V&G update.....

Dear all
We arrived yesterday from Singpore's humid heat, to Perth's dry, blazing hot sun.  Gary met us at the airport - it is really good to see him and Lara and they have a lovely home in, according to the lady that used to live upstairs to us in Crouch End, the "trendy" part of Perth, Northbridge, but according to G&L it is just the ex-red light district that they are gradually doing up!

Singapore was an interesting place - not our cup of tea really.  I think that if we went again, we would prefer to stay out of the central part because it is very tourist-oriented.  It is very clean apart from the fact that it just seems to be a continuous building site.  We were told that they do not renovate properties, they just pull them down and start again every time so they have signs up everywhere saying that they are in the process of "Upgrading"!  We were surrounded by in-your-face advertising and we were quite surprised at how tacky things were.  We made the trip over to the island of Sentosa (which boasts the southernmost tip of the Asian mainland).  This had been built up as "idylic" and "the" place to go.  We took a glass cable car across to the island, which was amazing - the views over the harbour were incredible, only to find that it was a bit of a tourist toy-town and we were so pleased that we had not booked a hotel over there.  There were some good things about the island though - there was an underground water world where we saw beautiful fish, sharks and coral and we did succumb to do the touristy thing and we went along to the Dolphin display which we must admit was fun!

We are having a bit of a mong-out day today as it is 35 degrees out there, so we thought that we would have a lie in to catch up on our sleep - which was great, and we are now trawling through G&L's brochures about Perth.  We're planning to wander in this afternoon and have a look around......... will write again soon to let you know what we are up to.

Lots of love

V & G

Our Itinerary

Thought you may be interested in our trip schedule;
Thu 17th Jan 2215 Fly to Singapore from Heathrow Terminal 4 (Qantas QF010)

Fri 18th Jan 1855 Arrive Singapore

Stay at:-

Hotel Phoenix
300 Orchard Road
7-1 To 10 The Promenade
Singapore

Mon 21st Jan 0850 Fly to Perth (Qantas QF072)

1355 Arrive Perth

Stay with Vida's cousin:-

Gary Joseph

Sun 27th Jan 1210 Fly to Sydney (Qantas QF580)

1905 Arrive Sydney

Stay at:-

Cambridge Park International Hotel
212 Riley Street
Surry Hills
Sydney
NSW
2010

Friday 1st Feb 0925 Fly to Wellington (Qantas QF047)

1435 Arrive Wellington

For the first two weeks we will be staying at:-

The Terrace Villas
Reception 202
The Terrace
Wellington
New Zealand
Ph: 64 4 920 2020
Fax: 64 4 920 2030
E mail: info@terracevillas.co.nz
www.terracevillas.co.nz