Singapore 2024, December 02

Another early morning, getting up at 6:30am for breakfast so I'd be back in my room in time for the Gold Coast half marathon registration at 7:00am. It was probably a bad decision by the organisers to open every race distance at the same time, as it took nearly 30 minutes to register due to repeated page errors.

From what I heard later the marathon distance sold out in a few hours like Melbourne, and the half marathon wasn't too far behind. I don't know why the marathon is still increasing in popularity so much every year, but I suspect most of those people would be just walking or jogging as a novelty. While the mass participation opportunity is great for everyone, I think they also need to provide some better access for serious runners to qualify based on time. The elite runners never have a problem gaining entry and all the other benefits that come with it, but the people at the next level below that get no help at all, even as good as the top 100. Additionally a public ballot might be necessary now with races selling out in a few hours when people might not have access to a computer.

After all of that was taken care of I went for a morning run across to Gardens By The Bay and back via Clarke Quay, Boat Quay, and Bayfront for about ten kilometres. A good run except I had to cross over the road once via a staircase connecting two buildings.

The morning travel time to the Art Science Museum was much less than I expected, so I had to wait a while for my 11:00am booking time to arrive. The museum had a special Word Of Studio Ghibli exhibit running for the summer.

Inside was a bunch of set creations for many of the animated movies, and a limited amount of background information to read on the walls.

Strangely they only got as far as Spirited Away and they it all ended at the gift shop, I figured at least Howl's Moving Castle would be included. There was some good stuff on display, but overall it wasn't really long enough or detailed enough. I didn't find any particularly good magnets in the gift shop, they were mostly selling badges and pins instead, and most of other stuff was like four times what you'd expect.

As per usual my legs were tired from lots of standing and shuffling, so it was time for lunch and somewhere to sit down for a while. It was quite a long walk back to the MRT station and then again to transfer between lines, which is the only real problem with the otherwise great Singapore train network.

I got out at the Promenade station to go to Suntec City. Perhaps I purposely forgot from last time but this place is a horribly confusing arrangement of shops split between 3 or 4 tower buildings. To make things worse not all floors are connected properly, so sometimes you have to up, down, and around to get from one section to another. Finally at probably the opposite end of the whole place I found some food stores and went to Jamba Juice and Shake Shack.

It was another long walk all the way back to the MRT again to travel a short distance to Bugis. The plan was for a quick walk around near the Little India area with some good street art, souvenir shops, and such. Instead I spent like 15 minutes walking underground trying to find the best exit, but ended up almost all the way back at Promenade station by the end instead. Finally walking to my intended destination, Haji Lane was the most popular location but I didn't see much street art or other nice buildings, but did find a good magnet though.

Learning my lesson from last time I walked back to Bugis Junction shopping centre and MRT station the shortest way this time. The shops in the basement here were incredibly similar to the first time I visited Singapore and stayed near here, which was all the way back in about 2013.

My last plans for the day were to go back towards the city hall and marina area but it was 4pm and I was quite tired so just headed for the hotel instead. Feeling a bit revived after dinner I got a quick 10 minute train to Bayfront to see the new version of Sands water light show running at 8pm.

There was already a big crowd right in front, which I think has a better view of some illumination that you can't see much of from a side angle. The show went for about fifteen minutes and was alright, but didn't have much variety to the water elements and colours.

Steps = 26,983 with 10km running