Travel Monkeys

Australia Trip Report: Day 7

July 23, 2025 – Day Trip to Kangaroo Valley (Author: J)

Kangaroos in the valley of the same name

P’s one request for this trip was to see “kangaroos and wombats,” but not koalas. (“Over-rated, lazy, and smooth-brained.”) Downtown Sydney is conspicuously devoid of wild kangaroos and wombats, so I planned a day trip to the aptly named Kangaroo Valley. If, like us, you would like to see wildlife in its natural habitat without the need to self-drive, the Wild Wombat and Kangaroo Tour by Perfect Day Sydney may be for you.

Our day started with a leisurely breakfast in our hotel room. We enjoyed muffins, apples, juice boxes, and coffee made in the hotel room coffee maker. Mercifully, this was before a TikTok influencer shared the hack of using the hotel room coffee maker to clean your underwear, so I enjoyed my coffee without any sanitation concerns.

We left our hotel room a bit before 10 so that we would be on time for our 10:15 am tour pickup. Perfect Day Sydney picks guests up at two locations in the Sydney CBD. The location closest to us was the Thomas Sutcliffe Mort statue. That’s not Thomas Sutcliff, mort (i.e., dead) as I originally thought. It’s Thomas Sutcliffe Mort, an Australian industrialist with 3 names. Across the road is a building that was used in the wool trade of the 1800s, which I assume explains the placement of the statue.

Dave, who owns Perfect Day Sydney, picked us up in his minibus right on time. Unsurprisingly, most of the tourists who had been studiously admiring Mr. Sutcliffe Mort were part of our tour. All together, I’d say there were about 20 people in the tour group, which was about the capacity of the bus. As we set out for the countryside, Dave asked everyone to introduce themselves, which is how I know that our group was primarily Americans, with just a few British tourists mixed in. In addition to P, there was one other non-adult on the group, a girl a few years younger than P.

The highlight of the Wild Wombat and Kangaroo Tour is seeing the aforementioned wild wombats and kangaroos. But since wombats and kangaroos are mostly active at dusk and dawn, the tour includes several other stops along the way to pass the time until the main event. Our first stop was Sublime Point Lookout, about an hour from Sydney on the South Coast. From the lookout, which is at the edge of a cliff, you can see the coast for a long way in either direction.

While we were stopped at the lookout, Dave put out a selection of Australian snacks, including chips and assorted Tim Tams. Tim Tams are a chocolate dipped biscuit cookie. We had our choice of double coat (the original but with more chocolate), caramel, sweet and salty, and white chocolate. The double coat was my favorite. As we were eating our snacks and admiring the view, a local who said he worked for the park system in New South Wales pointed out some landmarks for us. But we had to tear ourselves away when we noticed the rest of the group returning to the bus to continue our journey.

From Sublime Point, we headed inland. As we approached Macquarie Pass National Park, Dave asked if anyone got car sick and offered around some barf baggies. There were no takers. As I’m sure you’ve guessed by now, this detail would not have stuck out in my mind if everyone who politely demurred had made the right choice. As it turns out, the little girl sitting in front of us on the bus had a history of vomiting in cars in the US. As we sped down the bumpy, windy road in the National Park, the little girl got to have the experience of vomiting on a whole new continent. We spent the rest of the drive to our lunch stop with the windows down, while I prayed that P had overcome his early childhood tendency towards sympathy barf.

Arriving at Robertson Pie Shop was a happy occasion. With relief, we scrambled off the bus and headed inside the roadside pie shop. Dave runs a well-oiled machine, so our order of pies was ready and waiting when we arrived. I had the veggie pie (veggies and gravy in a pie crust) and D and P had the vegan pizza puff, which has puff pastry and tomato and tastes – I am told – like a cheese pizza.

Unfortunately, while Dave had snacks and barf bags a plenty in the bus, he didn’t have any cleaning supplies. So, we returned to a bus that had been wiped clean but didn’t smell much better than when we left. The mom of the little girl who had gotten sick offered P an essential oil stick that he could rub behind his ears to cover the unpleasant bus smell. I won’t say that it fixed the issue entirely, but it did allow us to make it to our next stop without any further incidents.

That stop was Carrington Falls. This is usually a guided hike where Dave spots wildlife for you. But, bus cleaning duty called, so Dave instead told us to be back in 30 minutes, and he returned to the bus to try to MacGyver up a solution the persistent smell. Carrington Falls has a short walking track with views of the falls. Walking the whole track takes about 30 minutes, so we had plenty of time to see what there was to see here. In addition to the scenery, there were a lot of colorful songbirds in the picnic area near the start of the walking track.

After our walk and a lamington tasting in the picnic area, it was back to the bus (which could have smelled better but also could have smelled worse). From Carrington Falls, it was on to Fitzroy Falls, an even more dramatic waterfall that plunges down a cliff face. I was fascinated to learn that there were platypuses in the area, but I didn’t manage to locate any in the shallow river near the walking trail. After visiting the falls, we went inside the visitor centre, which had some exhibits on local wildlife and a gift shop. Anticipating that we would see wombats later in the day, we purchased a wombat magnet to add to our fridge collection.

By this point, sunset was rapidly approaching. Our final stop before wombats and kangaroos was St. Joseph’s Church. St. Joseph’s is a small white church that looks like many other small white churches. The biggest differentiator is that the churchyard is home to a large colony of flying foxes – enormous bats with long dog-like snouts. I’m personally a fan of bats (or sky-puppies), so I was excited for this stop. Some others in the group were less enthusiastic.

After photographing the bats, it was at long-last time to make the short drive to Bendeela Recreation area for wombat and kangaroo viewing. Bendeela, a camping and picnic area, is also home to mobs of kangaroos and wisdoms of wombats – mobs and wisdoms being the respective names for groups of these marsupials. We saw our first kangaroos as soon as we turned into Bendeela. While Dave promised there would be many more kangaroos to come, we did stop to take pictures of this first mob of female and juvenile roos.

Then, we drove a bit further to our parking place for our time at Bendeela. Near our parking spot, we saw our first wombat. Dave quickly diagnosed the poor guy with mange and put in a call to whomever de-manges the area wombats. Apparently, there is a solution that can be poured on the animals to kill the parasites causing hair loss. Unlike kangaroos, wombats don’t appear to be at all skittish, so I would imagine it isn’t too much of a challenge to get their meds applied.

We spent about an hour wandering around Bendeela looking at the kangaroos and wombats. If you stand a few feet behind a wombat, you can get low angle shots that make it look like you are right next to the little guys. (Well, medium sized guys). There is therefore no need to kidnap any baby wombats for selfies, regardless of what you may have seen on the Tik Tok. The landscape, beautiful sunset colors, and abundant wildlife came together to create a wonderful experience. My only complaint was that my thin jacket was not warm enough for the chilly evening. It was clear that I had made a mistake when I removed my fleece jacket from my suitcase before departing the US. An extra layer would have been just right.

As it started to get dark, Dave gathered everyone up and led us back to the bus. Then it was back to Robertson for a pub dinner. On the way home, we made a final stop in a field to look at the stars. I think it is accurate to say that I have never seen more stars in the sky (although we experienced 5 minutes of clear sky in the Amazon rainforest that was comparable). D, who is interested in astronomy, was so excited that I had to stop him from wandering off by reminding him that we had no idea if there was another cliff concealed in the darkness.

By the time Dave dropped as at our hotel and handed us a parting package of Tim Tams, it was closing in on bedtime. Overall, the day had been nearly perfect. If you like seeing animals in the wild, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Perfect Day. I’m sure Dave’s gotten the bus deodorized at this point.

Australia Trip Report: Day 6

July 22, 2025: Sydney

On our first full day in Sydney, I woke up at 6 am – a normal time for me to be awake. I was pleased that my plan to recover from jetlag in Singapore had apparently been a success. P and D are much better sleepers than I am, so I left them a-snooze in their beds and went to the gym.

