tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-73320569941881526542024-03-27T20:27:32.234+08:00SHERRYSherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.comBlogger173125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-76302216844475901712019-05-07T12:14:00.002+08:002019-05-11T23:28:07.758+08:00The Salon I Keep Returning to: Studio M KSL Hair Salon @ KSL City MallIt's been a while since I crossed the straits to pamper myself at JB. Whenever I'm in JB and want to change my hairstyle or give my hair some well deserved treatment, Studio M is always the first salon that comes to my mind. I have visited Studio M @ KSL City Mall (previously known as Govin Hair) many times as I love the great service and friendly staff there. Price wise, it's definitely super value as you are getting top notch service and best quality products such as Mucota or Oway on your precious hair.<br />
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As a person who always want good deals, I have researched before and hey, there's no way I can find that kind of price for treatments, perm, rebond or hair color using top quality products such as Mucota or Oway in Singapore!<br />
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Look at my lifeless hair with the uneven hair color. It's time to go Studio M hair salon to pamper my hair and give it a new look!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Studio M is located at ground floor of KSL City Mall, beside Sasa.</td></tr>
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My hair stylist was Ben. I'm very lousy when it comes to how to style my hair and I'm also very indecisive on what to do for my hair. I only knew I needed a new look and a style that's easy to manage.<br />
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Ben was very patient, he took note of what I said and provided sound advice. My hair ends have been bleached before and hence, it's quite dry. He recommended cutting away the damage part of my hair and provided a few possible ways that I could change my hair style. He's patient in explaining the outcome of each style and let me decide what I like best.<br />
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After some discussion, Ben gave me a hair cut, he assured me that a nice haircut with some layers will be able to change my hair shape and create a new feel. Immediately after the cut, woah! I like the hair style! My hair is very thin and flat, but with this hair cut, it has a lot more volume and is lively.<br />
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After the hair cut, it's time to color my hair. Again I couldn't decide the hair color and asked Ben for opinion. I didn't want a hair color that's too dark but I didn't want to bleach my hair. He suggested a copper rose color that does not need bleaching.<br />
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I usually cannot stand the smell of ammonia as it gives me a headache and causes my scalp to feel itchy. He recommended Mucota hair color. There was no ammonia smell and I don't feel any giddiness or itchiness. After I left, my hubby said 'wow, your hair don't have that usual weird salon smell.' Hahaha. Ya, to a guy who don't know much about hair and stuff, he can only describe that as weird salon smell LOL.<br />
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I loved the hair wash as well! I hate it when I go to some salon and my hair was treated roughly. But the hair wash at Studio M was gentle and comfortable with great massage. The shampoo and hair mask smelt great too!<br />
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Oh, they also serve hot drinks such as Milo and a variety of flower tea.<br />
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After the wash, woah! I like the hair color! They helped to style my hair with some waves too. Woo! Nice! After seeing this, I might want to do a perm next time haha.<br />
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A few days have past and my hair is still easily manageable. Anyhow blow dry also nice hahaha. Compare this to my before salon visit photo above, this hair cut makes the top part of my hair more voluminous and hides my balding hairline hee. It's so smooth and flowy, it even has a bit of those natural curls at the end which I like! Very suitable for someone like me who doesn't know how to style my hair.<br />
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Give Studio M Hair Salon a try when you are in KSL City Mall, you might just find your favourite hair salon like me!<br />
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Do make an appointment before you go especially during weekends as it can be quite crowded. You can search for Studio M KSL on Facebook to make an appointment.<br />
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Gotta go meet my friends to show off my hair. Bye!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-4078956342726800492019-05-01T18:58:00.004+08:002019-05-01T19:16:24.865+08:00After Watching Avengers: EndgameSpoilers Alert! So skip this post if you have not watched Avengers: Endgame.<br />
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P.S. This post is more of my own feelings after watching Endgame, an avenue for me to vent my feelings, not so much of review or anything.<br />
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I am one of those who have watched all the 21 movies that led up to Endgame. I felt a sense of emptiness when Endgame ended. Don't get me wrong, Endgame is great, it did a great job of linking the past stories and as a closure for this phase of the MCU. I felt empty because, I am at the stage of thinking what should I do now that the characters that I have been watching for so many years will no longer have new movies coming up. Iron Man and Captain America especially, with this ending, it is quite unlikely that they will have their movies anymore.<br />
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So what Endgame got me started was, I began watching back all the past movies. Captain America - The First Avengers, Thor series, The Avengers, Age of Ultron, Guardians of the Galaxies series and many others to seek the details that link the infinity stones and the movies together. I find that re-watching these movies gave me new insights, details that I ignored when I first watched them. Now that I watched again, I get this new satisfaction haha.<br />
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Okay, my thoughts and feelings on Endgame and the characters now.<br />
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In the very beginning of the movie, we saw how Tony was dejected as his oxygen could only last for 1 more day. And then, we saw Captain Marvel! That was the first clap in the cinema.<br />
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Following that was Iron man venting his anger and feelings. The team found Thanos and Thor finally 'gone for the head' and killed Thanos. But this did not change anything. Everyone was depressed for the next 5 years. Until the screen showed a mouse stepping on some machine and ant man was out! Hmmm.. So, the universe was saved by a mouse!<br />
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After that the Avengers explored on a time heist to collect all the infinity stones. They need stories of where were the infinity stones at which point in time from Nebula and Thor as they only knew the 3 stones that were in New York in The Avengers 2012. This part of the movie is like bringing us back and linking us to the past movies, that's when it made me wanna watch back the movies to understand the movement of the stones throughout the MCU. A funny part was Nebula and war machine were sent to Morag to get the power stone. Here, we saw Starlord dancing and singing into a lizard hahaha. That got me wanna re-watch Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 1 again.<br />
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The avengers of course got all the infinity stones and Hulk snap it because he's the one that can take the impact of the gamma energy and because the drunkard Thor is not in the right mind to do it. haha.<br />
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That's where no one realise that the Nebula that returned from Morag was the year 2014 Nebula who was evil and wanted to please Thanos. So she used the Pym serum to bring Thanos to present time. Does anyone has the same question as me? How did she manage to bring Thanos, the current Nebula and Gamora and the whole army troop to present time with the limited amount of Pym serum that Captain America stole from 1970s?<br />
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Okay, but because Thanos was able to bring a whole troop of army over, that's why there is the epic final battle.<br />
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The really 'Shiok!' moment of Endgame was when Doctor Strange and the sorcerers brought back all those who have been dusted! That moment really brought a tear to my eyes and claps echoing in the cinema. This is really an epic final battle! But we dun have much time to be touched and tear because immediately, the big fight came! Hey, we've got a powerful villain to fight!<br />
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So the main point of the fight is Thanos wanted to get his hands on the infinity gauntlet and the avengers have to prevent him from getting it, so they are trying to bring the gauntlet to Ant Man's bus to transport it to some other time. Ultimately, Thanos still got the infinity gauntlet on his hand. As the gauntlet was created by Iron man, he managed to transfer the gauntlet to his own hand. He has no choice but to snap when Doctor Strange indicate to him the 1 chance that he saw they won is now. The scene of Iron Man dying made me teared. He was once a selfish man but now he's willing to sacrifice to save everyone. In the beginning of Endgame, he didn't want to be part of it because he has a family and he dun want to change anything.<br />
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Okay, now go on to what I feel about some of the characters.<br />
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Iron Man - He started out as an arrogant and selfish billionaire in the first Iron Man movie, but in Endgame, he sacrifice himself to save everyone. The fact that he now has a wife and a cute daughter just made it more heart wrenching to me when he died. I have been thinking could it be someone else who can withstand the gamma energy to snap the gauntlet to turn Thanos and his minions into dust instead of him? Aha.. Captain Marvel! In the last battle, the gauntlet was passed between many people when trying to transport the gauntlet to the Ant Man's bus. After Captain Marvel appeared, she took over the task of bringing the gauntlet to the bus. Well, she's the most unstoppable. If ultimately, the way to stop Thanos was to kill him, then at that point of time, she could have just wear the gauntlet herself and snap to turn Thanos and minions into dust. Given her powers, the snap could not do much harm to her. But I get that, it's more impactful for Iron Man to do it and it's sort of like a tribute to the original avengers and the honour to end the villain for this phase of the MCU should belong to them.<br />
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Captain America - There were 2 things that Cap did in Endgame that garners applause in the cinema. He finally wielded Thor's hammer! And Thor was shouting "I knew it!" It's funny because in 'Age of Ultron', Thor was so afraid that some one could wield his hammer hahaha. And Cap finally shouted "Avengers.. Assemble!" directly after that epic moment of the return of all those that were dusted. At the end, Cap said that he went back and lived his life and grew old, we also saw a glimpse of him dancing with Peggy Carter. I guess that's a nice ending for Cap as that's what he always wanted. He passed the baton to Sam but.. the Captain America image in my heart will always be the one by Chris Evans. I'm not sure if I will be used to the Sam version of Captain America in future. I am quite sad that I wont be seeing Chris Evans as Cap anymore.<br />
