In Memories of….

I know I have been lagging in my update but I was too tired on Thursday after watching How To Train a Dragon 3D and on Friday we celebrated my dad’s birthday.

In Sci-Fi City, one may find the following attractions: Accelerator, Battlestar Galactica – Human and Battlestar Galactica – Cylon. Transformers will only be ready in year 2011.

Battlestar Galactica is an adaption from the Duelling Dragons in Universal Studio, Florida. It is currently the tallest duelling roller coaster in the world.

 The Cylon coaster (blue) is a suspended track with legs free with vertical loops , a Cobra roll, a zero-G roll and corkscrews. This coaster will also plunge into a 5-metre deep pit filled with artificial fog to give thrill seekers the sensation of a near miss with the ground.

The Human Viper Mark II is a seated roller coaster that zooms at 90km/h and propels one 14 storeys into the air.  This coaster does not have inversions. 

I did not get to try this pair of coasters on that day as there was no one who dared to take the coaster with me. I will give the Human coaster a try one day but I don’t think I will dare to give the Cylon coaster a try.

Accelerator is a whirling twirling attraction which spin guests around. I gave this a miss on that day as we have to cater time to queue for other attractions.

In this zone, you can find a pair of pretty robots on stilts. If you are lucky, you can catch them “pole dancing”.

This part is divided into 2 themes, Jurassic Park and Waterworld. However, Waterworld was not ready when I was there on Sunday.

Main attractions found here are Canopy Flyer, Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure, Waterworld, Amber Rock Climb and Dino-Soarin’.

The only ride I’ve taken in this zone is Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure. Here, up to 9 passengers may sit on a circular raft on relatively fast moving waters. Along the journey, one can see different dinosaurs ‘roaming around’. The highlight of this ride is when the raft is elavated to a height and plunge down from a Hydroelectric Plant. As the raft is circular, one is not able to predict if the seat he has chosen will make him wet. I was one of the unlucky ones who was totally drenched from this ride.

Besides New York city, this is the only zone without any charactor appearance. Imagine taking picture with a Tyrannosaurus?

Far Far Away is inspired by the animation Shrek, a 2001 American animated comedy film. I personally would call it a ‘rojak’ fairy-tale made up of Pinocchio, The Little Pigs and Puss in Boots. Attractions like Shrek’s swamp house and Far Far Away Castle can be seen here.

Here, you can find Shrek 4-D Adventure, Donkey Live Show, Enchanted Airways and Magic Potion Spin. As time restriction is a limiting factor during my visit, I only managed to go for Shrek 4-D Adventure and Donkey Live Show.

In Shrek 4-D Adventure, the storyline goes that Princess Fiona is held captive and Shrek and Donkey will have to rescue her. You can feel the vibrations, water (Donkey’s saliva) and ’spiders on your feet’ from your own seats.

I personally find Donkey Live Show quite boring. Though Donkey is able to interact with the guests real-time, I do not find it amazing at all. Perhaps the reason is I am not a fan of talkshows all along.

Charactors appearances in this zone are Shrek, Donkey (I did not get to see him though), Puss In Boots and Princess Fiona.

Universal Studio Singapore (USS) opened its doors to its employees and family members as a sneak preview activity. As such, I had the privilege to visit the theme park and experience some of the rides and shows before its soft launch on 18th March 2010. The park was available to us from 9am to 2pm.

The ticket reads: RWS TM & FAMILY MEMBERS SNEAK PREVIEW. I guess RWS TM stands for Resort World Sentosa Team Members.

USS is the the 2nd Universal Studio in Asia and 1st in SEA. Although the park is only 20 hectares (about 1/6 the size of Hong Kong Disneyland), there are a total of 24 attractions although not all are ready in time for the year 2010.  It is made up of 7 themed zones: Far Far Away, The Lost World, New York, Sci-Fi City, Hollywood, Madagascar and Ancient Egypt.

Outside the theme park itself is the rotating USS globe.

Tickets prices for Adults (Ages 13 to 64) are as follow:

One Day Weekday Pass: $66
One Day Weekend Pass: $72
Two Day Pass: $118
Annual Pass-Fun Pass: $318
Annual Pass-Superstar Pass: $1098

I will try my best to blog about the 7 uniquely themed zones by this week.

Forest Adventure is an aerial course built through the trees comprising ladders, bridges, swings, nets, trapezes and giant zip lines.

10 of us, Guowei and girlfriend, Dawn, Guorong, Vernon, Nancy, Karen, Ethan, Jackie and I gathered at Bedok Reservoir Park at 10am to start our forest adventure activity.

We had instructors to demonstrate and brief us on the safety rules before we start on our course.

Zipping across the reservoir was so exciting!

When we reached a free-fall point where we had to do a “Tarzen Swing” to get to a net on the other side, Vernon who was afraid of  heights hesitated for a whole 3 minutes before he dared to jump.

