. At the check in desk I managed to place myself in a queue which had a family of 6 who about 100 bags, it took around 15mins just to process them alone. 25mins later i was heaving my rucksack on to the conveyor belt, i handed my passport over, after few bashes of the keyboard the lady asked me for me Australian Visa, i stared at her with a 'WTF you on about' look, I explained that it should have been all sorted by my travel company who i booked the RTW ticket with and that they advised that it was all electronic and on the system. After a few more bashes of the keyboard she politely explained that i didn't have a visa! Magic i thought, it was the middle of the morning in the UK so I couldn't even contact the my flight company! The nice lady explained i could buy one for $75 dollars and i could still make my flight. I was sent to Quantas customer services where though frustrated, just wanted to get a Visa and be on my way. I gave my details and was asked to take a seat, 30mins later i had my visa, checked in made my way to my gate still with 30mins to spare. It was only on the plane that it dawned on me that i hadn't paid $75 and nor did they ask for it, Result! The flight was 7hours and must admit went pretty quick, i think because of how great the service and plane was. It was a brand new Boeing 380, it was bright, super clean and airy. The in flight service was top notch and by far the best airline service i had ever experienced. I was handed a menu of the food, snacks and drinks and when they would be served throughout the flight, including an ice-cream. The entertainment system was certainly top of the range with plenty of films, TV programs (with lots of different genre to choose from) music and games, the piste a resistance was an option called 'Skycam', this enabled you to watch the whole flight from a camera in the tail fin, as you can tell i was pretty impressed, watching take off and landing from that view was pretty cool.. fair play Quantas, overall, excellent airline.

So i arrived in Sydney at around 6.45pm and was greeted by my English friends who are currently working and living here on a sponsorship, Ed and Lorna. I stepped outside the airport, i knew it had been good weather all week, however that had certainly changed, Ed and Lorna advised it had been up to 31 degrees that day, i found it hard to believe as it was now around 12 degrees, it was freezing and the rain was soon to follow. We had a short 15min journey to their apartment in Randwick, which is about 20mins from central Sydney. Their place is a one bed modern flat, its pretty spacious and has a big balcony on the first floor, the view isn't the best but nice place, my bed for the next 10 days was a mattress on the floor in the open kitchen/lounge, was just perfect and a also found out that night, pretty comfy, not too shabby for little Ruffy, not too shabby at all. I slept like a log and even slept to about 10am the following day, unheard of for me with my usual 6am energetic starts, i clearly was tired and my body was enjoying the home comforts. It was Saturday, raining and cold, my plans for the beach an getting a tan faded away. So we hopped on the bus to Bondi Junction, and went shopping. I clearly hadn't shrugged off my shopping fever! I left the mall a few hours later with a unlocked mobile phone which cost only $30 and allowed you to have to sims in it at once, of which you can switch between very easy, 2 T's, a pair of 'going out' shoes costing $150 (they are pretty sweet) and $30 dollars top up for my new phone, along with a few other bits and bobs. And the spending didn't stop there, on the way back we stopped at the supermarket and i picked up food for the week, at least i wont be spending loads on takeaways and restaurants. I am very surprised how expensive it is here, definitely on par with London prices, i guess being one of the biggest cities in the world, i shouldn't be too surprised. That evening myself and Ed headed out to a local entertainment center to meet one of his friends, Gary that Ed worked with, Gary is Irish who now had permanent citizenship. We ordered some food and had a few beers. we had headed out early, around 5ish as Gary and his mate Kev (who joined us around 6ish) were off to a comedy club at 7. They shot off and Ed and myself chatted, watched England smash Romania and of course sank a few more Schooner's (for those of you that don't know a schooner is not a pint nor is a half pint, its in between). At around 9 Gary and Kev had finished in the comedy club and headed to another bar in the complex, the 'Bavarian bier cafe'. This place was very cool and had loads of character, the food was supposed to be amazing and waitress' dressed in tight German style waitress uniforms which produced some great cleavage, not that i had noticed, it was only when Gary had pointed this out had I noticed.. of course! The cafe of course was all about the beer, mostly from Europe, there was plenty to choose from and a choice of sizes, Schooner, 500ml and a whole litre, which would have set you back $20 per glass. We sat chatting, drinking  and getting slowly drunk. Gary and Kev who i will mention at this point in their 30's treated us to some rather interesting and hilarious of tales of times when they had shit themselves!! yeh not really dinner talk but very funny nether the less and by this point we were well on our way anway! Gary and Kev left around 11pm, we decided stay for a few more and of course the inevitable happened, we started on the whisky's. We soon got chatting to a local couple, Jody and Rob by all accounts also had, had a fair amount of drink, they seemed to have a strange relationship and Jody who i will mention was pretty hot kept stroking mine and Ed's leg's at every opportunity, she seemed a little unstable with a couple of outbursts of tears.. very random but they were both a good laugh. We left at around 1am but not before the barman had said to Ed very smuggly if you can flick a dollar coin into a glass behind the bar the round of whisky's you just bought are free, of course first go Ed popped the one dollar straight into the glass.. Mr Barman was no longer looking so smug but Ed sure was.. good work Edward. We finally got kicked out as we were the last ones to leave, it was pissing down and blowing a gale the four of us shared a taxi not before getting soaked to the bone and headed home.