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Thor - The Thor in Endgame was just.. HILARIOUS! Haha.. It added a comedy effect to the show, I guessed he helped to lighten the mood. A beer bellied, drunkard Thor is not what I expected. In the end battle, he still put up a good fight, but somehow, I felt he was mightier in Infinity War. I think it's to tell us that even gods need to train and maintain muscles and stamina lol. At the end of Endgame, we saw Thor joining Guardians of the Galaxy, hopefully we can still see Thor in future movies - Asgardians of the Galaxy maybe?<br />
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Hulk - Hulk is another comedian in the show! All smiley and cute haha. He's the one who snap to bring back all those dusted and injured an arm. Such strong gamma energy, it's no wonder it killed iron man who is just a human. Nothing much concluded for Hulk at the end so I guess we will still see him?<br />
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Black Widow and Hawkeye - When retrieving the soul stone at Vormir, the 2 fight to sacrifice and in the end, it's black widow who jumped. All along I dun have much towards Hawkeye. So I kind of felt sad that it's Black Widow who jumped. But Hawkeye does have a family if they managed to 'un-dust'. So, no comments here, but hey, at least honour Black Widow in the end? Iron Man has a funeral but nothing about Black Widow was mentioned other than the Avengers shouting at each other to say no way to bring her back in the middle of the movie.<br />
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Wanda Maximoff - Woah! I was truly impressed by her power when she went one on one with Thanos in the middle of the final battle in Endgame. I knew she was powerful when she's able to sweep away a whole lot of Thanos' minions in Infinity War. But one on one with Thanos and she's the one who made Thanos panic and called for help to activate his spaceship shooting, that's another level. I think she would have killed Thanos (without Infinity stones) if Thanos didn't ask for help. She's one of the new character that I liked more hehe.<br />
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Captain Marvel - I seriously thought Captain Marvel would have more participation in Endgame. I guessed if Captain Marvel appeared early when the 3, Iron Man, Captain America and Thor were fighting one Thanos, they would have won too easily. So she appeared only at the last minute to destroy Thanos spaceship and only fight Thanos when he already got the gauntlet on his hand. I was thinking what would happen if she didn't take on the task of bringing the gauntlet to the Ant Man bus but instead immediately join forces with Wanda to fight Thanos while the rest of the Avengers protect the gauntlet and dun let Thanos and his minions get it until Wanda and Captain Marvel kill him. Will this be a better strategy? At the moment, Captain Marvel seemed too aloof for me to like her. So will have to see how her character pan out in future movies.<br />
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Thanos - He's the big villain in the show as he wanted to snap away half of the population in the universe. His intention was to solve the problem of over-population and reduce suffering. I have to say his intention was not totally evil, he's not killing for the sake of killing. In Endgame, after 5 years since the snap, Captain America did say that there's less pollution, which shows that what Thanos did paid off. Sometimes, when it's too crowded or when I watched documentaries of global warming, pollution and animals at the brim of extinction like polar bears, I will think of Thanos. Hahaha.<br />
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Sure, they said giving the original avengers an end is for the new avengers to take over. I still have the most affection for the original Avengers, but I heard the new avengers will be more powerful. I can see that with Captain Marvel on board. But probably will take time for me to get over the original avengers and like the new team as much as the original.<br />
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I think I could keep rewinding and watching Endgame because there were many "Shiok!" or touching moments that I can re-watch and re-watch and re-watch...<br />
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Okay, lemme continue to re-watch the 21 avengers movies and reminisce.<br />
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Bye!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-19909281089241436342019-05-01T15:31:00.004+08:002019-05-01T15:31:59.907+08:00Japan (Cherry Blossom): Itinerary and Transport PlanningFor our visit to Japan this time round, we only spend 1 day 1 night in Tokyo as we have visited this city last time. We decided to focus more days on other parts of Japan:<br />
- <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-tokyo-and-mount.html">Mount Fuji</a><br />
- <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-kyoto-and-nagoya.html">Kyoto</a><br />
- <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-takayama-shirakawa.html">Takayama and Shirakawa</a><br />
- <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-tateyama-kurobe.html">Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route</a><br />
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Our focus for this trip is of course - CHERRY BLOSSOM!<br />
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Since we are travelling to so many parts of Japan, we bought the 7 days Japan railpass and make full use of it. We were in Japan for a total of 11 days. Hence, the challenge for us on the planning is to try to visit as many places as possible and travel with trains covered by the railpass within 7 days.<br />
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You might be wondering why didn't we buy a 11 days railpass, because there is no such pass. The Japan railpass comes in 7, 14 and 21 days. We definitely wouldn't want to spend the extra money and waste the remaining 3 days.<br />
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For transport between Narita Airport and Tokyo, the Japan railpass actually covers the Narita Express. However, we cannot be using our Japan railpass for the Narita Express because we only have the 7 days pass but we were in Japan for 11 days, so our plan is to start our Japan railpass only on the third or fourth day of our trip.<br />
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We came across a Narita Express round trip ticket for 4000 yen, that's about 30% discount as compared to buying each way's ticket separately. Visit <a href="https://www.jreast.co.jp/e/pass/nex_round.html">the Narita Express website</a> for more details on this round trip discount ticket.<br />
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Do note that it is recommended to reserve seats for those trains that are covered under the railpass. Seats can be reserved at the JR ticket office. We actually reserved seats for most of the trains that we will be taking for the next few days at the first JR ticket office.<br />
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Do also note that the there are certain types of bullet trains that is not covered under the JR railpass, need to check out the train name when planning too.<br />
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So with the passes and tickets in hand, our itinerary was planned as such:<br />
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Day 1: Arrival at Narita Airport, Narita Express to Tokyo. 1 Night in Tokyo.<br />
Day 2: Tokyo to Mount Fuji, transfer to Odakyu Electric Railway at Shinjuku station and alight at Odawara (not covered by JR railpass). Buy Fuji Hakone Pass at Odawara station. Overnight Mount Fuji.<br />
Day 3: Explore Mount Fuji with Fuji Hakone Pass and overnight Mount Fuji.<br />
Day 4: Start using JR railpass. Took Shinkansen Hikari from Odawara to Kyoto. Overnight Kyoto.<br />
Day 5 and 6: Explore Kyoto and Overnight Kyoto<br />
Day 7: Took Shinkansen Hikari from Kyoto to Nagoya. Overnight Nagoya.<br />
Day 8: Took Limited Express Wide View Hida from Nagoya to Takayama (covered by JR railpass). Overnight Takayama.<br />
Day 9: Day tour to Shirakawa and Gokayama. Took Limited Express Wide View Hida from Takayama to Toyama. Overnight Toyama.<br />
Day 10: Tateyama Alpine Route (From Dentetsu Toyama to JR Nagano), take Shinkansen from Nagano to Tokyo (covered by JR railpass) - last day of JR railpass. Overnight Tokyo.<br />
Day 11: Took Narita Express to Airport and return home.Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-55655862117032475112019-05-01T15:31:00.001+08:002019-05-01T15:31:15.900+08:00Japan (Cherry Blossom): Tokyo and Mount FujiUpon arrival in Tokyo, we realised that we were a tad late as most of the cherry blossom has fallen from the trees. Nonetheless, we continued strolling around the Tokyo Imperial Palace to catch some strong trees that were still blossoming and yeah! We were still able to find some pretty amazing cherry blossoms!<br />
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Hope we could find more cherry blossoms in other parts of Japan!<br />
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Other than searching for cherry blossoms, we also went to the famous Tsukiji Fish Market for sushi! Yum Yum!<br />
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We can't wait to explore other parts of Japan where we have never been before. After a well rested night, Woo Hoo! Mount Fuji, Here We Come!</div>
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From Shinjuku station, we took the Odakyu Electric Line to Odawara, This line is not covered under JR railpass so we bought the tickets separately. Upon arrival at Odawara station, we bought the Fuji Hakone pass which is valid for 3 days. You can find more information on this pass <a href="https://www.odakyu.jp/english/passes/fujihakone/">at this website</a>. The pass allows you to use a number of transports within the area to travel around.</div>
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We checked in to our hotel first, we stayed at Hakone Lake Hotel and bought the half board package so breakfast and dinner were included in our stay. We spent 2 nights in this hotel.</div>
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What's the first thing to do when we're in such a nice hot spring hotel? Enjoy the hot spring and relax!</div>
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After a nice hot spring, it's time for the dinner! It's always exciting for me when it comes to food, especially Japanese food! Can't wait to see what the hotel has to offer!</div>
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Other than the appetizer, sashimi and the mains, there is also a buffet section which have some vegetables tempura, miso soup, rice and desserts.</div>
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Breakfast served by the hotel is a japanese and western buffet and they tasted pretty good!</div>
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The next day, let's explore Hakone and I wanna see Mount Fuji! They say Mount Fuji is very shy and even if you wanted to see it, it might not let you see hahaha. So let's see how is my luck.</div>
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We wanted to go to the instagrammable Chureito Pagoda with Mount Fuji in the background. To get to Chureito Pagoda, we need to transfer buses to get to Kawaguchiko first and from Kawaguchiko, take Fujikyu railway (not included in Fuji Hakone pass) to Shimo-Yoshida station and walk to the Pagoda.</div>
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We were really happy as we could already see the clear skies and view of Mount Fuji on the bus on our way to Kawaguchiko!</div>
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Fujikyu railway is so cute! It's Thomas! Hello!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reached!</td></tr>
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Then we climbed climbed climbed up towards the pagoda.</div>
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Woo Hoo!! We're so happy we got to see the Mount Fuji with clear skies!! It was truly magnificent and we didn't want to leave! We stayed there for a few hours enjoying the views, chill, took photos and connect with Mount Fuji hahaha..</div>