The Intercontinental’s gym is on the 31st floor of the hotel and shares a locker room area with the pool. The gym is clean and modern with a decent selection of free weights and cardio equipment. I was the only early bird in the gym, so I seized the opportunity to do a 20-minute strength training routine on my favorite fitness app followed by a quick 10 minutes on the elliptical. After my workout, I headed to the locker room. This gave me the opportunity to peek at the pool area, which has stunning views of Sydney Harbor and the Opera House. I topped off my gym time with a quick visit to the sauna.

By this point, I thought that my family might have noticed my absence. So, I returned to the room where I found D and P barely awake. I got myself cleaned up and then spent some time trying to figure out why I didn’t have cell service. Our wireless provider is Google-Fi. One of the reasons that we use them is the option to switch plans from month to month. A few days before we travel internationally, I switch us to their highest tier plan, which includes data in 200+ countries. My phone had worked fine in Singapore, but I was getting an error message that said there was no service available in Sydney. My efforts to fix the issue were ultimately fruitless. After 20 minutes of trouble shooting, the rep told me that the issue was that there were no cell towers in Sydney. At that point, I decided my time was better spent enjoying my vacation. (I suspect that the issue was my older phone’s compatibility with Australian cell towers. In hindsight, my decision to put off updating my phone until after our trip was the wrong call).

Fortunately, despite the lack of cell towers in the 2^nd largest city in Australia, P and D both had service on their devices. We used D’s phone to research places to eat breakfast, settling on Bennies. Bennies is a café in Circular Quay with view of the Harbor Bridge. We were quickly seated in the heated outdoor dining area. P ordered pancakes and juice. D got eggs and a latte. And I had the banana bread, which came topped with ricotta cheese, honey, and bananas, and my first flat white of the trip. We were happy with this meal. The prices were quite reasonable given the location steps from the Opera House, and our food was tasty.

After breakfast, we continued walking along the harbor until we reached the Opera House. I have wanted to see Sydney Opera House for a long time – ever since the early 90’s, when I read an article in one of my nature magazines about monuments that were threatened by rising sea levels due to climate change. The Opera House more than lived up to my expectations. Photos don’t really convey the scale of the building or the way that it just seems to fit its location. Other than a small group of backpackers, we were the only tourists poking around, so we had lovely unobstructed views from every angle.

The Opera House is adjacent to the Royal Botanic Gardens, so we continued our walk through the gardens. The Royal Botanic Gardens have to be one of the most beautifully situated gardens in the world. Like the Opera House, they are perched along the harbor, so you get amazing views of the water as you walk. The gardens also have a wonderful array of bird life. We followed the sound of squawking to an area that had trees full of cockatoos and then spent some time admiring aquatic birds in a pond. By this point, we were thirsty (and realized that we had left our water bottle in our room), so we stopped at a café in the gardens for some drinks.

After all of that exploring, it was still only about 9:30 am. The Australian Museum, which P had selected as our main destination for the day, didn’t open until 10 am. We decided to leave the gardens and walk slowly towards the museum. Our walk took us past the Art Gallery of New South Wales; it also wasn’t open yet, but we did get to admire some of the outdoor sculptures.

When we arrived at the Australian Museum, there was a long-ish queue to enter. We quickly realized that was because it was merely 9:55. We decided to sit next to a fountain across the street from the museum and wait for the doors to open. Precisely at 10, the queue started to move. We crossed the street and joined the line.

The Australian Museum is free to enter, so the line moved quickly. We hung our jackets in the coatroom and started our visit in the Wild Planet gallery, which has a variety of taxidermy animals. Some of the animals were quite old and – by the looks of things – the museums original taxidermist didn’t have a lot of experience with live animals. P was delighted, or maybe appalled, by a colobus monkey that appeared to be wearing ill-fitting dentures.

The Australian Museum has a hodge podge of exhibits ranging from dinosaur bones to displays on the Eora people, the Indigenous People of the Australian Coast and Torres Strait. Unfortunately, the intriguingly named “Surviving Australia” exhibit on native wildlife was closed for refurbishment. But we spent a good 2 hours enjoying many of the other exhibits. We could have spent a bit longer, but our tummies were telling us it was time for lunch.

P requested pizza. After reviewing nearby options (a task made easier because a number of restaurants were not open for lunch on Tuesdays), we settled on Macchiato Wood Fired Pizza and Coffee. That meant another short and pleasant walk. This time, we passed through Hyde Park, the sight of the Anzac Memorial.

When we arrived, Macchiato was doing a steady business serving lunch to office workers. There were a few available tables, though, and we were seated immediately. We ordered 2 pizzas, a salad, and a soda for P. D ordered a lunch beer. That meant it was appropriate for me to have a lunchtime glass of wine. A pattern was established. Macchiato was another solid lunch choice. Our food was enjoyable and it was a good value for the price. (Keep in mind that the AUD/USD exchange rate in July was about 100/65, which did influence my perception of value everywhere we went).

After lunch, we poked into some shops looking for local football jerseys for P. There wasn’t anything in stock in his size, but the staff at Rebel – a sporting goods store – suggested that we check back later in the week. We accepted defeat and decided to return to the Intercontinental for our afternoon rest. Back at the hotel, P went up to the room, while D and I took a quick detour to a grocery store to pick up breakfast for the following morning – plus an assortment of local candy bars for room snacks.

We spent the rest of the afternoon lounging in the room. For dinner that evening, we had our first experience on Sydney’s light rail, which we took to Spice Alley in Chippendale. Spice Alley is a Southeast Asian Hawker-Centre style dining location. It has a bunch of different food stalls surrounding an open-air dining area. We shared some spring rolls, dumplings, and laksa, and each got our own fancy fruit iced tea from the drinks and desserts stall. The vegetarian options were all clearly marked, which made it easy to find things we could eat.

As we ate, I enjoyed the ambiance that the glowing lanterns and “street art” created. Before we arrived, I had been a little worried about whether we would be uncomfortable eating outside. After all, it was winter and the sun sets early in Sydney (6pm). Happily, my worries were misplaced. There were plenty of heat lamps, enough that I didn’t even need to wear my jacket while I ate. After dinner, we walked to KOI Dessert Bar for fancy desserts and tea. Then, it was back to the Intercontinental for bedtime.

Australia Trip Report: Day 5

July 21, 2025: Singapore to Sydney

After 3 nights in Singapore, it was time to head to our next destination – Sydney. We were travelling on a Scoot flight that departed at 9:55 am, so I prebooked an airport transfer via Grab the night before our flight. This was our first experience using the book ahead feature on Grab, and it worked well. Our driver’s information and his ETA were waiting for us on the app when we woke up in the morning.

By 7:15 am, we were ready to check out of the Pan Pacific. We headed down to the lobby with jackets in hand, something that felt a bit odd in steamy Singapore. But wearing our heaviest pants and carrying our jackets ensured that our carry-on bags were under Scoot’s weight limit.

The lobby of the Pan Pacific, Singapore.

Our driver arrived at the Pan Pacific ahead of schedule, and we were on our way to the airport within minutes of arriving in the hotel lobby. We had no bags to check, so we printed our tickets at a kiosk and head straight for terminal 1 departures. This requires passing through an electronic immigration checkpoint, something that took just a few minutes. The lack of lines was a stark contrast to our usual departure experience at US airports.

By 8 am, we were sitting at the World of Tiger Beer, which we selected because it has a Western style breakfast menu. No matter where we go in the world, D only wants eggs for breakfast. There was a time when I found his adherence to routine endearing. But when routine gets in the way of my breakfast roti, I am not inclined to be generous. After some grumbling on my part, we made our selections: avocado toast for me, eggs for D, and a veggie burger for P. Everything was well-cooked and our bill was reasonable by airport standards. I’m still holding a grudge about the roti.

