Southeast Asia trip

[fosterscik]

DW and I have started to arrange a bucket list trip to SE Asia. We've booked a 21 day tour with Emerald cruises through Vietnam and Cambodia
https://www.emeraldcruises.com/tours/grand-tour-of-vietnam--cambodia/13198
So that's all set. We will also book a 12-day scuba diving trip in Indonesia
https://murexresorts.com/passport-to-paradise/
We plan to use Singapore as our arrival/departure point and to spend time there between these two different adventures. That's the reason for this post.
Do you have any suggestions about places to stay, things to do, places to eat in Singapore?

We also plan to book direct flights on Singapore airlines from JFK or EWR to SIN (claimed to be the world's longest nonstop flight). A brutal 19 hr flight but we think doable in business class.) Those flight plans may change to break up the travel into two legs, but we have some time before we need to finalize our plans.

 

[latexman]

Did you search and read the 11 threads on Singapore?

 

[explanade]

Only been to Singapore once.

Depends on how much you want to spend on hotels. You can spend well over $500 a night at a 5-star hotel overlooking Marina Bay, with a view room.

There are of course 4-star hotels and rooms without views.

People rave about the Hawker Food Halls. I went to a couple of them and maybe the food is very delicious but these Food Halls are not great presentation wise -- benches packed together, kind of like a lower-end food court at a mall, the tables are not bused or cleaned up.

Maybe following the pandemic, they clear them more frequently now as well as disinfect.

I opted for more pricey but cleaner regular restaurants, mostly with Western cuisine.

Not really into bargain Chinese cuisine but they must offer fancier banquet type of Chinese food, more pricey, nicer settings, but I really didn't search too much for them.

With proximity to Thailand and India, one would think those cuisines would be available in Singapore.

 

[brett]

We have spent 5 winters in SE Asia and Australia. We always spend a month in Thailand, then time in Malaysia or fly on to Australia. Last time in Vietnam we did a month of travel from the south to the north. My spouse was hesitant to snowbird in Thailand at first. Now it is her first choice, then Costa Rica or Mexico.

We love Thai and Vietnamese travel. We typically eat in small family run restaurants or night markets. In five years we have only felt sick once...that was in a western style restaurant in Phuket. I believe that your notion that western style restaurants are inherently cleaner is misplaced.

We have done multiple cruises but never one to Thailand or Vietnam. Many of the attractions or beaches are well away from the port...hours in fact.

We stay in all sorts of places. Six star resorts, five star hotels through to small family run hotels. Some of our best experiences were in smaller places. Same for dining. We tend to avoid the hawker halls in favor of outdoor eating in the night markets and small, family run establishments.

We flew SFO-SIN on Untied. 17 hours or so. Highly recommend business lay down seats. No issue, we slept. We are accustomed to 10 and 12 hour flights in economy so 17 in a lie down business class seat was a doddle.

I cannot recall every eating Chinese cuisine in Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, or Singapore. But...we were not looking for it.

Lots and lots of good places to stay in Singapore and great restaurants. Singapore has a restaurant area with two or three streets of restaurants and outdoor dining. You can get Thai food (our favorite) just about anywhere. Hotels in Singapore are far more expensive than in Bangkok, Kuala Lumper, or Vietnam/Cambodia.

 

[brett]

delete

 

[fosterscik]

Thaks for the reply Brett

We have done multiple cruises but never one to Thailand or Vietnam. Many of the attractions or beaches are well away from the port...hours in fact.

Our cruise runs down the Mekong river and travels slowly. I think of if more as a floating hotel stopping regularly to visit various parts of Cambodia and Vietnam. It seemed an easy introduction to the region. If I were braver we may have hired a private guide

We stay in all sorts of places. Six star resorts, five star hotels through to small family run hotels. Some of our best experiences were in smaller places. Same for dining. We tend to avoid the hawker halls in favor of outdoor eating in the night markets and small, family run establishments.

I have read a lot about the hawker stalls, but I'll have to look out for other options.