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Oppss.. but we still got a cruise to take to tour Lake Ashi to utilise our Fuji Hakone pass, so it's time to say bye bye to Mount Fuji!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The cruise looks like some pirate ship hahaha..</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So let me be the cutest pirate ever!</td></tr>
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After the cruise, it's almost evening and it's time for us to return to our hotel for hot spring and dinner. Hee. The next day, <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-kyoto-and-nagoya.html">Kyoto</a>! Here we come!<br />
<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-32527328554776215232019-05-01T15:30:00.000+08:002019-05-01T15:30:09.389+08:00Japan (Cherry Blossom): Kyoto and Nagoya<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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We will be spending 3 nights in Kyoto and explore all the interesting attractions in Kyoto! Woo Hoo!<br />
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We first checked in to our hotel, Sakura Terrace The Atelier, it is very nice and clean but the room is very small, hardly any space to move around. We booked a room with shared bathroom. Even though it is a shared bathroom, it is super clean. At the lobby, there is also a lounge where you can chill, have some tea and read some magazines. They have many different tea flavours to choose! The hotel is also located in a very convenient location, just 500m away from Kyoto Train station!<br />
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First, we went to Kiyomizu-dera temple. Take bus number 100 or 206 from Kyoto train station and alight at either Gojo-zaka or kiyomuzu-michi bus stop. The bus ride is about 15 mins. We just followed the crowd to get to the temple lol.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We chill at a teahouse and have some snack</td></tr>
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From the Kiyomizu-dera temple, you can descend via these 2 streets, Ninen Zaka and Sannen Zaka. The streets are lined with traditional shophouses full of restaurants and cafes.<br />
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We walked along the streets and all the way to Gion and had one of the best beef in our life! Kobe beef! We had our dinner at Itoh Dining, damage is about 500SGD for 2 person. The set is super good! Not only the beef tasted heavenly, the other dishes in the set meal was great too! It is a must to make reservation beforehand as it is always full! That explains how tasty it is!<br />
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We seated at the counter seats and we could see the chef cooking our amazing food!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sakura smoked red snapper with prosciutto and salsa verde</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pork Pate with Pickled Veg and spinach, shrimp quiche</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chef cooking our next dish!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grilled fish served with yuzu miso sauce</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The main lead! Kobe beef!!! The thought of this makes me drool.. Easily the best steak we had.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Waiting for Kobe patiently......</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">OHH MY GODDD! </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">HEAVENLY! I MISS U KOBE!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">End of with a dessert Matcha cheesecake with ice cream</td></tr>
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We were so so satisfied with our dinner. Yumz! We went back to hotel happily and rested for the night.<br />
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Next day, I am so excited because I am going to wear a kimono! I rented my kimono from the Kimono Rental at Kyoto Station. Hee. There were a lot of steps in wearing the kimono, I for sure dunno how to wear it on my own haha.<br />
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It was really tight and there is a board tied at your stomach area. I couldn't eat much when I was wearing the kimono and I also limit the number of times I need to go toilet. If you really need to go toilet, it is still possible, it's just that need double the usual time due to the need to lift up layers of the tight kimono. Oh, walking is also not that easy, you can't stride in big steps. After wearing kimono, you will understand why Japanese ladies have to walk in small steps. Hahaha.. And you definitely can't run!<br />
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Other than that, it is a nice experience to see myself in other culture costume! I will try again if I visit Japan again as I wanted to try different colors and pattern.<br />
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We are going to Arashiyama today in my Kimono! We will be taking the JR Sagano line and alight at Saga Arashiyama station. See me in kimono on the train hahaha.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Love the hair do!</td></tr>
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After a 15mins ride, we arrived at Arashiyama station. Along the way to the bamboo groves, there were many restaurants, shops etc.<br />
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After roaming around for a while, we arrived at the Arashiyama bamboo grove.</div>
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We spent a few hours chilling in cafe and walk around to enjoy the place. </div>
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Hubby is interested in the railway museum in Kyoto and we went to take a look after I have returned my kimono. It's just a 10 mins walk from Kyoto station.<br />
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After that, we had dinner and shop around before turning in for our beauty sleep.<br />
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Next day, we went to the Kinkakuji (Golden Pavilion), there were so many people that we were unable to stay longer and enjoy. We only stayed for half an hour and left. Quite disappointing as the journey there was about 45 mins -.-'''<br />
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After visiting the Golden Pavilion, we went to Nijo Castle. Nijo Castle is a lot bigger to walk around and there are nice gardens and also some cherry blossoms still blooming. You also have the chance to understand some history in the castle. It was quite a nice experience, walking around the gardens, enjoying the trees, small ponds and cherry blossoms.<br />
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Next, we took the JR Nara Line from Kyoto station to Nara! Deers, here I come! </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Many deer roam around here.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nara biscuits. The packaging is so cute!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not forgetting a photo with the cherry blossoms!</td></tr>
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<span style="text-align: left;">So we bought a packet of biscuits to feed the deer. We were told that when you wanted to feed the deer, you bow to them and they will bow back to you hahaha..</span></div>
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We played for quite long with the deer as they were so cute!! After we finished all the biscuits, they were still following us, thinking we still have food to feed them lol. It was already dark when we left Nara, so we just had some dinner at Kyoto station and went back to hotel to rest. </div>
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Ohh, we tried the Michelin star cup noodle! It tasted quite good for cup noodle standard, but still cannot be compared to the real restaurant cooked ramen la. </div>
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Next day is our last day in Kyoto, the last attraction that we have not visited in our list is Fushimi Inari! Let's go!</div>
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We took JR Nara Line and alight at JR Inari station. There were a lot of people and a lot of steps to climb! I didn't manage to finish all the steps, I was dead half way, hubby finished it on his own. </div>
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I saw many ladies in kimono at Fushimi Inari! My legs were sore from wearing the kimono slippers to walk around Arashiyama and there were no steps there. How did these ladies manage to come to Fushimi Inari with the kimonos climbing all these steps!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After climbing the steps, we were hungry, and stop by a tea house somewhere in the middle to have some food. It felt quite zen as it's all lush greenery when you look out of the window. </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amazake (Fermented rice drink) - so sweet, refreshing and nice! I miss it!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is the view from the halfway stop as I didn't climb all the way up</td></tr>
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Before we say byebye to Kyoto, I wanna recommend Manneken Waffles! There is a stall in Kyoto station. The waffles were so yummy and chewy! The chewiness of the waffles is really comparable to the ones I had in Belgian!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So many flavours to choose from!</td></tr>
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We bought some to munch before taking the Shinkansen to Nagoya where we will spend the night.</div>
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We didn't cater much time for Nagoya as it is just a stop over to transit to the Limited Express Wide View Hida train to Takayama. Nonetheless, we found a gem in Nagoya!</div>
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Maruya Honten! The best unagi rice set I have eaten! They recommended 3 ways to eat the unagi with rice. It is similar to Man Man in Singapore. But having ate both, Maruya Honten in Nagoya wins! Oh.. Be prepared to wait in a long queue! Advisable to come during off peak hours.</div>
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That's all for Kyoto and Nagoya! Check out the next post for beautiful <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-takayama-shirakawa.html">Takayama and Shirakawa</a>!</div>
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-74433246220608668302019-05-01T15:28:00.001+08:002019-05-01T15:28:15.690+08:00Japan (Cherry Blossom): Takayama, Shirakawa, Gokayama<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Woo Hoo! I have seen great reviews and nice pictures of Takayama and is totally looking forward to it! The train ride on Limited Express Wide View Hida from Nagoya to Takayama is a scenic route. A few stops before Takayama, the scenery gets more and more pretty and I got really hyped up!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">On board Limited Express Wide View Hida</td></tr>
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The weekend when we were at Takayama is their Spring Festival! We had a hard time booking the hotels and so we just booked whatever is available. We stayed in Country Hotel Takayama and it is very convenient as it is just across the road from the Takayama train station. It is also clean and price is reasonable as well.<br />
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It was bustling when we arrived at Takayama as the Spring Festival was ongoing. Other than the Spring Festival, the other thing that excites us is the cherry blossom!! As Takayama was colder than places like Tokyo and Kyoto, the cherry blossom is in full bloom here!!! We were super excited and it was extremely beautiful!<br />
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Takayama main streets are lined with wooden merchant houses dating back to the Edo period.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Such floats parade is one of the highlight in Takayama Spring Festival.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cherry Blossom in full bloom in Takayama!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View of Takayama on a hill</td></tr>
