SINGAPORE- Merlion Park

Merlion Park


Gulp, gulp..... my son was so thirsty :-)




Singapore Flyer- is the current largest Ferris wheel in the world



Skyscrapers in Singapore


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Our vacation in Singapore was short and unplanned but we....ooppps not we...it's "I" decided to stay there for 2 days hehehe since we had free flight we might as well enjoy it before heading to Philippines.

June 18, 2009- We arrived in Singapore around 5pm in Paya Lebar Air Base and took a taxi from there to the Navy Lodge. It's surprising that taxi driver can take credit cards otherwise we don't have any singapore dollars to pay the driver (there's no money exchange inside the airbase). We're supposed to stay in my brother's flat but plans changed and we opted to stay in Navy Gateway Inns and Suites managed by the US Navy in Sembawang; it's close to Sembawang Shipyard where my brother works. The price per night is $80 but the room is so huge, it has 3 bedroom, with large living room, large kitchen, a large dining room and two bathrooms :-) It can accomodate 3 families. One thing I don't like it, it looks haunted building outside but that's ok as long it's cheap hehehe. We only used 1 room for 4 of us. The air base and inside the navy lodging facilities prohibit taking photos (I don't know why even in a lodging facilities) so I don't have any photos :-( but you can still find their photos when you google them hehehe. By the way, we ate dinner in my brother's flat.

June 19, 2009- My brother and his gf went to our hotel to pick us up; we walked from the hotel down to the Sembawang MRT station. I think it was a 20 minute walk. We were so exhausted, that day... it was really hot! From the cold climate to tropical..... whoaah way too hot to manage! We left Misawa with a temperature of 14C and Singapore was like 30C++. We were sweating, my son hated the weather and kept complaining :-) oh well he had no choice but to walk hehehe.
We took the MRT to Orchard Road and bought tickets from Singapore to Manila from a travel agency. We paid around US$500 for 4 of us, not that bad since our flight was the next day.

From Orchard Road we took the bus to somewhere where I bought my lens cover ( I lost mine when we were walking to MRT) and we walked again to Merlion Park. What a day, it's really hot and humid. From Merlion Park we took the MRT going back to the hotel. We ate dinner in a fast food restaurant, forgot the name.

June 20- hmmmm that would be on my next post hehehe

Esplanade Singapore

Esplanade, Singapore


Our vacation trip:

We were able to fly through space A from Yokota Air Base to Paya Lebar Airbase, Singapore for free. It was a 7-hr flight. I thought the plane was a C-130 but it's DC-8 (4 engine jet liner) thank God, it's not hehehe otherwise it if it's a C-130 we would be wearing earplugs and there would be no windows. We were only16 lucky passengers out of 32 seats available. So we enjoyed the free meals and snacks. That was an awesome trip!

We wandered around the city, the Orchard Road and the malls and we took the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) and the bus, that's another experience!


That's our plane's shadow while we were still on the plane

Shinkansen- First trip of my vacation

Tohoku Shinkansen (bullet train)



Hachinohe Train Station




Inside the bullet train (shinkansen)


My tickets, the first of the 3 tickets was already taken in Hachinohe Station, too bad I didn't have the chance to take the picture of it hahaha

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I'm back!! After 3 weeks of being gone from my blog....I'm finally home.

June 16, when we just decided to take the shinkansen or bullet train after 2 days of disappointments due to cancellation of military flights going to Clark, Philippines from here to Atsugi, Japan (US navy base).

There were mo flights available until Thursday (June 18) that week. My husband's vacation is only 3 weeks and we already wasted almost 2 days so we have to do something :-) and the last resort was to take the bullet train. We thought we could visit Philippines straight from here through *space A travel for free (how I wish hehehe).


We spent around 55,507 yen or ~ $578 for 4 of us in taking shinkansen to Tokyo and then to Fussa station. We got off the shinkansen in Tokyo and took another regular train going to Fussa station, this is the closest station to Yokota Air Base, Japan. We planned to take the *space A (military flight) from Yokota to Philippines or anywhere that would take us closest to Philippines.


It's our first time to ride the bullet train (me and my 2 kids)....how exciting!

By the way, we just left our "Pajero io" suv in the parking area at Misawa Train Station and what the h*** the sign on there that we couldn't even read and understand, they're in japanese kanji....so we took our risk of leaving our vehicle without knowing what would be the consequences of leaving that for 2 weeks or more hehehe.

It took us 3 hrs to get to Tokyo; by car it would probably take us 10 hrs drive. And another 2 hrs from Tokyo to Fussa. i t was raining that time, we took the cab to base's main gate for 700 yen ~ $7 and another cab from the main gate to hotel lodge on base where we stayed.

Oh, well that was the first day of our adventure.


Note:

*Space available travel is a privilege that derives, in part, from United States Code, title 10, section 4744, which states, "officers and members of the Military Departments, and their families, when space is available, may be transported on vessels operated by any military transport agency of the Department of Defense". Space available travel is defined as "travel aboard DoD owned or controlled aircraft and occurs when aircraft are not fully booked with passengers traveling under orders".- Wikipedia