We flew SFO-SIN on Untied. 17 hours or so. Highly recommend business lay down seats. No issue, we slept. We are accustomed to 10 and 12 hour flights in economy so 17 in a lie down business class seat was a doddle.

Great to hear. It may be a long time in a plane but if I can get comfortable and move around a little during the flight I think it is probably the best choice for us.

 

[fosterscik]

Thanks!

Not really into bargain Chinese cuisine but they must offer fancier banquet type of Chinese food, more pricey, nicer settings, but I really didn't search too much for them.

With proximity to Thailand and India, one would think those cuisines would be available in Singapore.

It looks as if there will be lots of choice. Virtually every cuisine available and with prices which vary from cheap to pricey. I'm sure we'll rely on various online guides to help us decide, but perhaps some of the people on this board will have specific recommendations (and good enough memories to recall them!).

 

[brett]

The challenge is that restaurants and offerings can change from one year to the next.

Limited travel during covid so our assumption is that there will have been a large turnover in restaurants and in small hotels.

One thing though. We enjoy Thai curry dishes. We tend to stay clear of the touristy areas...Ko Samui and Phuket. Have been there before. When we go to a local place we will ask for the dish for Thai people...that way we get the correct amount of spice in the dish for our taste. Some of the best food we have had has been in small mom and pop outdoor family run restaurants.

Air within SE Asia is very inexpensive. Does not cost much to fly from Bangkok to Siem Reap, or Bangkok to KL.

If you are going to be staying in either Bangkok or KL we have a places that we highly recommend.

 

[explanade]

Other thing I remember about Singapore, it's very humid so you don't see a lot of people outside.

Instead, you have all these passage ways between buildings or skyscrapers and virtually every skyscraper has a mall with food courts.

So you can walk a long distance without going outside and people prefer to stay in air conditioned spaces -- I just returned from Australia and Brisbane and Gold Coast has the AC running full blast but with doors open so as you walk by these big wide openings of malls and such, you feel the blast of the AC so I guess at least they don't seem to waste as much energy.

When I was there it rained a lot, so I really wasn't able to search for places with outdoor dining, which would be my preference since covid now exists. I guess along the river and by Marina Bay there would be outdoor cafes.

For Thailand, I haven't been but Bangkok supposedly has all kinds of food courts in malls with very good quality food for low prices. Sounds good but again, not for minimizing covid risk.

 

[anethum]

Hawker centres are a part of the culture of Singapore. You can eat superb food there. There are mouthwatering scenes in the movie "Crazy Rich Asians" at hawkers centres.

Singapore is majority ethnic Chinese but there are significant numbers of ethnic Indians and Malays there. The Indian food I ate in both Singapore and Malaysia was outstanding. My friend & I loved eating roti canai outdoors for breakfast each morning. It's a flatbread cooked on a griddle served with a delicious dipping sauce. You eat it with your hands.

The botanic gardens in Singapore was outstanding.

Here's an article about the food in Singapore and in the movie Crazy Rich Asians:

https://www.afar.com/magazine/master-singapores-street-food-crazy-rich-asian-style

 

[explanade]

Hawker centres are a part of the culture of Singapore. You can eat superb food there. There are mouthwatering scenes in the movie "Crazy Rich Asians" at hawkers centres.

Singapore is majority ethnic Chinese but there are significant numbers of ethnic Indians and Malays there. The Indian food I ate in both Singapore and Malaysia was outstanding. My friend & I loved eating roti canai outdoors for breakfast each morning. It's a flatbread cooked on a griddle served with a delicious dipping sauce. You eat it with your hands.

The botanic gardens in Singapore was outstanding.

Here's an article about the food in Singapore and in the movie Crazy Rich Asians:

https://www.afar.com/magazine/master-singapores-street-food-crazy-rich-asian-style

I read several articles about Hawker centers, went to a couple of them in Chinatown, again, just saw a lot of dishes piled up on tables and such.

