On January 17th we arrived in Ko Samui, Thailand after spending one day at sea on the Celebrity Solstice.  Most of our group had Concierge Veranda Staterooms on Deck 10 close together on this cruise.  We needed the day at sea to rest up after our Singapore tours and be ready to tour Thailand.  On the night of the 16th, we had paid for a specialty dinner for the entire group called La Petite Chef.  It is a very interesting meal with animated characters walking across your table preparing your food.  Our entire group seemed to enjoy the experience.
 
At Ko Samui we had arranged a private boat tour to Ang Thong National Marine Park.  Due to the distance away from our port we needed to get our group started as soon as our ship was ready to disembark.  Unfortunately, this was a port that we had to tender in (take small boats to shore), because there was no dock at this port.  We had made arrangements with the Concierge to be the first tender to leave the ship and our private tour boat was waiting for us upon arrival at the dock.
 
Ang Thong Marine Park is a beautiful archipelago consisting of 42 islands in the Gulf of Thailand.  These islands consist of many limestone hills, sinkholes, caves, and inland marine lakes.  Although it is a great place to snorkel and kayak, we had a tight timetable to see the sights and get back to the ship before it departed.  The group did some hiking up one of the tallest hills, which was almost 1200 feet high and was rewarded with some great view of the surrounding area.  We did see a few monkeys and tropical birds in the area.  It was certainly a worthwhile trip to see another beautiful area of the world.
 
A few weeks later we returned to Ko Samui on our next cruise, but it was the first port stop that we had no tour organized.  Larry and Greg decided to rest on the ship while Lisa and Sharon went out to explore other areas of the island.  There was not much to see right where the tender docked but there were some nice resorts on the other side of the island.  Lisa and Sharon took a taxi to the resort side of the island and enjoyed the sights.  They even had a nice Thai massage on the beach.  There were some of the small Thai fishing boats on that side of the island.  They enjoyed their short stay on the island.

Sharon and Greg

SECOND VISIT FACEBOOK POST: We arrived back home but had one last post to our last stop in Koh Samui, Thailand - Chaweng Beach - white sand beach, beautiful turquoise water, great day relaxing. An island off the east coast of Thailand. Then departing the ship in Singapore for our flight back to Atlanta!
Had a great trip with family and friends! Lots of fun, laughs and great memories made!

​On January 9th we headed out to Singapore with 21 other members of our group on the plane.  We were meeting up with 10 other people in Singapore bringing our group to 31 people for this trip – our largest group we have ever organized.  Our trip consisted of 4 days in Singapore prior to our cruise and then a 12-night cruise to Hong Kong with port stops in Thailand and Vietnam.  In Hong Kong some people were flying straight back to Atlanta while others were staying 1 or 2 nights before going back.  Four of us (Conrads and Gardners) were staying on the ship for a return cruise to Singapore.
 
Upon arrival in Singapore, we headed to the Intercontinental Hotel, but we did not do much since everyone was struggling a little with the jet lag and the 24-hour flight we had just taken to get to Singapore.  That night a small group headed out of the hotel in search of one of Singapore’s famous hawker stands.  This is Singapore’s version of a food court that you might find in any mall in the United States.  Hawker stands in Singapore are all individually owned, and the food is prepared by local cooks unlike the food courts in the US that are all franchise owned and operated.  The hawker stand we visited that night was outdoors with all of the local dishes prepared while you watched.  We tried the chicken rice, and it was very good.  Greg also had a Tiger beer which is the local beer made in Singapore and is excellent.  After a brief walk around the area, we headed back to the hotel for a well-deserved night’s sleep.
 
The next day everyone met down at breakfast, which turned out to be an excellent buffet.  Every morning, we looked forward to starting out our day with this spectacular breakfast buffet and we missed this breakfast when we boarded the ship.  After breakfast a small group of people walked over to the Singapore Harbor and walked through some of the local malls before our afternoon tour.  Around noon the group walked over to Clark Quay where we met our Tours By Locals guide who we had hired to show us around Singapore.  We started out on the first day doing a harbor cruise that went down the Singapore river into the harbor where the famous Singapore Merlion spits water into the harbor.  The Merlion has become the official mascot of Singapore and is a mythical animal that is half lion and half fish.  The animal was derived from a legend when hundreds of years ago a prince on his first visit to the island saw a strange animal that was later identified as a lion and the prince named the island Singapura which meant lion in his language.  The Merlion that looks out over the harbor was made by a local sculptor who used all 8 of his children to help him.  Our guide provided the history surrounding the Merlion and shared how Singapore has grown so much over the last 50 years.  From the Singapore harbor you can see the magnificent Marina Sands Hotel which is now another icon of Singapore.  On one side of the harbor are large hotels to house the millions of tourists and businessmen that come to Singapore every year, and on the other side of the harbor is the financial district with huge skyscrapers for all the major banks and other financial institutes that do business in Asia.  Our tour ended at one of the most famous hawker stands in Singapore called Lau Pa Sat where we enjoyed some good Asian food.  There was even one food operator here that had been awarded a one-star Michelin status.  After our tour we walked back to our hotel, and everyone had the rest of the afternoon and evening to do whatever they liked.  Sharon and Greg headed out to hike around the area to see some other sights and walked around the Singapore harbor at night with all the many colorful lights all around.
 