That brings us up to today, must admit i was feeling hanging, more tired than anything, Lorna was out for the day, myself and Ed had your typical hangover day, TV, PlayStation and of course KFC, the colonel always seems to be calling me after a night out! Yes before you say it, i did buy food the day before so i wouldn't eat fast food, this however was a special occasion!!!! I am sure you understand. Keep well peeps.

PS. Its still raining and hasn't stopped and is fcking freezing! the sun better return soon, i need a tan! and having heard from Caz who is still in India, now travelling through GOA i am nore envious as she advised me that its been in the 30's and they had been sunbathing getting burnt and awesome tans! NOT jealous at all!!! Grrrr.

Supreme Singapore

Hello peeps.. Well i have to say i am loving Singapore, I loved India also but in a different way. I could very, very easily live here. So last night i did end up getting my gladrags on and meeting up with my friend Steve for food and more than 1 or 2 drinks. Steve gave me so directions of where to meet him which meant me using the MRT. The MRT is the underground tube which runs all over Singapore. I must admit i was more than impressed with it. If you compare it to the London underground, its 5* where as London would be only just pushing 2*. It was amazingly clean, it was air conditioned throughout, it was spacious and airy, you didn't even know that you were few hundred feet underground. Even when you were on it, it didn't feel like a train, it was fast and smooth, Singapore underground really is the dogs bollox!!! So I met Steve in Somerset, which hosts 'Orchard Rd' which is infamous for shopping malls and rows of shops, a Shopaholics heaven. At the top of one the big malls there was a huge food court we had some good food for pretty much nothing, a huge contrast from the dinner i had the night before, i think it was around $7, only a $110 less than my fish dinner the night before. So we chatted and caught up and then wondered to a bar just round the corner. Wednesday night is ladies night in Singapore, Ohhhh what a coincidence, it was busy, busy busy! lots of ladies and of course lots of men trying to pull the ladies, of course i was not one of them. We hit the bar and straight into the cocktails, which by the way were only a dollar less than the beer, even the local stuff! weird, even weirder was that they had 'Tetley' bitter on tap! Brilliant. We also had a free flowing bowl of monkey nuts, of which the custom is just to drop the shell on the floor, again for a city so anal on being prim and proper, a little strange. We then headed down to Clarke Quay were all the action was, we found a club and Steve's famous last words were 'just a couple mate, got to get up in the morning'. It was $28 to get in but included 2 drinks, the place was packed to the rafters. Around 3am Steve chipped off and i stayed a little longer but not much, the long island ice tea's had taken their toll. I staggered back to the hostel, of which i am sure i took the scenic route. Good night though, thanks Steve.


I awoke today not feeling too bad despite less than 4 hours sleep. It was peeing with rain, so chilled out until lunch and then myself and Irene headed out. The plan was to go to Sentosa. Sentosa is an Island just off the Harbourside. Formerly known by the rather unattractive name of Pulau Belakang Mati ("The Island After Death" in Malay) and the cente rpiece of Britain's spectacularly unsuccessful "Fortress Singapore" strategy in World War II, Sentosa has been rebranded and resculpted into one big tourist attraction, popular among Singaporeans as a quick island getaway. The island is accessible a number of ways, we chose to go by Cable car. The views from the car were awesome, you could see the Singpaore port, and the high rise buildings of the city centre. The ride was only 10mins. There is plenty of things to do on the island. Underwater sea world, universal studios, casino's, beaches you name its there. We had bought some sort of package ticket which included Sea world and also a 3D log ride. The 3D log ride was awesome, you sat in a 6 seater cabin thing and then watched a huge 3D screen which was a film about logging, yes i know sounds weird but its hard to explain it on here, anyway the cabin thing moved you had huge fans blowing on you, it was a great 15min ride and  I actually felt a little sick afterwards. We then rolled down to Sea World, were we watched a cool dolphin show. The most random thing i have done this trip then happened ( well maybe the Rat temple is the strangest thing) I fed a Stingray, that's right a stingray took squid straight from my hand, pretty cool though. We wondered around for a while longer and then caught the cable back to mainland. We jumped on the MRT and headed for Chinatown for some food. There were plenty of places to choose from included a Vietnamese place, the food and especially the spring rolls were awesome!!! 


