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| Lunar Celebration near Merlion Park |
Spent a few days in my favorite city, Singapore, before the cruise. It was my fourth visit in the last 12 months. The Gardens by the Bay was spectacular as usual, the Garden Rhapsody night show had an operatic music theme this time. The Cloud Forest Dome at the Gardens is always gorgeous and the Flower Dome also had a beautiful Chinese New Year display. Chinese New Year is only 4 days away so there was a lot of New Year decorations for a planned celebration on the Bay on Feb 2. It was a first visit for Liz, Kevin, Mary, and mom so we visited the Botanic and Orchid Gardens and Merlion Park. I finally made it to the Liao Fan Hawker Chan in Chinatown to have their $4 SGD Soy Chicken Rice dish. This is supposedly the cheapest Michelin rated restaurant in the world. We stayed at the Hilton on Orchard Road this time and the area is a huge upgrade from the Hilton Garden Inn Serangoon. We were near the Ion Mall that provided us with infinitely more eating and shopping options than Little India. One tour that I would not recommend is the Viator full day tour into Johore Bahru. I wanted to check off Malaysia as a country visited and I thought this would be an easy way to accomplish that. The immigration process both ways was miserable even with a private guide that did not require us to leave the van. At least an hour plus wait for both Singapore exit and Malaysia entry both ways was not fun. Johore Bahru is also not the Kuala Lumpur Malaysia that we would like to have seen as our guide explained. The highlight was the Malay Cultural Village where we were able to make a batik painting.
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| Cloud Forest Dome Gardens By the Bay |
The 12 day Asia cruise on the Diamond Princess visited Phu My/Ho Chi Minh City, Nha Trang, Hong Kong, Taipei, Osaka, Shimizu, and ending in Yokohama. This was my 5th voyage on the Diamond and the third visit to many of the cities in the past 3 years so I didn't expect a lot of novelty. What I also didn't expect was the Diamond to just come out of dry dock and have so many system problems. The AC in the cabins didn't work properly for the first 8 days where many cabins were extremely hot or cold while at the extreme temperature settings. There were also leaks around the ship primarily in the Santa Fe dining room and in the bathrooms outside the restaurant for most of the cruise. There were towels and buckets in the dining room to catch the leaks and the restrooms had noisy fans to dry the carpet. For long time cruisers, Princess also made changes to the coffee card plan where unused drinks cannot be transferred to future cruises. Also the daily charges to our credit card were a surprise instead of the one time charge at the end of the cruise on prior cruises. Evening entertainment did not compare to what we saw on the Majestic, however, The Secret Silk premiere was the most innovative show yet, produced by directors and song writers that did Wicked and Disney's Beauty and the Beast. Bravo also brought a standing ovation as it mixed Opera with pop music.
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| Chiufen Shopping Area |
The Vietnam cities were never great tourist attractions so we opted for private tours this time. We did see the Rex Hotel, Tet Flower Road, Glac Lam Pagoda, Notre Dame Cathedral, and Independence Palace in Ho Chi Minh City. We were in Nha Trang on the Tet Lunar New Year holiday so many places were closed and guides were twice as expensive as normal.
We planned to visit Hong Kong Disney while at the city but were convinced to skip it by the travel guide at the terminal. He said that Disney would be overcrowded due to families visiting from China for the New Year holiday so we decided to take the free shuttle to the Plaza Hollywood mall and visited the Nan Lian Garden and the Chi Lin Nunnery. Tried to wait for New Year Dim Sum but it was too crowded so we ate at a less busy restaurant.
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| Osaka Castle Park |
Taipei was the only port where weather affected our plans. We've been on the Best of Taipei excursion before so we went to the hillside, old, shopping village of Chiufen. Very interesting, quaint town with steep stairs everywhere and hundreds of small stalls. Would be very scenic if we had better weather but we had a great time walking the winding streets and paths. We were told that we needed local currency but other passengers said vendors took USD.
We met a Goodwill Guide in Osaka and visited Osaka Castle Park, Sumiyoshi Taisha Shrine, and the famous Dontonbori shopping area. The Osaka Castle is also a museum and has a top floor viewing platform. The Shinto shrine is like every other and Dontonbori was a hustle and bustle of activity with the famous Gilco sign as a symbol of Osaka.
We did a ship excursion in Shimizu that was all too similar to the free tour in Osaka. Sunpu Castle Park had some winter cherry blossoms but the castle has been long destroyed. We couldn't see Mount Fuji from Miho Beach Pine Forest but the sky cleared just before we got back to the ship. Just like that, the cruise was over as we prepped for the 9 hour wait at Narita.