In Singapore, security screening is conducted at the airport gates. So, after a final bathroom break — essential because there are no bathrooms once you pass through security — we found our gate and joined the line that had already formed for security. Other than some additional screening of the Ziplock containing our sunscreen and bug repellant, it was a painless process. In particular, no one weighed or measured any of our bags. (Your mileage may vary as we did take care to ensure our bags were the correct dimensions and were not overstuffed).

I was a little nervous about taking a long-haul flight on a budget airline. But our Scoot tickets were about $800 US total (including adding on meals), as compared to $700 per person on Singapore Airlines. How bad could Scoot be?

I think that your answer to that question will vary depending on where you live. If, like me, you are used to flying US-based airlines, then you should have no complaints about Scoot. The seat space and comfort were on par with economy on American or Delta. The key difference was the customer service; Scoot offers some.

Scoot does have a few negatives that you might want to weigh if you are considering booking. First is the lack of in-flight entertainment, free or otherwise. Second, meals and snacks are not included; even water has its price. (But, as I mentioned, the overall price including added on meals was quite reasonable). Third, the windows have a dimmer instead of a shade. This was my first time seeing a window dimmer on a plane and I was excited by the novel technology. However, the windows were locked in the dimmed position at certain points in the flight, which might be a negative for folks who like to look out the window.

It was an uneventful flight. When we reached cruising altitude, the cabin crew came through with meal service. Prebooking offered more hot options, but there were also a selection of meals and snacks that you could purchase on board. We had ordered a curried fish dish for D and vegetarian biryani for P and I. The meals each came with a drink and dessert item.

After I ate, I fell fast asleep. By the time I woke up and stretched my stiff neck, we were less than 2 hours from Sydney. We ordered some snacks (milk tea for me and a box of cookies to share), and I cued up an Australian history podcast that I had downloaded. I alternated between listening and reading my book for the rest of the trip.

Flying time between Singapore and Sydney is about 7.5 hours. With the 2-hour time difference, we landed in Sydney at around 7:45 pm. The windows were dimmed during the landing, so we didn’t get to see the view on arrival. On the other hand, it was dark outside, so perhaps there were no views to be had.

Like Singapore, Australia has automated its immigration process. You scan your passport, answer a few questions, and a gate opens to let you into the country. (All of this assumes that you obtained your ETA before arrival). Despite this relatively simple process, we did encounter a snafu. P asked how he should answer the question, “Are you the parent or guardian of [this minor]?” I told him to answer, “no,” reasoning that he was not his own parent. But apparently the questions were set up on the assumption that an adult was answering on behalf of the minor. The “no” meant that P needed to be manually processed through immigration. The line for manual processing was short, so my mistake took us no more than 5 minutes and an apology to rectify.

Once through immigration, we headed to the airport taxi stand. It was about a 30-minute ride from the airport to the Intercontinental. At the hotel, we were quickly checked in by a friendly desk clerk. We dropped our bags, cleaned ourselves up, and came back downstairs for a light dinner at the hotel.

View from the pool area at the Intercontinental Sydney.

The Intercontinental evolved from a Treasury building constructed in the mid-1800’s. The hotel’s lobby bar, the Treasury, takes full advantage of the historic features of the building. It is surrounded by the old stone arches of the original building. Its lovely atmosphere was mostly lost on us in our exhausted state. Still, we enjoyed our cheese tray, veggie and hummus tray, order of chips, and round of drinks (a wine, a beer, and a soda). After our meal, it was back to our room for an early-ish bedtime. I can’t say that we had made the most of our first day in Sydney but we had — at least — arrived.

Australia Trip Report: Day 4

July 20, 2025: Singapore (Author: J)

Singapore 60th Anniversary Inflatable at River Wonders

When we last left off, we had finished a wonderful dinner at the top of Marina Bay Sands and settled in for a good night’s sleep at the Pan Pacific. The following day, a Sunday, was our last in Singapore. Our plan was to visit River Wonders and the Night Safari at Mandai Wildlife Reserve. The Mandai property currently has 5 wildlife parks. On our last trip to Singapore, we spent the better part of a day enjoying the Singapore Zoo. On this trip, our priority was the Night Safari. We decided to pair it with River Wonders because we had been told that combining those two parks would make for a long, but manageable day.

Following advice to avoid overextending ourselves before our zoo visit, we stayed close to the Pan Pacific in the morning. We slept late and then started our day with breakfast in Suntec City. Now that we understood the layout of the upper-level pedestrian bridges connecting the Pan Pacific to other buildings, getting to Suntec City was a snap. In just a few minutes, we were strolling past Don Don Donki, singing their theme song. Everybody: “Don Don Don… Donki!” So catchy! And so embarrassing to your tween-son when you sing it in a mall!

Suntec City has plenty of dining options, which made it hard to choose. We ended up eating at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. This was a nostalgia pick for me. I treated myself to a vanilla latte from Coffee Bean every Friday when I lived in Los Angeles, but there aren’t any Coffee Beans in the Northeast US where we now live. The Coffee Bean in Singapore had a vanilla latte that tasted exactly like I remembered, but the food menu was quite different from LA. D ordered a hot breakfast of pancakes, while P and I kept things economical with muffins. My beloved cheese Danish was not a menu option.

After breakfast, we went to the Premiere Football store so that P could purchase a local jersey. Most of the available football jerseys were for Thai teams, but the helpful staff found a single Tampines Rovers jersey in P’s size. He is therefore prepared to root for Tampines for as long as the jersey fits – so, perhaps as long as eight or nine months.

We spent the rest of the morning relaxing and reading in our room. Around 1 pm, we headed back to the mall for a late lunch. There are a number of vegetarian food stall options in the malls near the Pan Pacific. We wound up at E. Veg. By this point, we had come to the realization that our eyes were bigger than our stomachs, so we shared two dishes between us. I ordered vegetarian duck rice, and D picked a combo meal that came with noodles and some sort of mock chicken dish. The staff made sure to clarify that everything was vegetarian — so that we weren’t disappointed by the lack of meat, I presume.

The duck rice was wild. I have never eaten real duck, so I can’t comment on whether the flavor was right. But the “duck” had “skin” that was really reminiscent of the texture of poultry skin. D and I were in awe. P has never eaten meat, so he didn’t get the fuss. (He did like the food, though). Overall, we were happy with our meal. It was inexpensive, satisfying, and felt somewhat healthy. The vibe in the mall, which was filled with locals enjoying lunch with families, was also nice.

After lunch, we topped off our sunscreen and bug spray and called a Grab to take us to River Wonders. The drive to Mandai took about 30 minutes, time that passed quickly as we enjoyed the views from our windows and admired our Grab driver’s extensive collection of dashboard décor.

From the passenger pick up area at Mandai East (which houses the Night Safari, River Wonders, and Singapore Zoo), it is a short walk to the River Wonders entrance. Because the Night Safari has timed entrance, I had prebooked our combo tickets to ensure that we had the earliest entry time: 7:15 pm. It took just a minute to scan the tickets on our phones and pass through the turnstiles into the park.

River Wonders is dedicated to the animals that live in and near the world’s great rivers. The habitats are organized river-by-river and looped together with a walking trail. We took the loop in a counterclockwise direction because it was the quickest route to the Amazon. P’s attention span seems to be decreasing as he gets older. He hurried us past the manatees and giant otters in the Flooded Forest so that he could reach the monkeys in the Amazonia Encounters exhibit. Amazonia Encounters is a walk-through habitat exhibit similar to our favorite exhibit in the Singapore Zoo: The Fragile Forest. Once you enter the biodome, there are no walls separating you from the wildlife. This provided a nice opportunity for P to enjoy the squirrel and saki monkeys, as well as some of our favorite South American rodents, the agouti and capybara.