Now back in the hostel, its my last night here, I could have been telling you tomorrow about an awesome night with Steve who had tickets to 'Fashion TV', i am gutted i couldnt go or more to the point couldnt really afford to, i would have to have bought shoes and a new shirt and the the table alone would have been $100 each!! Even writing now i am regretting not going, but with the money i have spent already or should i say wasted on my first night dinner and the fact that i have a 6am start i think its a wise choice to sit this one out, Sorry Steve! next time my friend, i am sure i will return.


So tomorrow i head for Sydney where i'll be staying with my friends Ed and Lorna for a week or so, its farewell to Singapore, in a way thankfully, i am sure i would be bankrupt within a week if i stayed. We had 'Incredible India; and now i am giving Singapore the name 'Supreme Singapore'. 


Its been expensive Singapore and you ruined me but it has been a pleasure.

Singapore slings, Raffles And Money, Money, Money

Hello from Singapore... So i arrived yesterday in the one of the wealthiest and most highly developed countries in the world. What a difference from India, high rise buildings, overly clean, efficient, wealthy, shopping malls galore and EXPENSIVE!!! I have arrived 3 days before the Singapore grand prix and for those of you not familiar with the Singapore grand prix its run at night, it looks spectacular on TV i am sure its just as amazing watching in person, unfortunatley i was unaware the race was this weekend and having spent £200 changing flights previously to stay longer in India i opted not to change them again, its a real shame and in the back of my mind i am still thinking i should stay and watch, though after less than 24hrs here I have already spent over £600 dollars but will come to that shortly, so i think the less time here the better. 

On arrival i still hadnt a hotel or hostel, my friend Steve who lives here suggested a hotel but when i rang they wanted $160 dollars a night (by the way its about £1 = $2.2 Singapore dollars). I contacted Steve, still sat in the airport, within 15mins he had booked me into the 'River City Inn' hostel based next to the Clarke Quay in central Singapore. He said he had put a deposit down and looked nice. I jumped in a taxi and within 20min was outside the hostel, it didnt look the greatest and the driver advice it was on the 3rd floor. I was soon to find the exterior was more than misleading, the hostel is probably one of the best i have stayed in, shoes off before entering, wooden floors, modern with free WIFI, clean hot showers and 4 man dorms, a very cool communal area which allows you to mingle nicely with other backpackers, 4* hostel i would say and its popular, not a single bed free, i was lucky to get in especially with the Grand Prix so close. So i dumped my stuff, showered and chilled on the sofa's, caught up on emails and my blog and then headed down to the quay. Here is where I realised how expensive Singapore is. My aim was a big fat beef steak after no beef for 6 weeks in India, that soon changed when i came across a seafood restaurant, only my favourite food. I ordered a whole fish and egg fried rice with of course a 'Tiger' beer. The fish was out of this world and so it should have been, at this point i ask you to take a seat, now don't get me wrong i didn't check the price, which was mistake one and the biggest mistake i'll probably ever make, i knew it wouldn't be cheap but thought i'd treat myself after 6 weeks of Curry's! so are you ready?!?!? $117 dollars, yes you read that right, $117 dollars, now i will also point out that this was no fancy establishment, it was on the quay which was nice, but it was outside, under a canopy with menu's and signs which clearly were 20 years old and faded in the sun and paper table cloths! So for 1 fish, 1 fried rice and a tiger beer (which was $8 dollars alone) i paid around £60 for one person! I sat there for a moment wanting to ask the guy whether i should bend over the table also then decided fcuk it, sucked it up, paid and left to walk around quay, putting the cost out of my mind, you only live once! The quay was surrounded by skyscrapers and beautifully lit hotels and walk bridges, there were more restaurants which i told myself surely were way more expensive that the one i had just been in but i doubted this thought, there were also lots of bars. The quay was horseshoe shaped on the other side i could here a pretty loud sound system, i wasn't really dressed for entering the bars but thought i'd take a peak. The bar/restaurant was packed to the rafters and guarded by many bouncers, as i walked by who did i see, yep the one and only 'Martin Brundle', i was soon to realise everyone was dressed in designer clothes, glittering jewellery and stank of money, it was an F1 party!! I tried to stare in for any further sighting's of celeb's but was starting to get a few stares myself from the bouncers, so i moved myself on.  I wondered back to the hostel and by now it was gone midnight. Got into my bed and slept the best i had in many weeks.