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Other than the nice scenery, there were also some food recommended in Takayama.<br />
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Takayama's local specialty is Hida beef! It is a must for us to try it of course! We went to Maruaki Hida Takayama for Hida beef.<br />
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As seen from the beef, Hida has more marbling as compared to Kobe. Hida also melts in your mouth more than Kobe due to the marbling and it is more fatty and juicy as well. But if you ask me, I prefer Kobe, because I felt it's too oily after eating Hida. I still prefer the meat to be less fat and less oily but still feels tender, soft and fragrant! My friend prefer Hida more, so I guess it's personal preference. Hida is also not as pricey as Kobe. Both are nice and both are worth trying when you are in Japan!<br />
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We also tried a few snacks in Takayama!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These Hida beef sticks were good and not too ex!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amazake (Fermented rice drink) is now one of my favourite drink haha</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We bought the Amazake and the Hida beef sticks from this stall</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some rice cake, can't remember the exact name. But not really to our liking.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tV8mudXu--A/XLtB0p9y24I/AAAAAAAABLQ/Jmk9tXvDUVQtluHBN1RUWfU4ToDcMco0ACLcBGAs/s1600/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-15%2B058.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1067" height="400" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tV8mudXu--A/XLtB0p9y24I/AAAAAAAABLQ/Jmk9tXvDUVQtluHBN1RUWfU4ToDcMco0ACLcBGAs/s400/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-15%2B058.JPG" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hida beef bun. Hmmm.. We still prefer to eat the beef directly instead of with a bun.</td></tr>
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So we spent our day exploring this little town Takayama, admiring the amazing cherry blossom. When the Spring Festival ended for the day, Takayama returns to its tranquil state. It felt so serene strolling through this authentic Japanese traditional town. We really liked Takayama and hoped we could spend more days here to enjoy the peaceful and serene environment amidst the mountains.<br />
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The next day we will be taking a one day tour to Takayama's neighbours, Shirakawa and Gokayama, and both are one of the UNESCO Heritage sites. We booked the one day tour via <a href="https://www.japanican.com/en/tour/detail/BUS1C00303CCC/?typecd=TOU&destcd=M43">Japanican website</a>.<br />
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After booking the day tour, instructions will be sent to your email to arrange the time and venue for the pick up. So that morning we waited at Takayama Nohi Bus Center for the tour bus and here we go!<br />
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The highlight of Shirakawa and Gokayama are the steep roof traditional houses and of course the beautiful mountainous terrain surrounding them. I would think they are even more gorgeous in winter when the roof are covered with thick snow. However, I believe the ground will be covered with thick snow too and will be difficult to get around.<br />
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First stop of the tour is Gokayama Ainokura village. We were given 60 minutes to explore the village. The village is quite small so 60 minutes is quite sufficient. We followed a route up a small mount so that we will be able to have a view of the whole village.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The surrounding mountain view is beautiful, there're some cherry blossoms too!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A close look at the steep roof</td></tr>
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It's a very peaceful and quiet town, as it's not very well known to tourists yet. Walking in this town with some farms around, the surrounding mountains and the fresh air made me feel so refresh and serene. I believe some peaceful and calm moments is what everyone really needed at times.<br />
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As it's still quite cold, there were still big patches of harden snow lying around, we played around with the snow and before we know it, 1 hour has passed.<br />
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Next up, Shirakawa! Shirakawa is the more well known UNESCO Heritage sites among the 2 so we would expect it to be more crowded there and it is also a bigger village than Gokayama Ainokura.<br />
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Before we explore Shirakawa, we had our lunch with is included in the tour.<br />
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The lunch place is a house on top of a hill so we could have a top down view of Shirakawa. A lot of people ate very quickly and rushed out to take photos haha.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The landscapes are so pretty yeah!</td></tr>
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We were given 2 hours at Shirakawa. It's time to walk around Shirakawa and take in the serenity amidst the traditional houses!<br />
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There were a number of small museums like this in Shirakawa for visitors at a nominal fee. We didn't explore these small museums, but you could if you are interested and if you have sufficient time here.<br />
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Our tour include a ticket to Gasshozukuri Minkaen Outdoor Museum. It's across a river from the main Shirakawa village. Cherry blossoms were blooming along the carpark beside the river!<br />
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We crossed the bridge over the river and slowly walked to the museum. The museum has many of those steep roof traditional houses that were no longer in use so they're open to visitors to go in and see how it's like inside the house.<br />
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There were a lot less people here in the outdoor museum and we almost have the whole place to ourselves! But I guessed it's also because of this that there were bugs crawling on the houses and bugs flying over the ponds.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Boiling water with charcoal in the house</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Had some dessert and chill out in the Gasshozukuri style house</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Finally, I can have the whole cherry blossom tree to myself! No one in the background! Hahaha</td></tr>
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With that, we gonna say byebye to Shirakawa and head back to Takayama, where we gonna take the Limited Express Wide View Hida to Toyama! We gonna stay one night in Toyama for our next day and is also our last highlight of the trip <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.com/2019/05/japan-cherry-blossom-tateyama-kurobe.html">Tateyama Alping Route</a> and we're going to see the famous snow corridor!<br />
<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-4892397534082460422019-05-01T15:26:00.001+08:002019-05-01T15:26:58.950+08:00Japan (Cherry Blossom): Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route and Last Night :(We spent our night in Dormy Inn Toyama, to prepare for the next day's highlight - Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route where we can see the famous snow corridor!<br />
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Dormy Inn never disappoints, it's clean and comfy, with onsen facilities and also free supper! A bowl of pipping hot ramen!</div>
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We bought the Tateyama Kurobe Option Ticket at Toyama JR ticket office. Baggage forwarding service is also available for a fee while you enjoy the alpine route from Toyama to Nagano (or vice versa). Do note the latest timing you can deposit the baggage in order for the baggage to reach the destination on the same day. You can refer to the details on the <a href="https://www.alpen-route.com/en/">Tateyama Kurobe alpine route</a> website. Do also note the opening period of this route. It does not operate all year round, usually opens only from mid April to November.</div>
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Lets start our Alpine route journey! There are so many different transport to take! Even taking the different transports excites us hahaha.</div>
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From Dentetsu Toyama, we took the Toyama Chiho Railway to Tateyama station.</div>
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From Tateyama station, we took a Tateyama cable car to Bijodaira.<br />
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From Bijodaira, we took the Tateyama highland bus to Murodo where the famous snow corridor is! Along the way in the bus, we already felt colder and colder and started to see tall snow surrounding us! We were so excited! Do note that private cars cannot enter so it is not possible to self drive to the snow corridor.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The views along the bus journey! I love snow mountains!</td></tr>
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Woo Hoo! We are here! The Murodo station was packed with people!! Let's go and explore my favourite, snow mountains and the amazing corridors!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Look at how much taller the snow is than the bus!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Silly things we did when we see heaps of snow hahaha</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pipping hot soup soba is perfect for such cold weather</td></tr>
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Continuing on our journey, from Murodo, we gonna take Tateyama Tunnel Trolley bus to Daikanbo and then the Tateyama Ropeway to Kurobedaira. It's totally scenic!<br />
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Next up, we took the Kurobe cable car to Kurobeko and a short walk to the Kurobe Dam.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kurobe cable car to Kurobeko</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From Kurobeko, we just walk to Kurobe Dam</td></tr>
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After that we took the Kanden Tunnel Electric Bus to Ogizawa, where we took a bus to Nagano.<br />
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That sums up our Tateyama Alpine route experience! We collected our luggage at Nagano station and took the Shinkansen with our JR pass to Tokyo. The alpine route is a two way route. Meaning, you can either be like us travel from Toyama to Nagano or you can also choose to start at Nagano and end at Toyama.<br />
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The highlight of the alpine route is really at Murodo to see the snow corridor and walk around in the snowy mountains and to enjoy the spectacular views. It is also crazily packed at Murodo. We went in April when the Alpine route just opened for a few days, hence, the snow corridor was really high. The snow corridor will slowly melt away and becomes shorter and shorter as the weather gets hotter. The other stations do offer nice views and it's definitely enjoyable to try so many different kinds of transport in a route! But things can get irritable and frustrating when it's so crowded with people. It's squeezy in the ropeway, couldn't get a seat on the bus, and the crazy long queues. It is advisable to start the route early to cater for sufficient time to finish the whole route before it closes.<br />
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On our last night in Tokyo, we stayed in Tokyo Nihonbashi Bay Hotel, a capsule hotel, it's less than 10 mins was from the Tokyo station. Male and female are on separate floors. It's clean, cozy and comfy. The shared toilet and bathrooms are clean and have all the facilities required. Although the capsule is small, it felt comfortable inside doing my own things. But as with any other capsule hotel, you will be disturbed by the alarms of your neighbours and when they climb up and down the capsules.<br />
