Day 17 Thursday 24th September
Johno says:
The 9 hour shuttle bus journey from Moshi to Nairobi stangely wasn't as grawling as anticipated. A fellow passenger who started off being annoying ended up being great entertainment when he became very restless with the journey from the 7 hour mark, we just kicked back and enjoyed the show and watched him wriggle for the next 2 hours!!
Stacey's ankle had been ravaged by some unknown bug either during the journey or the night before (first thought to be mosquito but not so sure after withnessing the pure amount of bites on her - urrggghh!) the flight to Jo'burg went ok which left us the wait fro the flight to Singapore - a massive 14 hours!!

Day 18 Friday 25th September
Johno says:
Jo'burg quite possibly is the largest airport ever!! AND yes, we had walked around it about 50 times within the 14 hours!! Maybe Mt Kili wasn't that big of a trek?! We didn't realise but Jo'burg airport doesn't operate flights past midnight so effectively we were the only passengers left in the airport as we arrived just before midnight with sleeping homeless people for company on any vacant benches!! Stace and I pulled our best homeless positions and slept on and off until 6 o'clock when the airport started to become alive. A quality 10 hour flight later and we were in Singapore.
Singapore is a far shout from Africa - the toilet actually flushed for me at the airport!! So, back to a normal way of life - the cab driver was very funny taking us to Cavanagh Road rather than Carpenter Street and letting us know that Singapore has no crime and is the safest place on the planet, just couldn't get the hump with the guy, he wanted to do all he could do help us. It is very humid here with the temperature at 27 degrees at 05:30 in the morning!! The place smells of Chinese food, which is probably understandable with the population being 80% Chinese! Mmmmm Chinese food. We couldn't believe our luck that our arrival clashed with the Grand Prix weekend - no wonder we found it difficult booking a hotel...!!! The F1 cars could be heared from our hotel window - - quality!!!! Great meal, we went to China town and I was forced to use chop sticks to lift rice which probably helped with the indigestion as i could only get 6 grains in my mouth at a time....! Bring on our next Chinese meal!! Mmmm. After our meal we retired a swanky bar by the river, i got stuck into a pint of stella, then a nice ozzy guy passed over two passes for the practice session of the GP - Wow!! The cars just seemed to get even louder once we were in the arena, we watched a few lapses from different positions and went home for midnight - what a first day in Singapore!!

Day 19 Sat 26th Sept

Stacey says:

Needing to replenish some toiletries, we set off to do some shopping, and then decided to have a wander by ourselves around the shops and town. We met back up for dinner time, and Steve returned with a new wardrobe, whilst he was shocked to see me with no shopping bags at all! Now he cannot comment on the size of my bag anymore.... We got some dinner, then headed to Raffles Hotel for the infamous Singapore Sling, costing $60. Had to be done I guess! I'd spotted a nice lively place earlier in the day in Clarke Quay which would be nice for some evening drinks, so we headed there for the evening, I suggested that being Saturday night we should let our hair down, so Steve ordered a jug of beer for himself, and I got a Mojito, which was the smallest cocktail ever.. few cocktails later and we ended up dancing to some live cheese/rock music by a local Chinese band in Yellow Jello bar.

Day 20 Sun 27th Sept

Stacey says:

After a sleep in, we decided to visit Little India, so went went for a walk via Sim Lim Square Shopping Centre. We were told this is a good place to shop for electronics, I finally picked up an iPod charger nice and cheap after having a dead battery for ages, and we were having a look around for notebooks. Not actually much cheaper after all. In fact one I quite liked was cheaper in England!! Steve had fun practicing his bargaining skills with the assistants. Then we continued onto Little India and had nice curry. Wasn't too keen on this place, was just totally overcrowded, and was a pretty dirty looking area! Then back to the Hostel for a quiet night!

Day 21 Mon 28th Sept

Johno says:

So, after all that bargaining and shopping the aim of today was to sniff out the best bargain for notebooks aka (to me) as mini laptops!

But first we needed check out this place called Sentosa Island which apparently is a must do to most that have been to Singapore before..! We set off for Harbourpoint for our connecting bus to the Island (the cable car is sadly out of action until April 2010 - so definite need to return at some time!) we found a tour package that included entry to the Island, transport, entry to a quality little aquarium called underworld (I am sure Underworld is Mike Baldwin's factory in Coronation Street?!) entry to Dolphin Lagoon, entry into a 4D cinema and a nice meal at Emerald Lodge for S$2 (80p) - Result!!

The meal was at Jewel Box where the cable car departs, i was expecting much from 80p but it turned out to be really nice with some great views of Singapore, food taste even better! Then we gotback to Harbour point and left for the Island. Straight into the aquarium with open pools to reach in and stroke the fish, Bamboo Sharks and all kinds of stingray. So, I forgot about Steve Irwin and all that rubbish and dipped my hand straight in and was told that we could hand feed them as well as touch!! I was well up for it, handed over S$3 for about 5 bits of cuttlefish and handed out for the rays to enjoy! Mmmmm cuttlefish. They were actually really gentle in taking the food - you wouldn't have thought it when stace dipped her hand in tho - she flipped her hand out as if it had eaten her fingers. Once we had finished with Underworld, we hopped it on an internal Sentosa Island bus to Dolphin Lagoon to visit the pink dolphin's flip, twist, wave, kiss and do what other well trained Dolphin's do. Then we made it across to the 4D cinema to watch the Extreme Log Ride via some lovely little beaches which were perfect for some beach snaps. The 4D film was brilliant - seeing as you don't actually leave your seat! Simple minds are easily pleased!! Sorry. Sentosa Island was really good and different to the other places we had visited in Singapore.

It was amazingly 7 o/c before we knew it so back to the mini laptop finding mission! Caught a cab originally destined for Sim Lim Square to re-visit the bargain i had negotiated yesterday then 50 mins of traffic and just 3km later decided to hit another shopping mall. BINGO the same shop was in this mall where we had seen the bargain, so 5 mins before they were closing (just what the poor salesman needed on a Monday night!) I snapped up the deal with added extra's thrown in!! 1 mini hp laptop for me!

Moving on to Kuala Lumpur tomorrow so we'll see what the next destination brings us!!