I awoke today, refreshed, feeling clean and raring to explore Singapore, i had met a couple of people, Henry from just outside Sheffield and Irene a teacher from Amsterdam. I invited both to join me, Henry had stuff to do but Irene was up for exploring. So we set off in search of China town. As some of you know Singapore is famous for electronics, especially Camera's. Within the hour i had parted with another $300 dollars, i had bought a new lens for my Canon 1000D, the lens i had was only 18mm - 55mm, i wanted the wide angle of the 18mm still but wanted more zoom but didn't want to be changing lens every 2 mins, so i went for a 18mm-200mm, having used  this afternoon, i am well happy with my purchase. We wondered round china town for a while and grabbed some lunch, this time spending less than $15 for 2 beers, huge prawn dish and beef fried rice, man i was seriously robbed on the quay! After lunch we headed for the infamous Raffles hotel. For those of you that don't know, Raffles is famous for the cocktail 'Singapore Sling' and originated from the hotel. We didn't actually go into the hotel, i really think i would have been asked to leave within seconds of stepping through the door but of course they still want to take advantage of silly tourists who are willing to pay $26 dollars for a Singapore Sling at the infamous Raffles Hotel, so they have a pretty smart outside circular bar, something you would see on a fancy beach in the Maldives or Bora Bora. Of course not  to disappoint Mr Raffles, myself and Irene pulled up a stool and ordered a $26 dollar cocktail, i must admit this was another fcuk it moment but the cocktail was amazing! Sinking the first ones pretty quick, it would have been rude not to have another, so we did!! After we had finished the second ones and paid the $115 dollar bar bill for 4 cocktails we headed back to the hostel, en-route walking past part of the F1 circuit, even if we could only get within 50m of it.

So here I am, chilling back at the hostel writing to you good people, i think after a rather expensive 24hrs i may stay in tonight, though i did see a bar offering 3 big bottles of Tiger beer for $15, Mmmm.. decisions, decisions!! Hope everyone is well, despite having spent a small fortune since arriving in Singapore, I love the city and the people, there are many, many westerners here but you still get a feel for the Asian side too. Speak soon followers and keep well.

Kate's Second India Poem...

Part two of our awesome adventure began in crazy Delhi.

We watched 'Who wants to be a millionaire' while filling up our bellies.

We got three new people that we didn't have before,

and got annoyed at our taxi drivers who took us to their friend's store.

Our explorer Carlotta with her growler is the Lonely Planet guru,

She got covered in pink powder in Jodphur and loves to chat about poo!

There's our smiley Scot Katie  who managed to get a seriously bung eye,

She's popular with the locals and will give anything a try.

Then there's well-travelled Roland or Rolski with guts made of steel,

He loves a sly comment and a Kingfisher with his chickpea curry meal.

We set off without Josh to see rats in Bikaner, then to the desert of Thar.

The camels hurt our arses but we enjoyed a rain-free night under the stars.

The Jaisalmer hotel staff were cool and the fort was defintely a winner,

we shopped til we dropped, walked in cow shit and hoed down on curry and pasta for dinner.

We continued in the AC bus passing crazy horn trucks and weeing men in Jodphur city,

where we learnt to cook on the ground with spices and some people's bums got shitty.

We took ourselves audio touring in a fort that was big and old,

but the best part were the samosas, omelettes and lassis that the locals sold.

We did a homestay in style with a cool roof top and and a dog that was fat,

the food was seriously awesome and we survived one long-winded chat!

By now we'd embraced India with masala, head wobbles, saris, penises and chai,

As well as bananas, paneer, tuk-tuk rickkshaws, dead dogs and bloody flies.

 

Then our smelly group continued to Ajanta caves where we met a hawker or two.

Our guide talked his own form of speed English as he showed us around,

we climbed lots of steps , enjoyed the view and then another bush camp was found. 

Rafik and his fam overfed us again in the rain,

then the next day we only did a short drive so Paul could stay sane!

We camped in a hotel, had much needed showers and then ate something new,

we said hi to some monkeys, explored the Ellora caves and had time to relax too.

Quicker than we wanted, our awesome trip has come to an end,

In Mumbai the sexy 11 will become 5 but we'll leave with great new friends.

Thali, motorbikes, rupees, naan, turbans and packed buses will always stay in our minds,

Incredible India - a dirtier, louder, more poo, wee, cow, dog, goat infested country will be hard to find!!