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On our last night, we had a super satisfying sushi and sashimi dinner! It's actually a random shop that we walked in and for that quality, it's not expensive at all! It's very near our hotel, somewhere between the hotel and Tokyo station.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The sashimi were all very fresh and yummy!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sushi yummy and so so fresh!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I super love uni and the uni here was super duper yummy and fresh, I think I had 5 that night hahaha.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our chef that night. Despite our language barrier, he was friendly! We ate and ordered some more, ate and ordered some more. The advantage of sitting at the counter.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The first time I have eaten such fluffy and sweet tamago!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We were offered some free desserts by the chefs haha. Yumzzz.. We liked this more than Shiroi Koibito biscuit.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/--n1V1oYly0k/XMlHSUD7hKI/AAAAAAAABUc/oHz2LaMI74MB7nd2pJ1ZUKgp6fu0qCWfgCLcBGAs/s1600/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-17%2B052.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="1600" height="266" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/--n1V1oYly0k/XMlHSUD7hKI/AAAAAAAABUc/oHz2LaMI74MB7nd2pJ1ZUKgp6fu0qCWfgCLcBGAs/s400/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-17%2B052.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Menu's on the wall.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-S4yQ8-r4Aq4/XMlHSS1BWvI/AAAAAAAABUY/rYaPZ6GU0-g72ovPOjrIZdBlC_TDOG9nwCLcBGAs/s1600/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-17%2B053.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1067" height="400" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-S4yQ8-r4Aq4/XMlHSS1BWvI/AAAAAAAABUY/rYaPZ6GU0-g72ovPOjrIZdBlC_TDOG9nwCLcBGAs/s400/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-17%2B053.JPG" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cheers!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9WWPb9OTPZY/XMlHSjsKX2I/AAAAAAAABUg/nEEnzoUtaL03gLjap0Yr84KmRNRU12rcQCLcBGAs/s1600/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-18%2B001.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1013" data-original-width="1600" height="252" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9WWPb9OTPZY/XMlHSjsKX2I/AAAAAAAABUg/nEEnzoUtaL03gLjap0Yr84KmRNRU12rcQCLcBGAs/s400/Japan%2B2018%2B2018-04-18%2B001.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Will definitely come back when I visit Tokyo again!</td></tr>
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Sob sob, last day in Japan, preparing to head home. We saw this and we had to satisfy our Belgian waffle craving before leaving!<br />
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<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02508641521093364433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-68492440739969855912018-10-08T17:23:00.002+08:002018-10-08T17:23:45.960+08:007 Days Melbourne, Phillip Island, Great Ocean Road Itinerary<div dir="auto" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: proximanova; font-size: 18.6667px; line-height: inherit;">
One day before our trip to Melbourne, just when we thought every thing, hotels, rental car etc, have all been settled, we realised one most important thing. We need to apply for a visa! Yes! A visa is required for Singaporeans travelling to Australia.</div>
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Google visa for Australia and you will find many websites offering this service and different websites charge different price. The safest is of course apply via Australian immigration website but that costs <span class="m_654432597536307156money">$20</span> per visa! I continued looking and the cheapest I found was <span class="m_654432597536307156money">$7</span> per visa and I booked through <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.australia-eta.com.au&source=gmail&ust=1535808286031000&usg=AFQjCNFUJHFoqMC0MoiU3mtoauzydsOSCA" href="http://www.australia-eta.com.au/" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">www.australia-eta.com.au</a>. <span class="m_654432597536307156money">$7</span> is for regular processing which will process within 24 hours during working days. <span class="m_654432597536307156money">$15</span> for express processing within 5 to 6 hours but exclude sat and Sun. For super express processing including sat and Sun and take only 1 to 2 hrs, the cost is <span class="m_654432597536307156money">$20</span>.</div>
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After this small hiccup, we are good to go!</div>
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We picked up our rental car at Melbourne Airport and drove to our accommodation to check in. The cost to travel from the airport to Melbourne City is not cheap. After doing some calculations, and since we are there during off peak, car rental was quite cheap, we decided to drive ourselves from the airport to the city. But having a car is also quite a headache in Melbourne City, the parking charges are exorbitant! Nonetheless, we still love our big blue! It's a Mitsubishi Eclipse, It's stable, quiet and spacious. Only thing hubby said the fuel consumption is not very good at 12+km per litre of petrol even when hubby on the eco mode most of the time and most of the days, we were on highways.</div>
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When we were travelling around Melbourne City, we stayed outskirts and find places near to the city center to park. Like we parked at DFO south wharf as they offer 50% discount on the parking charges if u purchase anything from the DFO. Do remember to take the discount ticket when making the purchase at the store. Still it cost us A$24 for 1 full day of parking. That's the maximum charge of the parking at the DFO South Wharf.</div>
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From DFO south wharf, we'll be able to walk across the river to the free tram zone of Melbourne center. You can take the tram without tapping the Myki card nor paying any thing as long as u board and alight within the free tram zone.</div>
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Outside the free team zone, even if u just wanted to take one trip, u will need to purchase a Myki card. There is no single trip ticket for public transport in Melbourne. The Myki card cost A$6 and its non refundable. On top of that, you will need to top up the card to pay for the transport fares. We are quite puzzled why are there no single journey ticket and the Myki card is so expensive if I am just gonna take 1 or 2 trips. Dur..</div>
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Here goes our itinerary!</div>
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<b>Day 1</b></div>
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We took red eye flight and arrived Melbourne in the morning. But we were exhausted from the red eye flight and hence, we rested at our accommodation till about 1pm before heading out. Our first stop is shopping at DFO South Wharf. It's like a premium outlet with great discounts if you are buying branded stuff.</div>
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Met up with my friend who stays in Melbourne and we had a great dinner at Merrywell Bar and Dining at Crown Melbourne. The steak was really nice, it's charred and crispy on the outside while tender inside. Love the guacamole too. One thing about dining in Australia is, the food is yummy but it's expensive.</div>
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<b>Day 2</b></div>
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Shopped at Chadstone, the biggest shopping mall in the Southern hemisphere! This is a normal shopping centre so there's not much discounted stuff for branded stuff like the DFO. But it's really big with all the big department stores in it like Target, Kmart, Woolsworth, Myers, David Jones. Its so big that you can really lost your way there, and you need to make effort to remember where u parked the car, otherwise, you will have a hard time finding it later. The best thing? Parking is free here!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chadstone has a really nice rooftop</td></tr>
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After done shopping at Chadstone, we drove 1.5 hours to Phillip Island. Main activities in Phillip Island are penguin parade, koala conservation centre, Churchill farm, Antarctica centre and eco boat to see seals. Our main objective is to see the penguin parade so we only bought tickets for that at A$52.50 per person for penguin plus. Klook website actually sold bundle tickets at a cheaper price, can take a look at that.</div>
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There are 3 ticket prices for penguin parade. The cheapest is general viewing, the most expensive is underground viewing, penguin plus is in the middle. For Penguin Plus, u get to see the penguins closer than general viewing and got limited seating of 200. Underground viewing also got limited seating and it was sold out for the next 7 days. I guessed now is winter so its much warmer to be in the enclosed area. For penguin plus and general viewing, will have to wait for the penguins in the cold. </div>
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Photo taking is not allowed when the penguins are out. So I didn't take any photo of the penguins. I only took a photo of the beach before sunset. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Waiting for Penguins in the cold</td></tr>
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As the night falls, some penguins started appearing on the shore. They look so hum ji when trying to come out of the sea. A little bit of things will scare them and they will scurry back to the sea hahaha. They were<span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"> really cute and it's a nice experience watching them waddle pass us. They looked so cute walking around!</span></div>
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Oh, if you are buying the penguin plus tickets, u will get to walk the boardwalk alongside with the penguins. So dun stay too long at the viewing area. When u see a huge crowd of penguin walking along the trail, just follow them via the boardwalk. Its a lot more interesting to follow them along the boardwalk than watching them from the viewing deck! We made the mistake of staying too long at the viewing deck, we only manage to follow 4 penguins along the boardwalk. We missed it when there was a big crowd of penguins walking down the trail.</div>
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After the penguin parade, it was dark. We stayed at a town called Frankston at Frankston motel. It's somewhere between Phillip Island and Melbourne. We drove for 1 hour in the dark from Phillip Island to the motel to shorten the traveling time next day. The motel was nice, spacious, clean and it has heated bed! We love our stay there. </div>
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<b>Day 3</b></div>
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We drove 45mins towards Melbourne and stopped at Brighton colourful beach houses, the instagrammable tourist attraction. The parking here was like A$4 an hour and u need to purchase the ticket at the parking machine and display the ticket on your car. </div>
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The weather was great when I was there. It was a nice walk along the beach, but there were many people visiting the area. I would prefer if it is more of a peaceful beach walk.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yeah! Life's a beach!</td></tr>
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Next, we drove another half an hour to South Melbourne Market. Parking at South Melbourne Market is free for the first 2 hours on Market days (Wed, Fri, Sat and Sun). </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From southmelbournemarket.com.au website</td></tr>
