We were up around 7:00 again and headed down for breakfast. We both had coffee. Graham had orange juice, and I had fruit punch. Graham had some assorted fruit, fried egg on toast and oatmeal. I had hoped for some more soup noodles, but they had the seafood broth again. Instead, I had what I thought might be my last longans of the holiday, some dragon fruit and some congee with fried onion and shallots and soy sauce. I also tried the pastry that Graham had described as a savoury churro, but that was not to my liking. Graham finished this off. I had a chocolate and a vanilla mini muffin instead.
After breakfast, we headed back to the room to finish our packing. Then we headed downstairs to check out. There was a bit of a line even though it was still quite early. Somebody in front of me took forever to check out as well. Eventually it was my turn, and it did not take me long to check out. Once we were checked out, I ordered a Grab, and we did not have long to wait for it to arrive. We had a very nice driver, and we had a clear run to the airport. We arrived around 09:00 for a 13:30 flight.
The first thing I spotted was a display with Duffy, Shellie May and Stella Lou made from flowers. This made my heart beat quicker. I decided to come back for this to take a photo once we had offloaded our luggage. I did not expect to check in so early, but the screens showed that check in was open for our flight. There were a lot of self-service machines, and we were checked in very quickly. They also have automated bag drop, but it was very quiet at check in and bag drop. A member of staff was glad to have something to do and helped us with this. Soon we were free to go.
One thing that always was on our to do list was check out the Jewel at Changi. The Jewel at Changi is a nature-themed shopping and entertainment complex that features the world largest indoor waterfall, various attractions as well as over 300 shops and restaurants. The original plan had been to visit this before our flight home, but with so much spare time on our hands, we figured we may as well do it then. I think this was a wise decision.
I stopped at the Disney floral display to take a couple of photos. Then we followed the signs to the Jewel. This was actually further than I had anticipated, but the walkways were air conditioned. When we got to the entrance, I spotted to my utter delight that they had a link up with Disney Cruise Line. Disney Cruise Line was supposed to have their newest and biggest ship, Disney Adventure, home ported in Singapore from December. This was delayed until March, but of course the plans for the tie in had been made a long time before.
We headed up to level 5, and I checked out the ticket options at the ticket machines. I figured the best option with the time we had available was a combination ticket of the Canopy Bridge and Canopy Park. I got our tickets and then we headed for the entrance of Canopy Bridge. A member of staff there told us that it was due to open at 10:00. We had a wander around enjoying the views. There were also a lot of nice restaurants in that area which considering the prime location were reasonably priced. Just before 10:00, we headed back to the entrance to Canopy Bridge. We were the first people on the bridge that day.
Canopy Bridge is not particularly long, but it has a glass bottom for some of its length, which gives an interesting perspective. It also gives some fairly close up views over the Rain Vortex, which is the indoor waterfall. We had been told that this would start working at 10:00, but it was a little delayed. We stayed on the closest section to Rain Vortex for a while and were there when it started working. It took a while to get going and initially there was just a little water, but soon we got the full effect. It was actually fascinating to see how the water pressure built up. We stayed and watched a little longer and then we exited the bridge and headed to Canopy Park.
There was a photographer at the beginning of Canopy Park. We stopped to take some photos. Some of them are just photos of our surroundings and some used green screen technology to act as a backdrop.
Then we went to explore. There was a good selection of plants, topiaries, and Disney touches. We took a good look around and I took some photos. There are some slides and something called foggy bowls that is included in the ticket price for Canopy Park. On top of this there are two different mazes, a walking net and a bouncing net that can be added in various combos. There is also an electronic dinosaur treasure hunt that is available at an extra cost. Given the time frame we had, we were happy just to explore the garden areas. We did not even bother with the slides or the foggy bowls. Once we had finished exploring, we checked out the photos. They were nice and the prices were fair with two printed photos and all digital photos included. I decided to get this package. I would happily have had a purely digital package, but that was not on offer.
Once we had sorted out our photos, we headed downstairs. I spotted that there was a pop-up Disney Store within the Jewel complex. I decided to go and find this. Graham was quite happy to sit down and wait for me. The Disney Store was in the basement, and I was struggling with finding this. A security guard pointed me in the right direction. This was not much to write home about. I had hoped for some Disney Cruise Line merchandise, but this did not materialise. Essentially, they had similar items from what I had seen the day before at Gardens by the Bay. Unfortunately, the one thing they did not have was the Lotso flower plush. I did not end up buying anything. I headed back to where Graham was taking some more photos of Disney Cruise Line displays along the way. Then we headed back towards terminal 2.
When we got back to the right terminal, we went through the e-gates for immigration. This time it was smooth sailing. There was an x-ray machine on the other side of the e-gates, and we were asked to put our hand luggage through this. I was quite surprised just how lowkey this was. We picked up our hand luggage on the other side and then we were free to leave. We headed in the general direction of our gate.