They must have gone to some more bougie place in that movie, since the characters are suppose to be "crazy rich."


On Vietnam, I saw people cooking on the side walk, actually squatting over little grills. The vendors had the raw chicken meat in plastic containers and I guess they grilled it for you.

Didn't try it, there was no place to eat so you'd have to do takeout I guess?

Wonder if it's the same in Thailand.

So I went more to sit down places and some of them were great value, good food, like about $10-12.

 

[anethum]

There are lots of "night markets" in Thailand and Malaysia. I only saw a few night markets in more sparsely populated Laos. Night markets are similar but not quite the same as the more permanent hawkers centers in Singapore, but nonetheless you can eat very well at them. I never have gotten sick anywhere in SE Asia. BTW, covered (but often outdoor) food markets in Mexico are great places to eat, too. They're excellent for breakfast & lunch.

 

[YVRRocketSurgery]

We visited Singapore for the first time in May 2018 as part of a Singapore, Bangkok, and Japan trip. And we went again in June 2019 as the turnaround point for our mini-RTW trip. Found it pretty humid both times.

We stayed at the Southbridge Hotel for both trips. The rooms were relatively basic but nice enough, attached to a pub (no noise issues) on the edge of Chinatown. Our room didn't have a window though. $462SGD for 4 nights total.

Our main activity was checking out various neighbourhoods and anchoring them with a visit to a hawker centre. As mentioned by others, Singapore is a bit of a melting pot of different ethnic group with some concentrations in a few enclaves.
Certain hawker centres are better than others and not every stall is going to be a star. My fav is likely Maxwell Food Centre but you need to avoid the lunch rush. We did go to the Newton Food Centre for the satay sticks where CRA had a scene. It was ok. A bit of a trek.
I found most of the tables at the hawker centres cleared as people usually put their dishes/trash away but it's not always the case. We occasionally shared tables with locals and had some nice discussions about the differences and similarities between Singapore and Canada.
Singapore has some pretty high end buffets but we didn't partake since we can't eat a lot nowadays.

Singapore's "core" is relatively compact so I wouldn't overthink where to stay if you decide on a common tourist area, other than maybe not near the airport. We found getting around via MRT (metro/subway) and bus relatively easy using Google maps.

Favourite activity was likely Gardens by the Bay, exploring the grounds, paying for the Flower Dome and Cloud Forest, and the night show among the supertree grove. We also walked though the iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel and nearby/attached mall which was kind of interesting.
We also liked walking along the Singapore River at night from Clarke Quay to across the Helix Bridge and back which kind of takes you to the Merlion, Boat Quay, etc. Parts of the route aren't really "defined" though so we kind of had to figure out some parts.
Some of the B tier activities we did were visiting Santosa Island, doing the Southern Ridges walk, walking Orchard Road, etc

For our first trip, we picked up a tourist sim at the airport from Starhub for $32SGD which provided 100GB of local data and 5GB of roaming that we used for our next stops in Bangkok and Japan.

 

[chris2008]

In Feb 2020 we have stayed and enjoyed the 3 star hotel "30 Bencoolen". Nice, clean, good breakfast, rooftop pool. Book direct for early access and late check out.
Very walkable area, lots of nice restaurants around, see restaurants at Chijmes.
Public transport just around the corner.
Makansutra Gluttons Bay hawker center had a good reputation and held up to it. Nice view on the bay in the evening.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Early Retirement Forum mobile app

 

[fosterscik]

In Feb 2020 we have stayed and enjoyed the 3 star hotel "30 Bencoolen". Nice, clean, good breakfast, rooftop pool. Book direct for early access and late check out.
Very walkable area, lots of nice restaurants around, see restaurants at Chijmes.
Public transport just around the corner.
Makansutra Gluttons Bay hawker center had a good reputation and held up to it. Nice view on the bay in the evening.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Early Retirement Forum mobile app

This looks like a really nice hotel for the price. Thanks for the recommendation - we may try to stay there (especially with a nearby Hawker hall thumbs up!)