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We spent 1 hour plus here trying the the seafood, raw oysters and sea urchin.</div>
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My verdict? The oysters look big and succulent but when I slurped it into my mouth, it tasted a tad salty and lacked the fresh ocean seafood sweetness. I am a tad disappointed. I have tasted better ones. As for the sea urchin, it's big but hmmm.. I prefer uni in Japan.</div>
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After filling out tummy at South Melbourne Market, we are going to start the highlight of our trip! The Great Ocean Road! Let's go!</div>
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Torquay is the first town of the GOR from Melbourne direction. Following the road, we come to the next destination, Bells Beach. It has a beautiful coastline. It was so therapeutic watching surfers ride the waves and hear the waves crashing on to the shore. I could stay here whole day!</div>
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Further down from Bells Beach, the next stop was Anglesea Beach. When we reach Anglesea, its sunset. That day's weather was great, totally clear skies! Look at the pink sunset, it's mesmerising! We did some funny slow Mo video in front of the pink sunset too hahaha. </div>
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Following the road, next up is Aireys Inlet. Here there is a short walk about 15 mins one way to see a light house and the views around there is beautiful. This is a good chance for us to test Samsung S9 night mode. It was quite dark when we reach the lighthouse but the photos turned out great!<br />
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After rushing to see the lighthouse, the sky is dark. So we immediately drove to Lorne, where we spent our night. Our accommodation for the night is Mantra Lorne. Near the hotel, there is a Tripadvisor number 1 in Lorne, Ipsos. The food is truly delicious and we were blown away!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grilled octupus. The octopus was so tender. It was nice but the portion was too small for it's price at A$22. We were not happy about this because of it's price.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Crispy pork belly. This was heavenly!!! THE BEST CRISPY PORK BELLY I HAVE EVER EATEN! I can totally hear the "crack crack" sound when I bite on it! while the meat inside melts in your mouth, and i don't feel the greasy fatty feeling at all! Coupled with the tangerine sauce, it give the meat a refreshing taste so that you dun feel greasy when eating. I can dream about this dish!!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Filo pastry and vanilla custard with ice cream and quince sauce. What is Quince? We dunno. But it tasted yummy! and the pastry is flaky on the outside and soft on the inside. Superb too! </td></tr>
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After a satisfying dinner, we had a swim at our accommodation's hot pool before heading to bed. Zzzz.</div>
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<b>Day 4</b></div>
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The breakfast was great at mantra lorne! We really love our stay here! </div>
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Our whole day will be along the great ocean Road! After checking out from the hotel, we visited teddy's lookout first. The view was beautiful.</div>
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<span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">After teddy's look out, we drive to Erskine falls. There is a upper lookout and a lower lookout. The upper lookout is quite easy to reach with only some steps to climb. But the view of the falls is not great from here. The view is better at the lower lookout but there are a lot of stairs. The tough part is climbing back up after viewing the falls. Nonetheless, we made good use of our time there and took lots of photos and testing out the Samsung slow mo function.</span></div>
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When Slow-Mo fails....</div>
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Continuing on the journey, we just stopped for a while to take pictures when there are scenic lookout points indicated. This whole stretch of great ocean road is a scenic drive and the coasts is beautiful. But do drive carefully as the road is very bendy with strong winds.</div>
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<span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">We next stopped at Apollo Bay to have our lunch. Fish and chips is really yummy in Australia. But it's not my type of food, I can't eat too much fried stuff. So we decided to skip fish and chips here and order something else. We had our lunch at Apollo Bay seafood cafe, it's crowded when we were there. We ordered the mussels cooked with white wine sauce in a pot and a grilled barramundi. Both were fresh and yummy though I find the barramundi fillet too thin. I guess fresh ingredients wins hands down. I seldom taste such fresh fish in Singapore. But here, almost all the fish I had were so fresh. </span></div>
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After our lunch, we continued our journey to Cape Otway, thinking of seeing the famous lighthouse. But.. Entrance fee is required here and it cost A<span class="m_-7199606864148395515money">$20</span> per person to go in. It was designed like a small theme park,with cafes and some other stuff in there. But the main attraction is of course the lighthouse. At the carpark, we can't see anything at all, not even a glimpse of the light house. A sign at the side road caught our attention, "free trail to view lighthouse". But errr.. after walking along the trail for 10 mins we come to a tiny lookout spot which we can't see much. So dun ever waste your time walking this trail. Haha. We didn't pay to go in in the end as our giam giam mode turned on. Didnt feel like wasting A<span class="m_-7199606864148395515money">$40</span> to go in for half an hour as we were also rushing to the 12 apostles before sunset. So we actually wasted half an hour to purposely drive in and out of Cape Otway and the drive in was somewhat scary as the road was surrounded by forests with no scenic stuff to see. So u decide whether u wanna come to Cape Otway. </div>
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From Cape Otway to the highlight of Great Ocean Road took about 1.5 hours drive. We first arrive at Gibson steps. There is a staircase all the way down to the beach. We didn't stay long here and proceed to 12 apostles to catch the sunset. </div>
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From the 12 Apostles car park, u need to walk about 5 to 10mins along the board walk to see 12 apostles. It's really pretty. A pity that its cloudy that day and we couldn't have a nice orangy sunset :( Ehh.. But i counted, there's only 7 apostles instead of 12.Guess the rest was eroded by the strong waves.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova"; font-size: 18.6667px;">After 12 Apostles, the sky is turning dark and we head to our accommodation at Port Campbell to rest for the night.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova"; font-size: 18.6667px;"><b>Day 5</b></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">We continued driving down the Great Ocean Road to sight see the rest of the landmarks, we were rushing for time to sight see all of the landmarks before the dark clouds arrived.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>The Razorback</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>Loch Ard Gorge</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">There is a staircase where u can walk down to see the Gorge closer. It's really therapeutic to be standing there hearing the waves and watching the waves crashed to the shore. But beware that some waves can be so strong that it washed really far up to the shore!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">You can walk to the other end to see other views of the cliffs around the area.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>The Arch</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>London Arch</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>The Grotto</u></span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Staircase to walk down to see the Grotto</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>Bay of Martyrs</u></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "proximanova";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;"><u>Bay of Islands</u></span></span><br />
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We did a few stupid jumping shots here where mine's a failed one and hubby kept laughing at me.<br />
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After all the sightseeing, the rain caught up with us! We were so lucky to finish all that we wanted to see. It's time for lunch and a cuppa hot chocolate while the rain is pouring. We went back to Port Campbell for our lunch and found Port Campbell No1 on Trip Advisor - Forage on the Foreshore! The food's really GREAT! Love it!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grilled Barramundi and potatoes. The fish was so fresh and tender and the potatoes were great!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gnocchi with cheese, spinach and mushroom. Best Gnocchi ever!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Outside the cafe, lots of seagulls!</td></tr>
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That marked our end of our Great Ocean Road trip and we drove the inland route back to Geelong where we stayed overnight before heading to Melbourne the next day for a full day shopping!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our dinner at Geelong - King George Fish and Grill Waterfront. Yums!</td></tr>
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<b><br />Day 6</b><br />
It's a shopping day for us. So we made use of the free tram in the free tram zone to move around Melbourne centre area and Chinatown area. We were wowed by the Victorian Library interior design, it's all symmetrical and it looks so grand!<br />
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Our main activity in the city was just shopping. So yep, for day 6, nothing much except walking around the city area and buying things.<br />
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<b>Day 7</b><br />
We had some time before heading to the airport, so we went to the famous Queen Victoria Market in the morning. Do take note of the opening hours of Queen Victoria Market as they don't open every day. It seems to us as a big market with stalls selling many things. It's a good experience, but i find South Melbourne Market better. However, my friend did tell me that if you are here on Wednesday, Queen Victoria night market is great! But we missed it this time. There is always future ya.<br />
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After that, it's time to say bye to Melbourne and proceed to the Airport.<br />
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We will be back!<br />