After Amazonia Encounters, we queued up for Amazon River Quest, a log flume type ride through the habitats of some of the South American wildlife. This ride requires a separate ticket, which I had pre-purchased. You can also buy tickets from machines near the ride entrance (which had their own queue that we were able to bypass). I had mixed feelings about this ride. The boat itself was fun, but the habitats along the riverbanks seemed a bit small for some of the animals. Consistent with my view of the entire park, I felt that this attraction came up a bit short when compared to the Singapore Zoo.

By this time, we were feeling hot and cranky, so we headed to the Panda Forest. This forest is home to both giant and red pandas. But the star attraction for us was that it is well air-conditioned to simulate the pandas’ mountainous home. We watched the pandas for quite a while so that we could enjoy the air conditioning. Then, we popped into Mama Panda Kitchen for more A/C and a snack. I could not resist the panda shaped bao filled with chocolate custard, and P supplemented the bao with an ice cream float.

After our rest break, we backtracked to the Flooded Forest to look at the exhibits that P had been too impatient to look at before his monkey fix. I was glad we did so because the giant otters, which had been napping during our first visit, were now swimming about. We were able to walk through the tunnel in their tank with the otters swimming past us – exactly the iconic view we had hoped for when we visited the park.

Finally, we completed the loop, taking in the animals of the Mekong, Congo, and Nile Rivers. We were finished with the park by about 5:15. I would say that if you are planning to visit River Wonders and the Night Safari together, entering River Wonders around 3 is about right if you are not going to see the Once Upon a River show. If you are going to see the show (which requires reserving a free ticket online), then you will need more time.

The Night Safari does not open until 7:15, but the Ulu Ulu Safari Restaurant next to the Night Safari opens at 5:30. We joined a long queue for the restaurant, which moved quickly once the gates opened. Note that we needed to show our Night Safari tickets to enter the restaurant area.

Ulu Ulu is set up like an outdoor hawker market with stalls selling different types of food. After milling around a bit to see what our meal choices were, we decided to share the huge Vegetarian Makhanwala Banana Leaf Rice meal. We each picked out of own drinks from the drink stall.

I was initially disappointed that Ulu Ulu was outdoors (and therefore not air conditioned). That changed with the appearance of a troop of wild macaques. They lined up along the rooftops overlooking the dining area, and it soon became apparent that they were planning to stage a raid. One of the restaurant staff was deployed to fend off this attack. Armed with his monkey-poking stick, he kept a close eye on the animals in front of him. Unfortunately, although the staffer proved adept at poking the monkeys in front of him, he was less skilled at anticipating the movements of the troop. This provided an opening for several monkeys to sneak behind him, hop down, and grab food from a patron’s plate. We decided that the safest course of action was to finish our meal and dispose of our rubbish before we became the monkeys’ next target.

While we were watching the monkey show — coconuts and beers in hand — a line was beginning to form for the safari tram ride. We decided we were happier in our seats than standing in line, so we kept our table until the park gates opened. By this point, there was quite a long queue for the tram ride. I had read that the line gets shorter as the night wears on, so we started our visit with the walking trails in the park.

As one of the few nocturnal zoos in the world, the Night Safari has lots of animals you won’t find in other zoos from pangolins to palm civets. The highlight for us, as anticipated, was the Tasmanian Devil enclosure. They were a chatty bunch, and Looney Toons definitely gets the sound effects right.

River otters: one of our few wildlife photos before it got too dark to capture images.

It takes a bit of patience to find the animals in their habitats, so we explored at a slow pace. As we walked, the sun set and it became progressively darker. Even though the paths are lit well enough to avoid injuries and I knew in my logical brain that we were perfectly safe, my lizard brain couldn’t help feeling a bit of fear as we saw a pack of hyenas looming above us in the dark.

By the time we finished the walking paths, the line for the tram was – indeed – much shorter than it had been. So, our plan worked just as intended. However, P was feeling quite run down, so we honored his request to skip the tram. Instead, we headed back to the passenger pick up area and called a Grab back to our hotel. (There were also plenty of waiting taxis, but they were charging double the going fare on Grab).

Overall, the River Wonders/Night Safari combo was a bit too ambitious for us given that we hadn’t quite recovered from jet lag. Without the extra zap of energy that P got from the wild monkey troop’s visit to Ulu Ulu, I’m not sure he would have been up for the Night Safari at all. If you are planning to combine the Night Safari with another park, my recommendation is to schedule the zoos later in your trip so that jet lag is less of a factor. And I definitely don’t recommend combining Night Safari with any of the larger parks in Mandai.

Up next in the trip report, we’re headed to Sydney on Singapore Airlines’ budget arm: Scoot.

Australia 2025 Trip Report: Day 3

July 19, 2025: Singapore (Author: J)

On our last trip to Singapore, we were fairly successful at defeating jet lag within the first few days of our trip. So, we revived our jet lag playbook on this trip. On our first evening, we stocked our room with some snack cakes from 7-11 in case anyone woke up in the middle of the night hungry. (These proved a better choice than the wasabi chips we picked up in 2022). And we all committed to staying in bed until at least 5 am, even if it meant laying there with our eyes closed.

We executed the plan as well as could be expected. While I won’t say that anyone had a great night of sleep, we did all manage to sleep for large chunks of the time between 10 pm and 6 am. At 6 am, I made a cup of coffee using the hotel coffee machine and enjoyed it with some pandan cake while reading my book. Because our room at the Pan Pacific was small, my activities eventually woke everyone else up (despite my best efforts to read by phone flashlight). We all got ready for the day, and then headed to Marina Square, one of the malls attached to the Pan Pacific.

Armed with directions from the concierge, it was quite easy to find the entrance to the mall. There’s an exit on the 2^nd floor of the hotel that puts you directly outside a door to the mall. At 7:30 on a Saturday, the shops were all closed, but we weren’t there to shop. We headed directly for Ya Kun Kaya Toast to order breakfast. For those who are unfamiliar, Ya Kun Kaya Toast is a chain that serves a common Singaporean breakfast spread of toast with butter and kaya (pandan and coconut) jam, soft-cooked eggs, and coffee (kopi), along with some other breakfast items. Because we had breakfast included in our hotel stay in 2022, we didn’t get the opportunity to try kaya toast then. It was time to remedy that now.

The Ya Kun Kaya Toast location in Marina Square is a little island in the mall with a counter and open kitchen, and some dinner style seating. After you order at the counter, they set up your tray and slide it along as they fill it with your food. We quickly learned that you shouldn’t grab the tray until your number is called; it seems like the way the tray is set up tells the cooks what to put on each tray.

I had a kaya toast set with regular kopi (coffee with sweetened condensed milk). D had a French toast set, which was served with kaya jam, soft-cooked eggs, and kopi. P had a muffin and some water. There was a bit of a wait for our food because there was initially only 1 cook on duty, and the French toast order disrupted his efficient toast and eggs assembly line. When the rest of the kitchen crew arrived, the restaurant turned into a well-oiled machine with dine-in and delivery orders going out at a quick clip.

We enjoyed our food. I was a little worried about the eggs because gooey textures are not always my favorite, but they were cooked enough that I could enjoy them with the contrast of the crunchy toast. D was happy with his French toast and especially delighted by the kopi. P’s muffin was a muffin.

After breakfast, it was time to attend to the highest-priority item on our agenda: finding P some monkeys. (P has loved monkeys since he was a toddler, and his lifelong dream has been to become a primatologist. So, over D’s grumbling, I always prioritize monkey-watching on our trips). We liberally applied sunscreen and bug spray, and then I called a Grab to take us to Thomson Nature Park. The park is part of the Central Nature Park Network a group of nature parks that abut the Central Catchment Nature Reserve, which is Singapore’s largest nature reserve. I chose Thomson for our hike because I assumed that more popular hiking spots like MacRitchie would be quite crowded on a Saturday.

