31C – feels like 35C
Feb 14 was change over day for the ship so lots of people getting off and new passengers getting on. The previous evening we said goodbye to our wonderful table mates since Southampton—they were a pleasure to be with each evening.
Getting off the ship this morning was a breeze compared to the day before because of our “blue dots”. We took the shuttle bus to the Convention Centre beside the Marina Bay Sands Hotel. There is a very very high end shopping centre attached to the complex. We walked about 20 minutes to a smaller shopping centre that had stores with merchandise we could actually afford. Tarja scored some nice linen stuff and Bob was very excited to get some new dress socks (with nautical stripes!). We met our new table mates at dinner that night, the jury is still out on that.
Raffles Hotel Long Bar update … one of the folks we were with on our Bangkok mini-van tour said that they had gone to Raffles when we were in Singapore and the latest price of a Singapore Sling at Raffles Long Bar is (Singapore dollar is roughly equal to the CAD) $57 plus 8% local tax plus 15% service fee so approx $71. Wowza. Raffles, where the Singapore Sling was invented in the early 19th century, was the local watering hole for the well to do. We were told that, unsurprisingly, locals never go there now