 

[Lancelot]

Other thing I remember about Singapore, it's very humid so you don't see a lot of people outside.

Agreed, super humid.

I used to get delicious meals in Singapore's covered, but open air, food courts. Most vendors have high turn over, so the food is fresh. Vendors serving spoiled or unappealing food seem to quickly go out of business.

 

[fosterscik]

We stayed at the Southbridge Hotel for both trips. The rooms were relatively basic but nice enough, attached to a pub (no noise issues) on the edge of Chinatown. Our room didn't have a window though. $462SGD for 4 nights total.

Really great price and about the same price in 2023. As others have said we'll have lots of choices in Singapore. Luckily we have time to decide.

Our main activity was checking out various neighbourhoods and anchoring them with a visit to a hawker centre.

We'll do much the same as well as many of the other attractions you mention

Favourite activity was likely Gardens by the Bay, exploring the grounds, paying for the Flower Dome and Cloud Forest, and the night show among the supertree grove. We also walked though the iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel and nearby/attached mall which was kind of interesting.
We also liked walking along the Singapore River at night from Clarke Quay to across the Helix Bridge and back which kind of takes you to the Merlion, Boat Quay, etc. Parts of the route aren't really "defined" though so we kind of had to figure out some parts.
Some of the B tier activities we did were visiting Santosa Island, doing the Southern Ridges walk, walking Orchard Road, etc.

 

[fosterscik]

The challenge is that restaurants and offerings can change from one year to the next.

Limited travel during covid so our assumption is that there will have been a large turnover in restaurants and in small hotels.

One thing though. We enjoy Thai curry dishes. We tend to stay clear of the touristy areas...Ko Samui and Phuket. Have been there before. When we go to a local place we will ask for the dish for Thai people...that way we get the correct amount of spice in the dish for our taste. Some of the best food we have had has been in small mom and pop outdoor family run restaurants.

Air within SE Asia is very inexpensive. Does not cost much to fly from Bangkok to Siem Reap, or Bangkok to KL.

If you are going to be staying in either Bangkok or KL we have a places that we highly recommend.

Unfortunately we'll only be unguided when we are in Hanoi, Singapore and Manado, so we can't pick your brain about those particular restaurants. Do you have any suggestions about how to find good family restaurants in new areas? In our travels we've had mixed results asking hotel staff - some have been real gems but I often think they are guessing what a tourist would want rather than suggesting where they would go.

 

[fosterscik]

Agreed, super humid.

I used to get delicious meals in Singapore's covered, but open air, food courts. Most vendors have high turn over, so the food is fresh. Vendors serving spoiled or unappealing food seem to quickly go out of business.

Luckily we've lived many years in the US deep south and while we don't enjoy humidity we can handle it

 

[brett]

We have found restaurant recommendations to be of little value. Probably even more so post covid.

The exception might be if you are looking for a traditional western meal which we are not.

We look for smaller, family run restaurants that at busy and that are packed with locals. Much as we do in Europe. Then we take our chances. Ninety percent of the time we have had great meals.

One place in particular we stopped at in Nha Trang. Small family run place with very low seats outside. Their English was as good as our Vietnamese. But we could figure out scallops on the shell and a Viet Version of Pad Thai. Lots of pointing, had signals. It was fabulous. But not as fabulous as the interactions that we had with various members of their family.

Our fav place in Baan Krut Thailand was an outdoor family run restaurant. The daughter of son would be helping our, in between doing their homework on the bar. Mom would be cooking up a storm in the little cook shack. Dad would be greeting, serving, or jumping on his motorcycle to go and buy cooking supplies. Best Thai food ever. Could not tell you the name even though we ate there for five nights in a row.

Our practice is to avoid restaurants where they have the menu in multiple languages and where the majority of customers do not appear to be locals. The very last place we want to eat is some place full of people with Rick Steves or similar guides in their pockets! By the time it makes it to the guide it is too late.

