April 17th, 2025

Very hard to sleep on a disembarkation day even if you are not the one disembarking. The announcements start at 7am and even though they are not broadcasting into the room you can still hear the chime that they play before every announcement. There were constant announcements from 7am, every 15 minutes until 10am. By 10am all disembarking passengers were off the boat.

We had no plans today except to wander around Singapore and make our way to Marina Bay Sands. We took the metro towards the harbor area. We got off the metro a little bit early so we could walk around town some. We noticed that the public parks had robotic lawnmowers parked at them. Singapore is famous for its cleanliness and everyone knows that you can’t chew gum in Singapore.

We stopped in a Starbucks for a frappacino for me and a coffee for Kathy.

The robotic lawnmower and the public urination fines.

We also saw these machines around town that had fresh oranges in them and for 2 dollars you got fresh squeezed orange juice. We did not try one but we were intrigued.

We walked through Chinatown where there are several historic buildings that line the waterfront and are now shops and eateries.

The historic buildings.

There was also some really great street art.

Air conditioning is common in Singapore and necessary but they don’t have central air in the older buildings just individual room units.

All the air-conditioning units behind the buildings.

We walked around the harbor to the Marina Bay Sands mall. The Marina Bay Sands hotel is such an iconic building.

They have started the ground work to build the 4th tower but they have a long way to go. The 4th tower was always in the plans and obvious that a 4th tower is missing when you look at the roof design.

Construction on the 4th tower.

When we stayed at the Marina Bay Sands last year we did not explore the mall right in front of the hotel so this time we walked the whole thing and found the massive food court. We shared a small plate of fried noodles and fried rice. We also managed to find another plastic case for my apple watch. In the couple of days that I did not have a cover on it I managed to scratch it up some so happy to have a new cover.

All the people at the food court and then looking down at the circular food court from above. The blue round floor was an interactive floor for the kids to play on.

We went up to the roof of the mall and looked around and then used the elevated walkway to cross over to the hotel and then through the hotel to the Gardens by the Bay which is a giant park.

They have a collaboration with Disney World going on and this giant Mickey was made out of flowers just like the rose parade.

It was very hot and humid so after an hour of walking around we started heading back to the metro. All on board was at 4:30. We made it back to the boat at 3:30 with an hour to spare. Sail away was right on time.

Some of the modern condos near the port.

All the cargo ships waiting for their time slot at one of the ports for loading and unloading around Singapore.

We had a very short distance to go to our next port, Malacca, Indonesia.