On our second full day in Singapore our guide met us at the hotel with a bus to take us around the city.  Our first stop was at Little India where we walked through the many shops.  The flowers sold at some of these shops were beautiful and very inexpensive.  There were many unique fruits sold and sugar cane could be purchased if you had a sweet tooth.  The shops were clean and well kept up.  It is very important to note that Singapore is a very culturally diverse city.  Almost ¾ of the population is Chinese Singaporean, there is also a strong presence of Malay, Indian and European people throughout the city.  The British once ruled Singapore and you can still see their influence throughout the city even though Singapore gained their independence almost 60 years ago in 1965.  Our second stop on the tour was the Malay Heritage Center and Sultan’s Mosque.  A Sultan ruled Singapore until a treaty was signed handing over control to the British in 1819.   The Sultan’s Mosque is a beautiful building near the Malay Cultural Center.  To enter the mosque everyone had to borrow clothing that is provided during entry to cover your knees and shoulders.  Make sure to check out our group picture with everyone wearing the colorful pants that were handed out.  The cultural center works hard at trying to ensure all Singaporeans respect each other’s religion and cultural rituals.  Our next stop on this tour was Chinatown which houses many shops, restaurants, and temples.  We walked around the shops and looked at all the unique decorations in the area.  We had lunch at one of the large indoor hawker stands.  Most people were adventurous, trying some of the unique delicacies offered.  Many also got some good Tiger beer which is offered almost everywhere around the city.  After lunch we went to a city planning building where they had a large three-dimensional map of Singapore showing their 50-year plan.  It is amazing how long in advance they have planned the construction of buildings and have planned their growth.  They told us that they had run out of areas that could be land filled preventing the construction of new buildings but has forced the city to think vertically.  Many of their buildings are very tall to handle the expected city growth and another layer of the city has been built underground.  You can literally walk down any of the rapid transit entrances and see a whole other layer of the city where you can buy anything and find an abundance of restaurants and shops.  It was remarkable how this city created a plan 50 years ago and has continued to follow and update this plan as necessary.  After the tour our group was brought back to the hotel, and everyone was on their own for dinner.  A few of our group followed us through a few malls and down to the harbor to look at the sights.
 
Our last full day in Singapore was on our own without any guides.  We had bought tickets for everyone to see Gardens of the Bay, which is a spectacular nature park built behind the Marina Sands Hotel.  We first took everyone to the grove of Super Trees where there are 12 self-sufficient 75-foot artificial trees.  These trees have a metal frame that allows for 100’s of plants to be inserted around the trunk of the tree to grow all the way to the treetop.  The plants get their water from a large rain barrel in the center of the tree where water is pumped to them using solar energy from solar panels on the tree.  The plants get their nutrients from the earth directly below each tree.  Connecting each tree is a walkway over 70 feet above the ground that you can walk between each tree.  From this pathway you get a unique view of the city and the many ships that are anchored around the surrounding waterway.  Singapore is one of the largest ports in the world.  After taking in these amazing views our group came back down and walked over to the Flower Dome, which is the world’s largest greenhouse according to the Guiness Book of World Records.  Inside this uniquely shaped glass dome are flowers and plants from the cool-dry areas around the world.  These plants are kept in immaculate shape and throughout the dome are unique sculptures which appear to be made out of driftwood.  After spending a long time in this Flower Dome, we went to the second dome which is called the Cloud Forest.  This dome houses one of the world’s tallest indoor waterfalls and is surrounded by different plant species from around the world.  You can take an elevator to the top of the waterfall and then walk down a path admiring the views as you get to the bottom.  Besides these three attractions there is so much to see in this 250-acre park.  You could spend a full day just looking at all the sculptures and plant life around this park.  After spending 4 or 5 hours at the Gardens by the Bay, we headed back to the hotel to wash up and go to the Marina Sands hotel that evening where we were went up to the top of the hotel to have a few drinks and get some more spectacular views of the city.  This is an ideal vantage point to see in every direction around this city.  We were hoping to catch the sunset but unfortunately a few low hanging clouds prevented us from seeing anything special.  We watched the harbor laser show from on top of the hotel which is an interesting perspective of this show.  It is better though to view it at ground level right at the harbor.  Some people had a little to eat while we were up in the hotel and others decided to go to some nice restaurants in the area.  As we left the Marina Sands hotel, many of us went back down to the Gardens by the Bay to see the evening light show.  We watched the first show from high atop the Marina Sands Hotel and now wanted to look at it from down below.  It is an excellent light show with each Super Tree lit in different colors with excellent music matching the changes in the lights.  At that point everyone went back to the hotel to pack and get ready for our cruise the next morning.
 
Four of us returned to Singapore 24 days later after we completed our second cruise (back-to-back on the same ship) to see more sights at each port stop.  We only had a few hours to tour Singapore before we needed to go to the airport to fly back to Atlanta.  During that short visit we want back to Gardens by the Bay and Chinatown to see some of the decorations that had been put up for Chinese New Years.  At Gardens by the Bay, they had a display called River Hongbao that they were just starting to create when we were there in mid-January.  On our return it was February 8th with Chinese New Years scheduled to occur 2 days later, on February 10th.  This is the Year of the Dragon and many of the decorations are colorful yellow and red dragons.  Our guide told us a lot about Chinese New Years and how it is celebrated.  We were able to see some great decorations while we were there.
 
 
Regards,
Sharon and Greg

FIRST FACEBOOK POST: ​Our 1st day in Singapore with many of our Vietnam cruisers! Spent the day cruising from Clarke Quay to Marina Bay and a trip to the most famous “Lau Pa Sat” Hawker Stand (a large food court with food stalls selling a variety of local cuisines).

SECOND FACEBOOK POST: ​Day 2 in Singapore visiting the towns of India, Kampong Glam, Chinatown and evening views from Clarke Quay and Marina Bay.

THIRD FACEBOOK POST: Our last day in Singapore to view Gardens By The Bay and spend a great night on the 57th floor of the Marina Bay Sands Hotel overlooking Singapore!

SECOND CRUISE BACK to Vietnam