In Singapore we stayed at the the IBIS Bencoolen. Typical IBIS hotel. Breakfast was very good. Stayed four nights. Excellent value for Singapore. In the India district.

 

[Popsicletoes]

I've been to Singapore many times and I have to say, it's my least favorite cities in Asia because it's boring (and also the most expensive - especially now with the crazy inflation). But it's Asia 101 for folks who haven't been to Asia - it's super clean, most everyone speaks English, road signs are in English, great public transport, easy to navigate, etc. So it's a good place to start before you go to less urban Asian cities. But if you're into natural beauty, you won't find it in Singapore - everything is man made, including the beach on Sentosa Island. Orchard Rd is their main drag - and I recommend first time visitors to stay there because everything you need is within walking distance: shops, restaurants, subway (they call it MRT), etc. And when it's too hot and humid, just do what the locals do, duck into one of those gigantic malls to cool off.

If you're not into food court eating then you won't like hawker center. I should say that it's part of Singapore's culture and heritage and their hawker centers have much better food quality and varieties than US's food court. They have a Michelin Star hawker center food stall that serves Chicken Claypot Rice. That's the stall featured in Crazy Rich Asian movie, and no, it's not in a high-end hawker center (no such thing as high end hawker center), just a regular hawker center but because it's so good, the line to get it is very long (over one hour wait is normal).

You should try Singapore's 2 signature dishes: Hainanese Chicken Rice (Tien Tien inside Maxwell Rd Hawker Center is the most famous - even Gordon Ramsey and the late Anthony Bourdain were raving about it), chili crab or black pepper crab (Jumbo Seafood Restaurant is known for both) - they typically use imported giant mud crabs from Srilanka for these dishes. Try dim sum, too, while you're there.

Things to do in Singapore: check out Sentosa Island (you can take the taxi one way and the cable car on the way back to the mainland so you can see the place from bird eye's view), they have night safari if you're into that sort of thing, walk down Arab Street, check out chinatown and Little India. It's all about urban sights in Singapore.

I've also been on the JFK - SIN direct flight on Singapore Airlines. They use Airbus A350 ULR exclusively for these ultra long flights. It's a smaller airplane than A380 but the seats felt more spacious (1-2-1 configuration in business class). You should try Singapore Airlines at least once, their service is legendary for a reason and their food onboard is exceptional.

Re: Manado is much more gritty as compared to Singapore (most cities in Asia will be more gritty compared to Singapore) so I would hire a car with driver to get you around while you're there. Ask around people on Trip advisor for driver + car recommendations who can act as your private guide. Public transport is not that great outside of Jakarta (Indonesia's capital city), and if you're going on diving trip, there are many diving resorts that have restaurants onsite and they're all outside of Manado city. Local food in Manado is super spicy, FYI.

 

[fosterscik]

Great comments. Yes it's our first Asian trip so hopefully we will enjoy Singapore. And yes, scuba diving is the reason for the Manado visit. We stay at an all-in dive resort, so I expect we'll be sheltered from the most spicy food once there. But a good warning - at least for meals outside the resort. Private drivers won't be necessary as we have boat ferries between the 3 dive resorts we'll visit: Murex Manado, Murex Bangka, and the Lembeh Resort

 

[SecondAttempt]

Never been to Singapore but it is on my bucket list. Unfortunately I cannot help with your questions but would give you a heads up that several of the nature-related attractions are now closed because they are being relocated to a consolidated nature park. If you are interested in those, several of which are must-sees, you should probably do some carefule research.

 

[explanade]

BTW, the big hotels charge a lot for views of Marina Bay.

But they are spectacular.

https://www.panpacific.com/en/hotels-and-resorts/pr-collection-marina-bay/location.html

 

[brett]

We spent five winters in SE Asia since retiring. Thailand mostly, plus Vietnam, Malaysia two add on to Australia. Planning another trip back to Thailand in Feb/March.

Only four days in Singapore during those five years. We enjoyed Singapore, but not nearly as much as some other places in SE Asia. Four days was enough to take in the sights.