I enjoyed the Grab ride to the park. It gave us an opportunity to locate the metro station that had so eluded us the night before and see the preparations for Singapore’s National Day that were going on near Marina Bay. Our driver dropped us right at the main entrance to Thomson Nature Park. We did a quick study of the trail map and then made our way towards the Langur and Macaque Trails.

I am pleased to report that the monkeys complied with the park’s signage. As soon as we stepped onto the Macaque Trail, we saw some movement in the bushes and D located a family of macaques. We spent some time taking photos of the monkeys, which were close enough to watch, but not so close as to be too close for comfort. After visiting with our primate friends, we hiked a bit more to explore the ruins of the Hainanese village that formerly stood on the site of the park.

On our way out of the park, as we stopped to take some pictures at the park entrance, one of the park caretakers approached to ask if P was interested in wildlife. We said, “yes,” and he used one of his brooms to carefully move tree branches revealing some snakes taking their morning snoozes. All in all, we had an excellent experience at Thomson Nature Park. It’s a small park, easily enjoyed in 1-2 hours, but it packs a lot of interesting things into a small area. Plus, it has a caretaker willing to go out of his way to make sure kids can enjoy the local fauna.

We finished with our hike around 11 am, so we decided to head directly to lunch. I called another Grab, and, after a wait of about 20 minutes, we were on our way to Little India. Our destination was Gokul-Raas, another vegetarian restaurant serving vegetarian versions of local dishes. Happily, Gokul showed no signs of winding up its business operations. Indeed, the menu was so large that we had trouble narrowing things down. We ordered vegan chicken 65 (meatless chicken in a spicy batter), rojak, meatless mutton rendang, butter chicken, naan, and roti. It was way too much food, but we made every effort to eat it.

After lunch, I had planned to walk around Little Indian. But when we waddled out of Gokul, we decided to instead head back to the Pan Pacific for a rest and swim before our evening plans. We took the metro back to the Pan Pacific and walked back to the hotel without incident. There really is no need to cross any streets if you simply come out the door nearest the Pan Pacific when exiting the metro.

Our plan to nap first and then swim failed because we hadn’t hit the “please make up room” button. Instead, we swam first while our room was being cleaned and then lazed about in our room. Forgetting to ask for housekeeping became a theme for the trip. So, definitely look for a make up room button at your hotel if you are traveling in Singapore or Australia.

That evening, we had dinner at Ce La Vi restaurant, which sits atop tower 3 of Marina Bay Sands. When I asked P and D what they wanted to do in Singapore, I was very surprised to learn that going to the top of Marina Bay Sands was high on their list – particularly because none of us is a fan of heights. I was also vaguely annoyed about devoting an evening to MBS because I would have preferred to explore areas of Singapore that we had not yet seen. It turns out that P and D were right on this one and I was wrong.

Our dinner at Ce La Vi was excellent. The food and service were both exceptional. While there are not that many vegetarian options on the menu, the options they had were delicious. I particularly enjoyed the miso eggplant. We were also lucky to have perfect weather, which meant that we could sit in the outdoor area with panoramic views of the city. Finally, because we were there on a Saturday in late July, we were able to watch the National Day Rehearsals during our meal. That meant that we were treated to military aircraft flyovers and a fireworks show after dark.

The whole dining experience took about 2.5 hours, and it was magical. It was also quite expensive. All of the money we saved by staying at the Pan Pacific and then some went towards the meal. In short, D and P were right to insist on dining at the top of MBS. By the end of dinner, P was flagging, so we called it a day as soon as the last firework lit up the sky. It had been a wonderful day.

Australia 2025 Trip Report: Days 0-2

July 16-18, 2025: Travel to and Arrival in Singapore (Author: J)

The pre-trip logistics for this trip were somewhat more complicated than usual. In addition to our flights on Singapore Airlines, we had two flights on budget airlines. Those airlines, JetStar and Scoot, both have combined weight limits for your carryon bag and personal item. As long-time carryon only travelers, we are used to packing light. But a 10kg per person limit for a trip that includes both tropical and cooler destinations posed a challenge we had not faced before.

Our usual method of fitting everything in a carryon is to pack for a 1-week trip and do sink laundry as we go. For this trip, D and P packed 4 short sleeve shirts, a long sleeve shirt, a flannel for layering, 2 pairs of shorts, and 2 pairs of pants. I packed 5 short sleeve shirts, a button down and a cardigan for layering, and a sundress. We each packed 7 days’ worth of socks and undies, a warm jacket, a sun hat, a winter hat, a dressy outfit, sandals, and lightweight dress shoes. We also cut back on the toiletries we packed, bringing only 1 tube of items like sunscreen and bugspray that I usually pack 2 of.

Even with all that cutting back, we each had about 12 kg of total luggage. (My last pre-trip errand was purchasing a real luggage scale to confirm our status as light packing failures). Although my pre-trip YouTube viewing had been replete with videos suggesting ways to avoid overweight fees by cleverly secreting items upon your person, we decided a more reasonable option was to just hope that no one weighed our bags. If they did, we would have to pay to check one of them. Not as much fun as fastening a neck pillow out of undershorts, I know. But we were happy with our plan.

By mid-morning, we had said goodbye to our cat and started the drive to New Jersey. We arrived at my parents’ house in time for a late lunch and an uneventful afternoon of sitting around their house. The following morning, my dad drove us to Newark Airport. Because we had checked-in online and had no bags to check, we were able to proceed directly to security.

We were at the gate about 2 hours before our flight. The terminal that Singapore Airlines uses in Newark is, unfortunately, boring as can be. There are a handful of restaurants, a few airport newsstands, and that’s about it. There are only so many times that you can do a loop of the airport to admire the newsstand mint selection, so we wound up spending most of the time leading up to our 18-hour flight sitting near the gate.

Singapore Airlines flights SQ 21 and 22 use specially designed Airbus A350-900 ultralong-haul planes that have about 1/3 fewer seats than their regular long-haul planes. This apparently makes the A350-900ULR light enough to fly halfway around the world without a refueling stop. To make the flight economically feasible to operate, the plane only has business and premium economy classes. The upshot of all of this is that boarding goes quickly.

The premium economy cabin has a 2-4-2 seat configuration except for the last few rows. Those have a 1-4-1 seat configuration. The single seats have a little storage bin next to them, which adds a bit more legroom because you don’t need to store your personal item under the seat in front of you. When we flew SQ 21 and 22 in 2022, we chose to sit next to each other, with 2 of us near the window and 1 on the aisle in the middle of the plane. P and I found the arrangement comfortable enough, but D struggled to sleep with an aisle on one side and a stranger on the other. For this trip, I decided on a small splurge and paid $100 extra for D to sit in one of the single seats in the back of the plane. By the time I decided to pay for this upgrade, the 2 seats in front of D were booked, so P and I sat several rows in front of him.

In 2022, Covid rules and low demand meant that service was a little different than “normal,” so I was excited to get the full longest flight in the world experience. It began before our flight when we were able to select our meals using the “book the cook” feature. If you have special dietary needs like we do, you can set special dietary meals as your default and then modify individual meals to select book the cook. However, the side dishes for book the cook meals will not necessarily meet your dietary needs. On our flights, the sides included shellfish, gluten, and dairy, so anyone with food allergies should probably avoid book the cook. P and I are vegetarians for ethical reasons, so we were willing to risk booking one book the cook meal each.

Also back were hot towels upon boarding, and a post-takeoff drink service with wine, champagne, beer, cocktails, and soft drinks. (All of these drinks were available in 2022, but the crew minimized contact with passengers by limiting in-aisle service. That meant that there was bottled water waiting in each seat at boarding and drinks weren’t served until the first meal service). During this initial drink service, the crew also came around the cabin to check in with folks who had ordered special meals to confirm our dietary needs.