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-2711167228280592322018-08-31T21:35:00.000+08:002018-08-31T21:35:01.681+08:00Tokio Inkarami Hair Treatment and Hair Color at Nine By Sweet Basil<div dir="auto" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 18.6667px; line-height: inherit;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So here I am again at another Japanese salon. Saw this promotion on jpassport too! 50% off for first time customer for hair services. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This deal is too good to be true and I immediately made an appointment for hair color and Tokio Inkarami hair treatment which I totally love as it really helps my severely damaged hair. The last time i did this treatment was 4 months back and the effect really lasts for at least 2 months and my hair never gone back to it's worst dry state before I did this treatment at all! I have been using the Tokio Outkarami treatment oil too which really helps in maintaining my hair condition.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Needless to say, the best thing I enjoyed in a Japanese salon is the top notch service provided from the time I stepped into the salon to the time I left. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Masa was my hair stylist that day, his service was excellent and he was very gentle to my hair. He discussed with me on what color I wanted first. I told him that I cannot stand hair color with ammonia as my scalp is sensitive, so he recommended the colors that have no ammonia. True enough, I totally dun feel any irritation on my scalp or any nasty smell during the process of colouring, in fact i actually smell a tinge of sweet, pleasant scent. And I think before he apply the color, he actually applied some scalp protection liquid on my scalp. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">After a while we proceed to the washing area where he washed off the color and the tokio inkarami treatment process was done here. It was intensive and I felt so comfortable lying here with the hot nano mist sprayed on my hair while the treatment cream was applied and he also massaged my head when shampooing and applying the treatment. I swore that I fell asleep which is why I'm unable to detail the steps of the treatment here hahaha. But I'll try.. lol.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I remember he shampooed my hair, sprayed the nano mist, then applied some treatment cream, sprayed the nano mist, and applied somemore treatment cream and sprayed somemore nano mist. I think this process was repeated 3 times before my hair was shampooed again with a super comfy massage and more treatment cream was applied and I think I felt somemore nano mist? I was asleep by this time already haha..</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Then I was woken up to return to my seat to blow dry my hair. I love the outcome! So smooth and soft! This is the first time I had hair colouring that I really think my hair was not damaged at all, instead I felt fresh and pampered! And I think the hair colouring was mucota! If I didn't see wrongly lol. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And oh, did I mentioned that each customer has their own cubicle which means other customer can't see my wet hair ugly look. Haha. And the ambience of the Salon was so quiet and peaceful. I get full attention of my hair stylist with top notch service at a really good price. What more can I ask for! I am so glad I found this deal on Jpassport!</span></div>
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-3699259878103894642018-05-29T20:10:00.000+08:002018-05-29T20:10:02.138+08:00Tokio Inkarami hair treatment experience at BumpRV I had bleached my hair in Oct last year which caused my hair to be very dry and brittle. I dunno what's wrong with me, I damaged my hair further when I perm it in Mar this year. After the bleach and perm, my hair was very rough and it tangles when I comb. I urgently need some really good and effective treatment to save my hair!<br />
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I researched online and saw people raving about Tokio Inkarami treatment. Through the app Jpassport, I saw some Japanese salon having 20% discount. I chose BumpRV based on the good reviews and the reasonable price. The Tokio Inkarami treatment was priced at $160, after 20% discount, it's only $130+ (inclusive of GST). I made an appointment immediately.<br />
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My hair stylist was Konomi, although her english was limited, she was polite and all smiley, which made my visit a pleasant one. Worried about communication? There's a receptionist who can help with the translation.<br />
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When Konomi saw my hair, she knew my hair was badly damaged and assured me that this treatment will make my hair super moisture!<br />
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First, Konomi washed my hair. Then, on my wet hair, she sprayed a generous amount of treatment. She told me that this was a Nobel Award winning ingredient, I think it's called Fullerene if i didn't remember wrongly. After that, she slapped lots of treatment cream on my hair. When i say lots, it's really a lot, it's like pampering my hair with a super thick layer of cream. She slapped the cream in, like really hard. For a while, i was worried that her palms will hurt because of the loud slapping sound like making sure that the cream covered my hair and was absorbed. She then sprayed some more of the award winning treatment and slapped more treatment cream before steaming my hair.<br />
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After the steam, it's time to wash my hair. At the washing area, another cream was applied to my hair and I rested there with hot towel on my head for a while. It was so comfortable that i nearly fell asleep. After that, the treatment was done!<br />
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Konomi was also the one who blow dried my hair. She attended to me from the start to the end, no change of hands at all. I love this. She asked me to touch my hair and I felt my hair has so much moisture now and it's shiny! So much moisture that I found it's hard for my hair to dry totally hahaha. She advised me to wait for 2 days to let the treatment do it's magic before washing my hair. My hair was so moisture and soft and without any tangles after the treatment. The effect was even better after one week because directly after the treatment, I felt my hair too heavy as it was super moisturized.<br />
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Konomi was totally not pushy at all, and was very friendly and nice. Throughout the treatment, she just explained to me about the products and what she will be doing without selling me anything.<br />
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I knew about the Tokio Outkarami treatment oil and bought one to save my hair. <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: source_sans_proregular;">When I'm leaving, Konomi stood at the door watching me walk down the stairs to say byebye to me. It's really heartwarming to see such politeness, attention and great service! I will definitely be back!</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">When I am home, I took a picture of my back view and it looked like it's loaded with moisture!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tokio Outkarami Treatment Oil. It's funny how they play with the words. It's Outkarami, meaning for me to bring out of the salon to use? Lol</td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: source_sans_proregular;">1 month have passed and my hair, although not as soft as when I just did the treatment, is still free from tangles when I comb it. I'm really surprised with the effect. I love the Tokio Outkarami treatment oil too! It has a faint scent of lemongrass and when I applied onto my hair, it's absorbed by my hair without any greasiness at all! The results really lasts unlike other hair treatments (which are not exactly cheap also) that I have tried previously. For a $160 treatment to have this lasting effect, I am pleased. </span><br />
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Previously, I was using Mucota leave in treatment, Mucota was awesome and had been my holy grail for a few years. Until my hair was so badly damaged by the bleaching and perming that I started looking for an alternative. Tokio Inkarami treatment oil saved my hair and it has replaced Mucota to be my holy grail now! <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: source_sans_proregular;">I highly recommend Tokio Inkarami treatment and the treatment oil!</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "source_sans_proregular";"><br /></span>Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-76266879805700349792018-05-21T22:46:00.000+08:002018-05-29T18:11:12.950+08:00Vegetarian 6 course lunch at Joie by Dozo<div dir="ltr">
Few years back we were amazed by the food and service we had at Dozo River Valley but it was closed subsequently. It was recently that we found Joie by Dozo. It's now a vegetarian restaurant. Same as many people, we got the impression that it was not worth the same price as their predecessor who served meat in their courses. However, we were blown away with this vegetarian experience!</div>
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Service was great as usual, the service staff takes pride in explaining each course served. Free flow flower tea were served once we sat. </div>
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Hubby and I chose different dishes on the menu for each course so that we can have more varieties.</div>
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For a start, we were served complimentary pre-meal drink - passion fruit and plum ice blended. The waiter explained that this can help to clear our palette for the several courses later.</div>
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Starter: chef selection of assorted platter </div>
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The waitress advised that we eat the middle first, then the right one and finally the left one. </div>
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Middle one is sliced carrot with shredded radish and sauce on top. Oh my, the texture was so alike to salmon sashimi! I seriously dunno how they did it.</div>
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The right one is crackers with truffle and wasabi mayo, it's not much a surprise as compared to the middle one but it still tasted great.</div>
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The left one is Raspberry on a cracker. The waitress advised not to open the mouth while chewing it. Okay so I put it in my mouth and bite. BOMB! It bursts and Raspberry juice filled my mouth. Another surprise for us!</div>
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Side dish: I ordered gratinated champignon with mozzarella while hubby ordered Bailing mushroom on paper hotpot.</div>
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The gratinated champignon looks like escargot, the taste dun really taste like escargot but got the feel haha, u can still taste that it's mushroom.</div>
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Bailing mushroom on paper hotpot looks like those ah yat abalone with some vegetables on the sides and the abalone sauce. The crispy seaweed surprises us, it has a very special feel when we chewed it.</div>
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Both tasted really great!</div>
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Soup: I ordered infusion with cepes and truffle, while hubby ordered Japanese kunbu broth with handcraft tofu.<br />
For the cepes and truffle, the waitress advised that I put the piece of truffle in my mouth for 5 to 10 seconds before savouring the soup. Ohh! The fragrance of the truffle when I put it in my mouth is indescribable! U really have to try it yourself. The soup so smooth and it's not very creamy unlike mushroom soup that we had in other places.<br />
Hubby's kunbu soup is very light and sweet, not for people who like strong taste I would say. And the exquisite handcrafted tofu, the chef must have skills in order to craft a tofu that define. We also read that the soup was boiled with vegetables and fruits, no meat or bones were used so it's less greasy and sweeter.<br />
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Main course: I ordered truffle risotto while hubby ordered grilled summer mushroom steak on 'pu-ye' hot stone.</div>
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My truffle risotto does not have the creamy cheesy feel like other risotto i have eaten else where, it's light and a bit salty when I first taste it. However, After I mixed the special sweet tar tar look alike enoki mushroom sauce, it tasted heavenly! There was a piece of enoki mushroom, corn croquette to go with the risotto too. I finish the whole plate without feeling 'gelard' which I usually will when having risotto due to the creamy and cheesy taste. This risotto felt refreshing instead.</div>
