Southern Ridges Walk

Today our family went to the Southern Ridges. To borrow from the official sight..."The Southern Ridges comprise a 9-kilometre chain of green, open spaces spanning the rolling hills of Mount Faber Park, Telok Blangah Hill Park, and Kent Ridge Park before ending at West Coast Park. It is an area steeped in history and is home to some of nature's greatest gifts of flora and fauna. It is also one of the best spots in Singapore to catch panoramic views of the city, harbour and the Southern Islands."

We started in Hort Park and took the Alexandra Arch to the Forest Walk and continued to the Henderson Waves. We we were on our way to Mt. Faber Park when it started to rain. We stayed under a shelter until the rain lightened up a bit and then went back to the car. I would recommend the walk to anyone living here or visiting.

Alexandra Arch:

Forest Walk

Henderson Waves

Back at Alexandra Arch, I'm not sure what Elyse is doing.

Headed back to the car

Walk by the Pool

One of Elyse's favorite words lately is "go" meaning she wants to leave the apartment. When Elyse kept repeating "go" this afternoon I didn't feel like traveling far so we went outside to blow bubbles and walk around the pool. I was able to capture her with a barrette in her hair which is rare since she usually takes it out after a minute. The barrette was later taken out and placed in a neighbor's mailbox, which can only be opened with a key-Oops.

Cute Pictures

Here are some pictures from Elyse and Toby's Daddy/Daughter trip to the zoo and some of Elyse at the IMM playground.

Living in Singapore

If you are interesting in knowing a little more about what it is like to live in Singapore you can look at my friend Laura's list of pros and cons as she looks back over her 2 years in Singapore.

Brave Girl

Today Elyse and I went to the pool. I put her waterwings on and we were on our way. Elyse has been in the pool only a few times with her waterwings and each time she has to hold on to at least a finger when we were in the big pool. Today she floated on her own without having to hold on to me! What a brave girl. I obviously couldn't take a picture of her while she was in the water, but here she is afterwards.

Painting with Water

I decided to take Elyse out to the terrace and paint with water since we haven't done that it a while. After a little bit of painting the decking, this is what Elyse wanted to do:

We also went on a play date a couple of days ago. We had a lot of fun hanging out with our friends. One of my friends made these cupcake pops for MOPS (YUM!), but saved some for the kids to decorate. You can read about it on her blog and see a couple pictures of Elyse enjoying the treat.

Happy Birthday Toby!

Babies

Elyse really loves here babies...

But sometimes has a strange way of showing it. (Do you see where the 2nd baby is?)

Random Pictures

Discovery Zone

Yesterday Elyse and I went back to the Science Center and visited The Discovery Zone. This area has things kids can climb on, bang, roll, and splash. It even has an area you can see mice, hamsters, cockroaches (eww), and baby chicks. Hardly anyone was there so it felt like we had the whole area to ourselves. I think Elyse's favorite part was going down the slide.

Bali

For those who do not know, our family went to Indonesia. Elyse stayed with Grammy and Gramps in Jakarta while Toby and I continued on to Bali. This is the first time Elyse and I had been apart for more than 6 hours. I think we all had a great time.

The first day in Bali was very low key and relaxing. Toby and I were staying in Sanur at the Sanur Beach Hotel which is right on the beach. We slept in, ate breakfast and headed for the beach. We read, got in the water and read some more. In the afternoon we caught the free shuttle to the center of Sanur. There we had a lunch of traditional Indonesia food. Mine was very good, but by the end of it my tongue was on fire! After lunch we wandered around a bit.

Dad and son (I think) catching fish on the beach

The town was very typical of what we saw later on our drives. Many tourist shops, a bit run down, and offerings to the gods everywhere. We saw them placed in doorways, on the street, in alters, and even in the stores next to displays. They contained food, flowers, cigarettes, or anything else that might please the gods and bring safety or prosperity. The incense help connect you to the god, because the smoke goes up to him/her. (This is what our driver told me)

As we were waiting for our shuttle to bring us back, a taxi driver approached us and asked if we needed a driver. "no thanks" "how about tomorrow?" was his response. We found this was a common tactic. This man offered us a friend price as well. All the guide books tell you to be very wary of this "friend price" because the driver might not listen to where you wanted to go. Anyway, we knew we could get a driver from the hotel so we told him no again (and again, and again...) and he left us alone.

That night we went to dinner and a show at the hotel. It was a Mongolian BBQ and the entertainment was live music, a Cabaret and some fire dancing. Very interesting and some somewhat comical. One of the dancers clearly didn't want to be there.

The following day we slept in (yippee) and got a driver to take us to around. We stopped at a Batik shop, a monkey forest and the town of Ubud. We at lunch at a restaurant called Indus which had a gorgeous view.

After lunch we told our driver to take us to the rice paddies/terraces. On our way (2 km from our stop) our driver's car broke down! After awhile of trying to fix the car, the driver said he called his brother to come and get us. In the meantime we waited in front of a few shops and read the books that we brought. We also got to see a bit of Balinese life as we waited. We saw a man come buy to sell oranges from the back of his motorcycle and the ice cream man stopped by as well. Finally, about 90 minutes later, our driver's brother showed up. We got in his brother's car as the brother sat and waited for us.

We arrived at our destination and I was a little disappointed. I pictures us driving through rice terraces for a while and enjoying the scenery, but we stopped in front of one rice terrace that had a restaurant and hawkers out front. We did get to see the rice terrace, but we had to put up with aggressive hawkers and cute little girls selling postcards. The little girls got us, but we were able to avoid buying anything else

On the way back to the hotel we passed our driver's brother. The exchanged some words (not angry, just instructions of some sort- I think) and we were off. The brother stayed by the car, so I don't know how long he waited to be picked up.

The following day we got a different driver and went to a traditional Balinese dance called Barong. it had a story line, but I wouldn't have gotten the plot if it wasn't given to us on a hand out. I was very entertaining and I learned crotch shots to bad guys can be funny in any culture. This was followed by a drive to a temple: Tanam Lot which is out off the western coast.

After a lunch of fresh seafood(I mean you pick it out of the tank fresh), we headed back to the hotel to hang out on the beach. Our night was capped off by a Indonesia buffet and more dancing.

We had a great time on our vacation, but were glad to see Elyse. We heard she had a wonderful time with Grammy and Gramps. (I tried to limit the pictures I put on here, but it was hard. I do have about 70 more I could have added.)