As we flew north towards the Canadian Maritimes, I reclined my seat, extended my leg rest, and started my first movie with a glass of champagne in hand. Things were off to a comfortable start. Before long, our first meal of the flight was delivered. I had a vegetarian eggplant meatball option through book the cook. It was served with a shrimp salad, a roll, cheese and crackers, and a dessert. P had the lacto-ovo vegetarian meal, which had a mozzarella, tomato, and greens salad, a roll, cheese and crackers, a vegetable and grain dish, and a dessert. D had ordered the Indian vegetarian meal, which he ate without providing any details for this trip report. This would have been a decent meal on land; by airline standards it was excellent. One of the cabin crew even came by to offer P an alternative meal option after noticing untouched items on his tray.

After dinner, I watched another movie. Then, I washed up for bed, taking advantage of the toothbrush kits in the bathroom. Even in my aisle seat, I was able to get about 7 hours of fitful sleep thanks to the generous recline and leg rest. 9 hours down, 9 to go. I passed the rest of the flight watching movies, reading, eating 2 more meals (a snack of pizza and a lacto-ovo veg meal very similar to the one that P had received as his first meal), and walking back and forth to the bathroom – because where else is there to go on a plane.

Despite the length of the flight, the only time that I felt restless was when we encountered turbulence towards the end of the flight. While the turbulence was relatively mild, it seemed to go on and on. As a nervous flyer who may or may not have extensively researched turbulence related injuries before our flight, I was impressed with the safety precautions the captain took, including briefly suspending service to ensure crew safety. While service was suspended, the captain made several announcements reminding everyone to remain seated. This frightened P, who assumed the announcements were a forecast of worse to come. From my vantage point in the aisle, I was able to see that each of the announcements was prompted by someone on the plane ignoring the seatbelt sign to go to the bathroom. (I did tell P this, of course, but aerophobia doesn’t always respond to logic).

18 and ½ hours after taking off in Newark, we landed at Singapore’s Changi Airport. With the time difference, it was now approximately 5pm on Friday, July 18. Disembarkation was efficient, and we were soon thanking the cabin crew and walking down the jetway.

Immigration in Singapore is now even more efficient than it was in 2022. If you have already submitted your arrival card, you can proceed to gates where you scan your own passport. I arrived at the gates with P and D behind me and quickly proceeded through. It was at this point that I realized that D had also cleared the gates, leaving P struggling to figure out how to properly scan his passport. The immigration officials would not let me move back towards P to help him, so I was left ineffectually shouting instructions from 6 feet away. (Incidentally, the immigration officials would prefer you don’t do this). P eventually figured out that reading the instructions on the gate was a good idea, scanned his passport, and reunited with us.

It’s about a 20-minute taxi ride from Changi to the Pan Pacific Marina Square, our hotel for this trip. We chose it because, unlike some other 5-star hotels near Marina Bay, the Pan Pacific considers a 12-year-old to be a child. We therefore saved a “3^rd adult fee” of approximately $100 per night by staying there. We hit a bit of a snag at check-in because the hotel did not have a record of the room request I had made; however, they quickly fixed the issue and moved us to a room with two beds.

Our room category was a deluxe twin, which – much to our relief — had two beds that would be considered double beds here in the US, and not twins. Overall, the room was a bit tired, but it was well-designed with everything we needed for our stay. Indeed, there were so many hidden cubbies that I didn’t find the one with extra pillows until I was checking for stray items as we packed up to check out. My favorite feature of the room was the mango scented shampoo and conditioner provided in the rain-style shower. It has my pick for best shampoo of the trip.

After getting cleaned up, we headed out for our dinner reservation at Clover in Kampong Glam. I pulled Google Maps up on my phone and entered the restaurant’s address. Then we started walking. I quickly realized that Google Maps assumed that we knew where the metro station was. The first part of the directions simply said, “go to Promenade Metro Station.” I set our new destination as Promenade Metro Station, and we were back in business. The only problem was that a multi-lane street with no crosswalk lay between us and the station. After multiple ineffectual efforts to find a way up to the 2^nd story pedestrian bridge over the intersection, we made a mad dash across the street and took the escalator down to the metro.

We had an easier time finding our way from the metro to the restaurant, largely because Kampong Glam is much more walkable than Marina Square. Kampong Glam, Singapore’s old Muslim-Malay quarter, is one of the neighborhoods we didn’t visit on our last trip. Folks on the Tripadvisor Singapore forums recommended it as a nice neighborhood to walk around in the evening, and I was delighted to find a vegetarian restaurant serving local Singapore specialties in the neighborhood.

What I did not realize was that Clover was in the process of closing. And they were winding down their business by slowly selling off the food in their fridges without replenishing anything. We arrived at Clover to find a few tables in an unairconditioned foyer, a menu of the restaurant’s 4 or 5 worst selling items (with other items crossed out), and a drink menu that consisted of tap water (number of glasses – your choice!). It was a bit of a disappointment, but our jetlagged brains didn’t have the ability to formulate a new plan. We ate what they had and hit the streets to explore.

Kampong Glam is a lovely neighborhood of historic shophouses that would be fun to explore at any time. On a Friday night, it was buzzing with people out enjoying the evening and restaurant-workers touting their establishments. Though the many no-touting signs in the neighborhood suggest to me that touting may be illegal, I quite enjoyed our interactions. It felt more like a warm, friendly welcome than hard-selling tactics. While we weren’t in the market for a second dinner, we did have some teh tarik and Turkish ice cream as we wandered. “I think it was worth coming here even though dinner wasn’t great,” I said hopefully.

Soon enough, we were exhausted and ready to head back to our hotel. We easily found the metro and made the short trip back to Promenade. At this point, the night took another turn. The Promenade stop has multiple exits and we weren’t sure which one to choose. Google maps was no help, so I suggested that we exit towards Suntec City Mall, which is connected to the Pan Pacific. What followed was a 1-hour slog through one of Singapore’s largest malls. At one point, we did succeed in following a shop keeper’s directions to the bridge that connects Suntec to the Pan Pacific – but we took a wrong turn somewhere and wound up at a different hotel.

Faced with the prospect of beginning a new life as itinerant mall-dwellers, we decided to go back outside where we found ourselves once again separated from the Pan Pacific by multiple lanes of traffic.

“We’re going to have to make a run for it,” D said.

“Are you sure it’s safe?” P asked.

“It’s definitely not safe,” I said. “We could be hit by a car, or, worse, banned from Singapore for jaywalking.”

“I’m not going back into that mall,” D said.

“We can’t go back. We’ll never escape,” P agreed. So, please forgive us people of Singapore, but we made a run for it.

We were sweaty and barely standing by the time we made it back inside the Pan Pacific. I headed straight for the Concierge and explained our plight. He pulled out a tourist map and patiently drew a route to the metro station. Had we simply made a left out of the Pan Pacific driveway instead of a right, we would have found a metro entrance a half-block away – no street crossing or malls required. Just for fun, he also drew me a route to Suntec via a 2^nd story pedestrian bridge.

As we were getting ready for bed that night P asked, “Do you think tomorrow will be better?”

“Yes,” I said without a moment’s hesitation.

Australia 2025 Trip Report

July 17-August 6, 2025

Earlier this month, we returned from a 20-night trip to Australia via Singapore. As in my previous trip reports, “we” is me, a 40-something professor; my husband, D, a 40-something teacher/pet sitter; and P, our 12-year-old son. It tends to take me a while to finish these trip reports, so I will start with an overview of the trip and some general thoughts. Then, I will add each day of the report as I write it.