We still had some time until the gate was due to open. We stopped at an outlet of The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf for a drink. Graham had an Americano and I had a watermelon cold brew tea. We had some amusement while we were having our drinks. Near where we were sitting, a couple of wheelchairs were parked. Suddenly one of them started moving with nobody anywhere nearby. The second one followed not long afterwards. I had never encountered robotic wheelchairs before.
Once we had finished our drinks, we headed to our gate. The gate was not open yet, but there were seats nearby. Suddenly it became clear why security had been so lowkey. There was more in-depth security at the gate. However, this was very well organised. We were through in less than 5 minutes from getting in line and had some time to sit down before boarding. Boarding itself was also very quick.
This was our first time flying with Singapore Airlines. The actual flying time was only about one hour. I was surprised that not only they had inflight entertainment, but we also got a meal service, which consisted of a slice of margarita pizza and a choice of soft drink or hot drink. Graham had a coffee and I had some mango juice. It made me smile that one of the options on the inflight entertainment was Crazy Rich Asians. I did not have any headphones with me, and I would not have time to watch more than about half of it anyway, but I did watch the opening scenes to get in the mood for our hotel. For the rest of the flight, I read.
The airport in Penang is not particularly big and is a little old-fashioned. However, things worked like clockwork. We did not have to wait very well to clear immigration. Our luggage arrived shortly after we got to the luggage hall. The longest part of the arrival process was customs as everything had to go through X-ray machines and only two X-ray machines were operational. Still, even this took less than 10 minutes. When we got landside, there was a taxi booking office. I thought that this meant that we were going to pay there, but we were just assigned a taxi number and given a slip of paper. We were advised to pay the driver and told where we needed to wait for our driver. Our driver arrived shortly after we got to the meeting point. It was about 13 miles from the airport to our hotel which cost us the princely sum of 50 Ringgit, which is a little less than 10 Pounds. Using Grab would have been cheaper still, but after our experience in Singapore, I was not inclined to mess around with trying to find the pick-up location at the airport. Traffic was pretty bad and it took us about 40 minutes to get to the hotel.
We got dropped off in front of the Heritage Wing of the Eastern and Oriental Hotel. We were welcomed by a doorman in a rather snazzy uniform. That was something that took some getting used to. It took some doing to be able to open a door by yourself. When we went to check in, we found out that the Victory Annex, where we were staying, has its own reception. A member of staff from the Heritage Wing walked us over there. The reception of the Victory Annex is not quite as impressive as its counterpart at the Heritage Wing, but it is still very nice. Check in was very smooth and soon we were on the way to our room. When we got off the lift, I could see some of Ovation of the Seas peeping through the gaps of the buildings.
We had a studio suite, which is the entry level accommodation at this hotel. This was very nice. Every suite has a sea view and we had a balcony. The room was huge and we had a bathroom with two sinks and two wardrobes and then a second room with a claw footed bathtub, the toilet and a very spacious rainfall shower. As much as I loved the shower, this year I will bring something nice to put in the bath and will enjoy a nice soak.
Once we had a look around the room, we went to explore the Victory Annex a bit more. We found both restaurants and both of them served breakfast. The restaurant on the sixth floor offered continental breakfast and the restaurant on the ground floor offered an international breakfast buffet. We stuck with Sarkie’s which was the restaurant on the ground floor. We also checked out the pool terrace, which I really loved. It was nice that there were some loungers under cover. I also really liked the infinity pool. Then we checked out the garden which features the oldest olive tree and Penang and the beach. The beach was described as a pebble beach, but boulders would be a more accurate description. This is definitely not the kind of beach you can enjoy, but the walk along the seafront was nice. We had planned to explore the town a little, but there was no obvious way out from that side, and we headed back to our room.
Graham was done, but I wanted to figure out how to get out of the hotel. I left him to it and headed out. I retraced my steps to the Heritage Wing and headed out that way. Opposite the hotel was an area with different restaurants. I checked this out and then I tried to find a way into town. As I learned later, I should have headed straight on from where the restaurants were, but I walked along the main road in front of the hotel. The pavement was at best intermittent and there was not a great deal there. One interesting thing that I did find was an old Lutheran cemetery, but I was not sure if this was open to the public and just passed by. I had hoped to find some take away food near to the hotel to take back, but I was out of luck. I headed back to the hotel. I decided to cut through the Heritage Wing. I took a wrong turn in the lobby and ended up in a little museum about the history of the Eastern and Oriental Hotel. This was interesting. Then I retraced my steps and on the second attempt, I found the walkway to the Victory Annex.
Graham was interrupted three times while I was gone. Apparently, the door had not closed after me, and somebody came to check if everything was alright. He also got a visit from somebody wanting to do the turn down service and somebody checking the minibar. We had a fridge with various free soft drinks and water, which was replenished daily. We learned very quickly to switch on the “do not disturb” light when we were in the room.
Even though it was not particularly late and we had not done much that day, I was tired. I got ready for bed and read a few pages before falling asleep. At some stage Graham got up to go to the bathroom and noticed that there was a cruise ship leaving. He woke me up just in case I wanted to go out on the balcony to see here sail out, but I was comfortable where I was. I turned over and went back to sleep.
Dolphingirl’s Travels 
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