Singapore Zoo & Sydney

I had dragged myself out of bed to do some shopping with Izzy, Jean & Valerie, but the next day it came back with a vengeance. Unfortunately the 20th Feb was the last day we had left to go to the Zoo, so I would have to put up with feeling sick if I wanted to go. It would also be our last chance to catch up with Jean & Valerie before they go back to Thailand for the rest of their travels. I had heard so many good things about the Zoo (it's also number 1 thing to do in Singapore on TripAdvisor!) that I really didn't want to miss out. The 30 minutes on the train and 30 minutes on the bus were torture, but when I got there I wasn't so bad I just had to walk at a snail's pace. Not many good photos either I'm afraid as I was really not in the mood for it.

Just as we walked past the lion enclosure it was 'Snack Time' as they called it. One of the park rangers had a bucket of meat chunks he was throwing in for the lions while another member of staff gave a commentary. We got chatting to the guy (called Mcroy) who was throwing in the meat and he took us aorund of few of the other big cats to tell us some interesting facts (none of which I can remember!). He even fed the jaguars and leopards especially for us to watch. He must have liked us because he said it was not their feeding time, he just wanted to show them jumping into the water to find the big chunks of meat.

We left in the early afternoon as Jean & Valerie had some things to sort out before their morning flight the next day and I wanted to go back to bed as I was feeling worse by the minute. The next morning, at around 4am I woke up with a strange feeling about our flight to Sydney which was meant to be a 7:55pm that following evening. I got up to check the tickets and it turns out the flight was on the 20th Feb not the 21st Feb! We had missed our flight, and in a couple of hours would be about to miss our connecting flight to Cairns. Not sure how I made that mistake but I blame it on me being sick. The company I had booked with had a 24/7 helpline which was busy. I checked the flight prices and it was looking like it was going to cost hundreds. I got straight on the phone to Qantas and told them what had happened, and fair play they got us on a flight within 5 hours and another connecting flight within 24 hours of that... For only £99 each! Outstanding customer service!

We got straight up, packed, checked out and straight on the MRT to the Airport. The plane we were to board turned out to be the new Airbus A380! It was amazing inside, even in economy the seats have a fair amount of leg room and as the seat reclines the lower half slides forward. It was kitted out with fancy carbon fibre seat backs holding 10" (I would guess) touch screens. There was a great feature built into the screens where you could choose a camera mounted on the back of the planes tail facing forward, so you could watch take-off, flight and landing.

We landed in Sydney at about 10pm with nowhere to stay in this unplanned overnight stop. Luckily for us the travel concierge was still open and helped us find a 'cheap' hostel to stay in for the night near the train station so we could easily get back in the morning for our flight to Cairns. I don't think $105 (£65) is that cheap but it is for Sydney. I think when we revisit Sydney it will be a flying visit beacuse it is very expensive. £2 for a small 300ml bottle of water!