Itinerary

Day 0 – drive to New Jersey

Day 1 – Singapore Airlines flight 21 from Newark to Singapore, one of the longest flights in the world

Days 2 -4 – Stopover in Singapore staying at the Pan Pacific Marina Square

Day 5 – flight to Sydney on Scoot

Days 6-9 – Sydney, staying at the Intercontinental

Day 10 – flight to Yulara

Days 11-12 – Uluru & Kata Tjuta

Day 13 – Bus to Alice Springs

Day 14 – Alice Springs and Kangaroo Sanctuary

Day 15 – Board Ghan train to Darwin

Day 16 – travel on Ghan, arriving in Darwin around 8 pm

Days 17-19 – Darwin staying at the Vibe

Day 20 – flight home on Singapore Airlines with a layover in Singapore

Why travel via Singapore?

If you are looking for the most direct way to travel from Boston to Sydney, driving to New Jersey for a flight to Singapore isn’t it. So, why this flight route? The short answer is that we flew flights SQ 21 and 22 in 2022 and enjoyed them. The longer answer is that there’s really no comparison between the level of service on Singapore Airlines and any US-based airline.

In 2024, we had a particularly bad experience flying Delta, the airline that offered the most direct route to Australia. The seats were so uncomfortable that we were not able to sleep at all for the entire overnight flight, the vegetarian meal was literally unseasoned white rice – and just white rice, and the customer service was offered with the apparently-standard attitude of US-based airlines that “you’re lucky we even allowed you lot to buy a ticket for this plane.” In comparison, Singapore Airlines offers comfortable premium economy seats, exceptional customer service, and multiple hot meals that actually taste good. And our premium economy tickets cost less than economy seats on a Delta flight to Sydney.

To illustrate how much Singapore Airlines cares about customer service, in 2022, I completed a survey about my experience on our flight. I rated everything excellent. In the comments section, I asked them to consider offering ice cream to those who order special meals because it was only offered to those with standard meals on our flight. Within a day, I received a phone call apologizing for this deprivation. In contrast, when I suggested that Delta consider serving actual meals to vegetarians, I was told that I should know better than to expect food on a flight and it was on me to buy something in the airport before boarding.

So, why Singapore Airlines? The better question is why did I spend even a minute considering the Delta flight.

Why this itinerary? (Or why didn’t you visit the Great Barrier Reef?)

When putting together this trip, I first considered the weather. We were hoping to avoid both extreme heat and real winter weather (snow, gloom, etc.). Sydney was a must see for me. From there, I added Uluru – a place I had long wanted to see that is best visited in winter. Darwin made the list because it was on the way back to Singapore. From there, the task was to figure out how to string these locations together with minimal flights. That’s how I discovered the Ghan as a travel option. Booking it necessitated traveling to Alice Springs, so our itinerary was set. We skipped the reef – something that shocked many Australians we spoke with – for the simple reason that it would have required 2 additional flights.

Why the fixation on avoiding flights? We really don’t like flying. D and I have always been afraid of flying, and P developed a new fear of flights after all of the bad news about planes over the past year or so. Skipping the Great Barrier Reef meant that two days of our vacation that would have been fairly miserable for us were instead spent happily enjoying Australia.

Overall thoughts on trip and itinerary

We loved Singapore when we visited in 2022, and we loved in just as much the second time. We’ve now spent a total of 8 nights there, and there is still a ton we haven’t gotten to see and do. I don’t think we would stay at the Pan Pacific again because we didn’t love the neighborhood. (After staying on the river at the Fullerton during our first trip, being essentially in a shopping mall was a bit of a letdown.) But we are already looking for another opportunity to return to Singapore.

We also loved Australia. During our trip we enjoyed excellent food, met lots of friendly people, and saw amazing landscapes and wildlife. The itinerary we chose might not be for everyone, but it worked well for us. We prefer to take it slow and see the sights at a leisurely place – even if it means we can’t see everything. So, skipping some of the big-ticket sights like the reef in favor of a route with less internal travel was the right choice for us. Hopefully, we will have an opportunity to visit Australia again and see some of what we missed.

General Tips

I recommend looking into transportation options before booking hotels, especially if you are going to more remote places. Just because there is a plane, bus, or train between two locations doesn’t mean it runs every day.
Also check availability for any tours or activities that are must-sees for you before finalizing your itinerary. Two of tours that we did (a day trip to Kangaroo Valley, and the Kangaroo Sanctuary in Alice Springs) don’t run every day. So, we mapped out our itinerary based upon a combination of the transportation schedule and the schedule for these two tours.
I had multiple fellow-Americans tell me that Australia is really expensive. It’s certainly more expensive than travelling in some parts of the world, but we found that it wasn’t any more expensive than travelling in the US. (Don’t forget to account for the exchange rate and the fact that there is no tipping when looking at prices). That was particularly true for things we booked in advance. When we were in Uluru, for example, the cost for a room at Sails in the Desert popped up on my phone – and it was 2x what we paid for the same room by booking it a year in advance.
The instructions on the e-Visa app for scanning US passports are incorrect. Look up where to find the chip in your passport before starting the application, and save yourself a headache.

Southeast National Parks Road Trip

As is probably apparent from my long hiatus, I decided to stop blogging about our US National Parks road trip. I write this blog because it’s fun for me and hopefully helps other travelers from time to time. Given the recent cuts to funding for our National Park Service and efforts to censor the history that can be told at these sights, I was no longer finding any joy in writing about this trip. And I suspect that my experiences in 2024 are not an accurate reflection of what traveling to these parks is like now. I’ve thus abandoned this trip report and will be starting a new report about our recent trip to Australia soon.

Southeast National Parks Road Trip 2024 – Day 6

Charlotte, NC to Columbia, SC – Monday, July 28, 2024 (Author: J)

Several of the major attractions in Columbia are closed on Mondays. I didn’t anticipate this being a problem because we planned to visit Congaree on our only full day in Columbia. But as I mentioned in Day 5 of the trip report, we scrapped that plan and visited Congaree on Sunday due to predicted rain. So, when we woke up on Monday, the second order of business (after more instant oatmeal) was figuring out what to do with ourselves.

The weather forecast for the day now called for showers instead of downpours, so we decided to risk an outdoor activity. From the Hilton, it was a short drive to the Columbia Canal and Riverfront Park. The park has several miles of walking trails along the river and canal.

The first thing that we noticed about the park was how very Southern it looked — from the vegetation to the historic waterworks buildings. The second thing we noticed was that the humidity was back. Withing minutes of leaving the car, we were sweating. We still managed to enjoy our walk by keeping a slow pace and turning back when P started to get testy.

Our next stop was the University of South Carolina. The University’s McKissick Museum has permanent collections on natural history, culture, and decorative arts. More importantly, it is open on Mondays. When we arrived at the university, we were welcomed by a member of the museum staff who chatted with us about our trip and gave us an overview of the current exhibits. The highlights for us were a display of presidential campaign memorabilia and an exhibit on the logging and furniture making industries in South Carolina and their connection to the founding of Congaree National Park. Seeing the latter just a day after visiting Congaree drove home how miraculous it is that the park still exists in its untouched state. The McKissick Museum isn’t large. We saw what there was to see in under 2 hours. That timing was perfect because we were done by lunchtime.

Lumber company scrip (company currency issued as pay to employees)

At the Fireflies game the previous evening, we had received coupons for discounted meal combos as Rebel Dogs, a hotdog place. My first instinct was to pitch the coupons because I assumed they would be useless to us. (If I haven’t yet mentioned it, P and I are vegetarians and D is pescatarian). However, I decided to check the Rebel Dogs menu before throwing out the coupons. I was surprised to see that they had a menu that catered to a variety of different dietary needs from vegan to gluten-free. So, after the museum, we headed to Rebel Dogs with coupons in hand.

D and I ordered pimento chili cheese dog combos with meatless dogs and meatless chili. P had a plain veggie dog. The combos came with a choice of sides and drinks from a drink station that let you mix and match lemonade, sweet tea, and fruit punch. It was a fun, tasty, and reasonably priced meal.

