It Never Rains But It Pours

So, having not managed to find anything we needed the day before we scoped out exactly where the ATM was supposedly located. It was apparently in the CBD area so even if we didn’t find it we would be treated to the sights and sounds of the inner city.

We walked down to the city centre and managed to find the Barclays in Singapore that we had found on Google. My fears were realised – it was an office, and not a proper bank. But maybe the guy behind the desk could confirm if we would find a Barclays ATM anywhere in the city. We wouldn’t, as they were just the investment arm in the area and no ATMs were in Singapore. Balls. We would have to use a non-Barclays one and take the hit on the extra % fee for withdrawing. But we needed money as we only had about $5 SGD between us and a whole lot of Singapore to see.

There's the 5% withdrawal fee...

For lunch we made our way down to the harbour and were blown away by the view. All the skyscrapers surrounded the water and the Marina 1 hotel (I think!) stood out on the other side of the water. If you don’t know about this hotel it is essentially 3 apartment blocks side by side……with a cruise ship across the top. See pic below! We had a mooch round the local area and saw a few noteworthy things before heading back to the hotel – we would need to leave reasonably early to get up to the north part of the island to get to the Night Safari.

The Marina One hotel

In order to get the train up to Kuala Lumpur on Saturday we would need to get up to the train station in Woodlands, from which we would then go to the Night Safari. The metro system was very easy to negotiate and when we got to the Woodlands stop we started searching for the KTM station. Unfortunately the guy at the metro station told us that we would need to get a bus out to the KTM station as it wasn’t actually at the Woodlands stop. Our trip was coming apart at the seams. We had to get some food and to the Night Safari that night too so we decided the tickets would have to wait til the next day and we might be able to work out how to get them online (the website is in Malaysian, and even translated into English it was impossible to work out).

At the Night Safari

It was a short (and dodgy, due to the drivers inability to see clearly) taxi ride to the zoo but when we got there it was pretty impressive. It seemed a little like Singapore’s answer to Australia Zoo; almost; like a theme park, but with animals inside instead of rides. We had paid for admission into the zoo and for the tram ride through it. We lined up with everyone else (it seemed very popular too) and then were ushered into one of the trams coaches with rolled plastic sheeting on the sides if we needed them if it were to rain, but we couldn’t see any clouds in the sky so presumed that we would be fine. We rolled through the park whilst someone at the front gave us a running commentary over the PA system, and conveniently all the animals seemed to be right near the roadside so that we could see them. Either they were fed there or they were chained there, or both.

A lion that came within touching distance...

After 10 minutes (maybe not even that) we came to the halfway point. I was thinking that we weren’t going to get value for money out of this little trip, so we decided to get off the tram and explore the animal enclosures as offered by PA guy. It was a good call, as there was lots to see including Cloud Leopards, the lions (from over the road this time) and flying leopards. A highlight was seeing the (apparently generic) leopard resting right next to the glass of the enclosure so you could get up close and personal with it. Another highlight was the bat enclosure. After seeing the massive flying foxes in Australia we didn’t think we would be impressed with teeny tiny ones. We were surprised. And impressed. When we walked in there were a couple of huge beasts munching away on various fruits hanging down from the branches of the trees. We got as close as we dared and one of them just hung there in the tree upside down……watching us. Looking us right in the eye. It was very spooky. There were also little ones flying around our heads just to add a bit of flavour to the scene. And then something terrible happened.

The bat that never blinked

Both me and James felt it at the same time and turned to each other. Rain. It was coming. What we had already gathered from being in Asia this short time was that when it rains it pours. And it’s not like the shower lasts for 10 minutes either, it’s an all-dayer sometimes. We grabbed our raincoats from our rucksacks and threw them on just in time. The deluge lasted for ages and the queue to get back onto the tram was obviously massive. We were looking at a 45 minute wait, especially as nobody was getting off at the halfway point to free-up seats for us to complete the journey. Eventually we got on one and sped off into the night. The rest of the tour was much longer, which was nice, and the rain continued on and off, with thunder and lightning in the background. It was an amazing sight to be going through the safari at night with the flashes of lightning going off in the background.

Once we had finished the tour we needed to get back and investigate the train to Kuala Lumpur. We found a direct bus and jumped on, with the rain still battering down on top of us. We got back to the hotel and James managed to figure out the booking system, but it didn’t look good – we couldn’t book tickets for the 29^th, only the 30^th onwards. We need another plan, but that would have to wait til morning.