The whole course took us about 2 hours and we were very dehydrated by the time we completed the course. Luckily for us, the weather was quite cloudy and the sun wasn’t very strong.  A prefect weather for such an outdoor activity.

On the 4th day of our Hong Kong trip we went to this restuarant @ Prudential Hotel for Dim Sum Breakfast (I honestly forgot the name of the restaurant but the dim sum is really good!)

My parents & I then went to Mongkok to buy the famous Wing Wah Wife Biscuits. Dad then bought another goose drumstick (his excuse: he won’t get to eat this back in Singapore). We then went to the ferry terminal to join Chae Siong and wife to take the ferry back to Macau.

I think we had too much good food in Hong Kong; we actually find food in Macau quite disappointing.

Later in the evening we went to to the casino in Venetian Macau.

We went to Ocean Park on the 3rd day of our trip. It was a wise choice as that was the only day that did not rain throughout our trip. Dad said we were really lucky.

Dad was amazed by this Asia’s longest (or is it world’s longest) escalator.

I never had the courage to take this roller coaster, not to mention no one is accompanying me to take trill rides this time round!!!

I like this picture of my dad. This is one of his best pictures taken in our trip.

Dad’s tense face when we were on the ferris wheel.

The pandas’ cave has been renovated since my last trip. There’s even a raccoon section!!!

We later went to the peak. Pardon my poor night shots as I have shaky hands.

On the 2nd day of our trip, we went to 大屿山 and Disneyland.

There was a little bit of fog so the Buddha background became a bit blur in mum’s picture.

We have meant to take the cable car to the Great Buddha but dad has a little phobia of heights, so we decided to take the bus up and take the cable car down later, giving him the time to mentally prepare himself. However, it started to rain very heavily so we aborted the idea and took bus 23 back to Tsing Yi Station.

For those who love shopping for good buys, please note that Citygate Shopping Centre beside Tsing Yi MTR is occupied by factory outlets of international brand names like Nike, Addidas, Club21, Levi’s, Espirit etc whose prices are 30-70% cheaper than what you find in the actual boutiques though the designs may be one season older.

When we reached Disneyland, it was still drizzling. Nevertheless, we still managed to have fun on the rides and watch the fireworks.

The day ended with my favourite dessert shop in Hong Kong, 许留山.

I went to Hong Kong & Macau with my parents, Chae Siong & wife last month. Jackie has decided not to join us at the last minute so I had to share a room with my parents. We took the plane to Macau and transferred to Hong Kong via ferry on the 1st Day. I had seasick on the one hour ferry trip. By the time we reached Prudential Hotel in Kowloon, it’s already late evening and all of us were famished.

Dinner was roasted rice near Temple Street. We had roasted goose drumsticks, roasted pigeon, roasted pork, char siew and vegetables. Look at how oily the goose drumsticks are!!!

On 22nd of April, Jackie and I set off to the city of Hong Kong, leaving Kookie and Rinko behind in Singapore.

We arrived in Hong Kong airport @ 10.35am and set off to Nathan Hotel on Airport Express. Jackie was fascinated with the Hong Kong transport system.

The 1st reaction I had when I went into the hotel room was: Oh no!! No bathtub!! How am I going to soak my sore legs after shopping???

Lunch was roasted meat rice as what I’d promised Jackie on the plane and silly him actually asked if we can have that for every meal.

After lunch, we went shopping around Mongkok area. We bought a doggy bed for our dogs and 3 harness for Wonka, Rinko and Kookie at Women’s Street. We also went into several pet shops in Fa Yuen Street and also learnt that Pomeranian is known as 松鼠狗 in Cantonese. Jackie bought himself 2 pairs of shoes from Fa Yuen Street and 2 boxes of Gundam Models from Kwong Wa Street. We also had dessert in my favourite shop, 许留山.

In the evening, we went to to Avenue of Stars and also watched Light of Symphony show.

Before we ended the day, we went to Temple Street for a short walk.

New Year Day was celebrated at Singapore Zoological Gardens with my family. It’s a pity that Dad and Jackie couldn’t join us on the ‘excursion”.

The last time I went to the zoo was 16 years ago when Inuka, the 1st and only polar bear born in the tropics was born. There’s currently 2 polar bears in Singapore. However, the hot climate in Singapore is unsuitable for polar bears and the bears are reported to have shown abnormal behaviour due to heat stress. ACRES (Animal Concerns Research and Education Society) has called for the Zoo to send Inuka away when his mum passes away. Inuka’s mum, Sheba at the age of 29 has way past the normal life expectancy of a polar bear of 25 and is too old to withstand the travelling.

I did not get to watch any animal show this trip but I got to see a sesame plant for the 1st time of my life. I also saw turtles mating and got to touch and feed goats for the very 1st time.