By the time we finished our hotdogs, the forecasted rain had started. We ran back to the car and returned to the hotel to wait out the storm. We didn’t have long to wait. After a lobby reading break (while we waited for housekeeping to freshen our room), we returned to our room and peeked out the window to find clear skies. For P, clear skies meant just one thing: swim time.

After pool time, our thoughts turned once again to food. Monday is a popular day for restaurants in Columbia to close, so our options were somewhat limited. We ultimately decided to visit the Columbia location of Mellow Mushroom, a pizza chain founded in Atlanta. The primary appeal (other than pizza) was that Mellow Mushroom was a short walk from the Hilton on Gervais Street. Gervais Street runs through Congaree Vista, a historic industrial neighborhood that was redeveloped in the 1990s without compromising the area’s historic character. Unlike the sleepy street the Hilton sits on, Gervais Street was jumping. We were still seated at the Mellow Mushroom immediately, though, mostly because not many people eat dinner at barely 5pm.

We enjoyed the Mellow Mushroom. It had comfy seats, a nice drink menu, and pizza that was good enough for my New Jersey tastebuds. (We also had some salad because pizza and hotdogs does not a day of balanced eating make). As we finished our pizza, we debated ordering dessert, but my gut told me we could do better than Mellow Mushroom’s limited menu. I asked Google Maps to find me some ice cream. That’s how I learned we were just a block from a dessert café called Kaminsky’s.

At Kaminsky’s, we were again seated immediately. D and I shared a slice of Hummingbird Cake, a pineapple spice cake with cream cheese frosting. P had cheesecake. Then we waddled back to the Hilton to watch the Olympics before bed. It had been another good day. Unlike some places I have visited, I didn’t fall in love with Columbia at first sight. Once I took the time to explore, though, the city won me over.

Southeast National Parks Road Trip 2024 – Day 5

Cyprus trees and their knees (roots that protrude up from the ground as little points) at Congaree National Park

Charlotte, NC to Columbia, SC – Sunday, July 27, 2024 (Author: J)

I was up before the rest of my family as usual, so I used the opportunity to visit the Ballantyne’s fitness center for a short workout. By the time I had finished my workout and gotten ready for the day, D and P were up. We packed up and then headed to the hotel restaurant for breakfast, which was included in our room rate.

The Ballantyne serves weekend brunch in its Gallery Restaurant. The restaurant has a classy, casual vibe and serves elevated versions of standard American breakfast fare, e.g., not just French toast, Fancy French Toast. The meal started with a pastry basket. For our mains, I had the French toast special (pear and cream), P had pancakes, and D had the crab cake benedict. How do I remember everyone’s meal orders 6 months later? It’s because P and D are very repetitive in their ordering patterns. The food was delicious. It turned out that “breakfast included in package” meant that we received a $75 credit to spend on breakfast. The credit just about covered the meal; we wound up paying a portion of the tip out of pocket.

After breakfast, it was time to check out and head to the grocery store to restock our picnic supplies. D vetoed stopping at the Harris Teeter near the hotel, and insisted we drive a bit further to shop at Food Lion because it had a “better name.” I rolled my eyes and went along with it. At Food Lion, we purchased fruit, cheese, bread, and chips. Then, we continued our journey south.

As we were driving, I checked the weather in Columbia and saw that rain was predicted the following day – the day we had planned to visit Congaree National Park. We decided to reroute and head directly to the park to take advantage of the dry weather.

The drive from Charlotte to Congaree is just over two hours. Before too long, we were crossing into South Carolina and D was shouting, “Holy s*!+.” I looked up from the weather report to see a tremendous Confederate flag billowing over the highway. Holy s*!+, indeed.

Congaree National Park was established to preserve one of the last remaining tracts of old growth bottomland hardwood forest in the United States. At about 11,000 hectares, it is one of the smaller national parks. And despite its proximity to a state capital, it is one of the less visited national parks. In my pre-trip research, I learned that it is also one of the more reviled national parks; indeed, we were warned against visiting in the summer because of the humidity and mosquitoes.

I am glad we ignored the negative reviews because we really enjoyed the park. While the other 4 parks we visited on this trip are undeniably amazing, they all have very similar habitats with similar fauna and flora. Congaree was something totally different. (It certainly helped that we visited on a summer day that somehow had low humidity and few mosquitoes).

The famous Mosquito Meter offers good news.

We began our visit with a picnic in the parking lot. It was nicer than it sounds. The lot is in a wooded area with lots of shaded picnic tables to choose from. After lunch, we changed into long pants (in the restroom) and generously applied insect repellant. We were then ready for a hike.

The most popular hike in the park is the Boardwalk Trail, a 2.6-mile loop that starts near the Visitor Center. It’s just the right length for getting a taste of the park without inducing too much whining from children, so I knew it was the right trail for us. We picked up a guide for the trail at the visitor center and started our hike. Along the way, we saw an interesting variety of wildlife, including water birds, turtles, and racoons. The trail guide that we picked up helped us to also appreciate the plants that we were seeing, which really are what makes the park special. There are markers along the trail that indicate points of interest. They match up to entries in the trail guide that explain what you are looking at.

As we approached the end of our hike, we heard the distinctive grunting of a pig. Wild boars are not native to Congaree, but they have invaded the park in recent years. Indeed, the park was closed to camping while we were visiting for several nights of hunting to try to reduce the boar population. We got excited and followed the grunts. They led us to … a guy wearing a speaker around his neck that played boar sounds. I don’t know if he was there to entice the boars ahead of the hunt or to disappoint tourists who were hoping for a glimpse of a hog. He certainly succeeded at the latter.

more wildlife along the trail and some Cypress knees

After our hike, we spent a bit of time in the small museum in the Visitor Center. Then, we purchased our magnet and ornament and made our way back to the car. Before too long, we were arriving in downtown Columbia and checking into the Hilton.

My initial reaction to the Hilton was confusion. The hotel advertised itself as “downtown,” but the neighborhood seemed almost deserted. And the low, industrial buildings that surrounded the hotel didn’t match my expectations of “downtown” anywhere. Wrapping my head around downtown Columbia would have to wait, though. We had tickets to a Columbia Fireflies game.

We changed out of our hiking gear and piled back in the car for the 10-minute drive to Segra Park. Attending a minor league baseball game was another suggestion that we took from the Tripadvisor Road Trip forum. We weren’t able to see the Rocket City Trash Pandas in Huntsville because they were on the road during our visit to town, so we chose to see the Fireflies instead.

We don’t go to many sporting events, so the restrictions on carrying bags into Segra Park came as a surprise. The little paperback novel sized bag that I brought to carry my phone and wallet was slightly over the size limit. However, the security guys let me off with a promise to invest in a clear bag for future games, and we made it to our seats behind home plate before the first pitch was thrown.

This evening, the Fireflies were playing the Lynchburg Hillcats. Though some members of our family felt that Lynchburg had the better mascot, we agreed that rooting for the home team was the right call. P went so far as browsing the Fireflies jerseys, but he ultimately decided against making such a pricey purchase.

I wasn’t sure how P would feel about minor league baseball after attending a major league game earlier in the summer. (I know that I said I don’t go to a lot of sporting events, and that’s true. It just so happened that P and I saw our first major league game and our first minor league game in the same month). The good news is that P enjoyed the minor league game almost as much as rooting for the Red Sox. The ability to sit right behind home plate and the antics of Fly Guys, who show off their dance moves while grooming the field, compensated for the weak pitching. Both teams did have some very solid hitters, which led to a high scoring game that went into extra innings. P gets very invested in the team he is rooting for, so it was a great relief when the Fireflies clinched a win in the 10^th.

When the game ended, we speed walked back to our car in a successful bid to beat any traffic leaving the park. Back at the Hilton, we squeezed in a swim in the hotel’s outdoor pool before heading to bed.