Travel diary: Do what you feel like day

It sounds weird, but one of the great things about travelling with mum is we have a similar energy threshold - she gets tired because of her knees and I get tired because I do. So it's good because you both need to have little rests throughout the day and you don't care much for ticking things off on an itinerary.

Another good thing is we have similar interests and we decided not to do anything we didn't feel like doing. If we wanted to laze around the hotel all day, that was perfectly fine (well if you're paying for it you may as well enjoy it, right?). Though lovely as it is, we didn't just stay in our room for the whole day...as if we would!

We started today with a rather expensive but delicious hotel buffet breakfast, one of the better ones I've had actually. Side note: one thing that I like about hotel breakfasts (in Asia anyway) is they always seem to have pink guava juice. I would never buy it at home but I really like it on holidays. So there you go.

We then took a leisurely stroll up Scotts Road and Orchard Road. The shops are insanely swish on Orchard Road, and there are multiples of high end shops like Prada, Louis Vuitton, etc, almost opposite one another (because heaven knows you wouldn't want to have to cross the road to buy your luxury goods). The buildings are massive, shiny temples of consumerism. It's quite staggering.

We only really went in to Tangs department store, again because it had been somewhere we used to go when we lived here. I think it's much ritzier than it used to be, but then everything seems to be around here. Or maybe I didn't pay as much attention to the ritziness when I was a kid. It was just what it was. Anyway, we wandered through the beautiful makeup section and I wish Elsie had been with us, she would have loved it.

After what was a fairly leisurely stroll up and back again, we were hot and bothered so it was time to hit the pool. It's nice being here mid-week as it's pretty quiet around the pool; there was only one other person there for most of the time we were there. After a deliciously refreshing dip I fell asleep in the sun reading Danielle LaPorte's the Desire Map (incidentally, I feel quite conspicuous toting around a book with a bright pinky purple cover and 'desire' in huge type on the front. But I'm enjoying it, and I probably need to get over the idea that anyone else is even looking).

Our timing was all out and we had missed lunch, and, well, it was afternoon tea time. How could we resist high tea?

After a nap we headed back out and caught the fast and efficient MRT to Gardens by the Bay, a sprawling place with various themed zones (eg Chinese garden, Indian garden, etc) two cooled domes (one growing flowers from all over the world and the other called 'Cloud forest', showcasing rainforest and high altitude plants) and the supertrees, which are gorgeous structures that collect energy in their solar panels and made me feel like we were in Avatar or something.

(Those are part of the supertrees on the right and the Marina Bay Sands complex in the background - that zeppelin-looking thing on the top has restaurants and an infinity pool. From the ground, it is impressively large and a little scary actually.)

Dinner was at Satay by the Bay, a hawker centre within the gardens. We had satay and popiah and lots of fresh orange juice. We were seriously flagging by this point. We ended up doing a lot of walking, but I was proud of us that we didn't give in and catch a taxi back to the hotel but managed on the train and walking.

Then Ben and Jerry's in the hotel room and turning in to read and blog and just be quiet. This holiday thing is pretty rad! I should do it more often...

(PS If you want to see more photos of the gardens, check out my Flickr photostream)