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Hubby's mushroom steak is even more interesting, the mushroom steak was monkey head mushroom and as we sliced one piece to put in our mouth, the texture actually felt like we were chewing meat and it tasted like ngoh hiang. We were pleasantly surprised! Not to mention there's a mustard grape sauce which helps to reduce any greasiness u might feel as u would when having steak. But of course, since this is a mushroom steak, it's already not much of a greasy feel.</div>
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For drinks, I ordered Hawaiian blue which is a mixed of lychee and blueberries, while hubby ordered iced mallow Apple melody which is a blend of mallow flowers, Apple and guava juice. Both were certainly refreshing! I remember few years back when we went Dozo, we were also pleasantly surprised by their drinks. We were not disappointed this time too! See how pretty it was!</div>
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Dessert: I ordered warm chocolate lava cake with vanilla ice cream while hubby ordered layers of red bean and yam with rose glass. I cannot forget their chocolate lava cake ever since I tried Dozo few years back, their choco lava cake is easily the nicest I had! And yes! It's the same taste that I've been drooling for! Hubby's dessert was special as well but I was too engrossed with my chocolate lava cake, so I didn't really take notice of his hahaha.</div>
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And oh, thumbs up for their service recovery, the waitress actually served the red wine poached pear with lime sorbet to me instead of my choco lava cake. But instead of taking the wrong dessert back, they gave that to us for free and thereafter served another portion of my chocolate lava cake! Excellent service recovery!</div>
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And finally, a complimentary birthday cake for me! Make a wish. Make a wish!</div>
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Joie is now listed in fave at a discounted price at about 30% but it's only valid for dinner. We find the lunch pricing more value for money. You can take a look and compare if you are interested! I'll be back for sure!</div>
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-14207864652618105552017-10-10T15:13:00.000+08:002017-10-10T15:13:10.631+08:004D3N Cruise with Royal Carribean (Mariner of the Seas)This was my first cruise and I chose Royal Carribean (RC) because I have heard good reviews of RC and also because I came across a road show at Punggol Waterwaypoint and the price was quite reasonable.<br />
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As this was my first time on a cruise trip and I'm bringing parents as well, I wanna ensure that everything went smoothly and I did not miss out anything. I did some homework and here I'll share some things to note for first timers.<br />
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- A month plus before the sail date, RC sent an email to me to ask me to do online check in for all passengers. Online check in was to be done at least 4 days before the sail date. At the last part of the online check in, they will ask if you wanted to provide your credit card details to link your Seapass card. I didn't want to provide my credit card details at this junction, hence, I chose cash first. On the sail date when I reached the Cruise Terminal, I then passed my credit card to the staff at the check in counter to link to the Seapass card.<br />
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- Seapass card is very important when on board the cruise. It acts as your ID, because your passport will be kept by the cruise when you board. It is also your room key and all the expenses you incurred on the ship will be charged to the Seapass card, which will then be billed to the credit card you used to link to the Seapass card. Of course, you can also pay by cash if you do not want to link your credit card, however, you need to pay in US dollars and the day before the last day of the cruise, a statement indicating all the expenses you incurred on your Seapass card will be sent to your room and you will need to go to the counter to queue and make the payment. <br />
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- RC will email you the time you need to reach the Cruise Terminal before your sail date according to your Deck number. This is to help facilitate the check in process.<br />
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- All pricing on board are in US Dollars.<br />
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- The ship do not have free WIFI. You will need to purchase to have WIFI service.<br />
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- Passengers are not allowed to bring fresh food on board.<br />
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- I brought my own water bottles to the cruise because the cafe to refill the water was quite far from my room. Do note that RC do not provide mineral water in the rooms, you have to buy the mineral water from them and it's not cheap. There's a kettle in the room but I find it troublesome to have to wait for the water to cool before I can drink it.<br />
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- There's a fire drill before the ship sail. There will be an announcement to inform all passengers to proceed to your designated deck and location. Show your Seapass card to the staff and they will direct you to your designated location. Approach the staff when you reach your designated location to them to take your attendance.<br />
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- Room Attendants will provide the activities sheet for the next day and any information that you need to know in your room.<br />
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- The day before the last day of the cruise, passengers will need to collect the passports at the designated location. Information on this will be put in your room. Bring along the Seapass card to collect the passport.<br />
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Ok! Enough of the admin stuff! Let's start on my journey!<br />
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<u>Day 1</u><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Boarding</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View of Marina Bay from the ship</td></tr>
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Our room, the promenade stateroom at Deck 6 has a window that has views of the Royal Promenade. The room was cosy, small but not cramp and it was tidy and clean.<br />
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Level 5, Royal Promenade, is a shopping street with some shops selling bags like Coach etc, there were also watches, perfume, skincare sales. The scale was quite small though. At times, there were lucky draws going on here.<br />
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At 5pm, there's a parade at the Royal Promenade and we watched it from the comfort of our room!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ship started sailing</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lucky Draw! But we didn't win anything :(</td></tr>
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Dinner you can choose to eat at the buffet place, Windjammer at level 11, or enjoy courses dining at the Main Dining Room. For the courses dining at the Main Dining Room, your Seapass card will indicate the table number allocated to you for your dinner.<br />
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The servers at the Main Dining Room were friendly and provided great service. Food wise, I find western food a lot nicer than Asian ones. Those Asian food that we ordered were a tad disappointing, but western food tasted fine. Oh, and if one serving isn't enough for you, you may keep ordering. It's sort of like a 'buffet'!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Butter garlic with scallops and garlic bread</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Prime Ribs with mash potatoes and vegetables</td></tr>
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After dinner, it's time for show! For the ice skating show 'Ice Under the Big Top', we have to go for the show timing allocated to us. If you do not want the timing allocated, you have to be on waiting list for the timing you wanted. This show was fantastic! Do not miss it!<br />
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<i>*For breakfast and lunch, choices of having buffet at Level 11 Windjammer, or courses meal at the Main Dining Room were available. However, do check out the opening timing Windjammer and Main Dining Room as the timing were different.</i><br />
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<i>Other than Windjammer and the Main Dining Room, Cafe Promenade located at level 5 operates 24 hrs and they have snacks and drinks throughout the 24 hrs. This was where I fill up my water bottles too! Another 2 places the Arctic Zone, which serves soft-serve ice cream and Dog House which serves hotdog buns are located at Level 11 near the pools, and they operate from 1130am to 630pm.</i><br />
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<i>Some restaurants on the ship (the servers will usually go around advertising for their restaurants) and some items on the menu require additional costs. They will indicate on the menu for those items that are charged.</i><br />
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<u>Day 2</u><br />
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The ship arrived at Port Klang and was here from 7am to 7pm. We didn't follow the excursion arranged by RC to KL as additional charges was required and we wanted to enjoy the facilities on the ship while there were lesser people on board. Nonetheless, we did walk to the Port Klang Terminal and took picture of the ship.<br />
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Today, we spent some time explored around the ship and had a great time using the pools and Jacuzzi. There's also gym on the ship. Good to hit the gym since we kept eating on the ship hahaha.<br />
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2 beautiful sunset photos here!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Did I mention that there's a big screen on the pool deck screening movies</td></tr>
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The featured show tonight was a magic show. This show was free seating, unlike the Ice on the Big Top. The magic show was entertaining as well! After the magic show, we immediately proceeded to the pool deck as there's a dance party on the pool deck! However, there's too many people and the space was quite limited so hmmm. that's the downside.<br />
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There's a surprise when we returned to our room tonight. Other than a very tidy room, there's this little towel doggie sitting on my bed.<br />
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<u>Day 3</u><br />
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This morning, hubby woke up early to take some photos of the orangy sunrise! Pretty!<br />
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We signed up for a tour at 24 USD per person to see the 3-storey kitchen of the Main Dining Room to understand how the crew members served the 3000+ passengers on board for each meal. It was definitely an eye-opener! Through the tour, we understand the hardship of the crew members, they work for 7 months every day on board the ship and are given 2 months to go back home. We also see how hectic it was in the kitchen to prepare food for 3000+ passengers. It made me appreciate them more. We also learnt that the fridge on the ship was so big that it can store food to feed 5000 people for a total of 15 days!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our guide for the tour</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chocolate cake!! </td></tr>
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Other than the tour, they also provided buffet brunch with specialties food and unlimited champagne.<br />
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On the last night of the cruise, there's a Gala Dinner in the main dining room. The attire advised was formal wear and we dressed up for the night.<br />
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In the midst of the dinner, the servers at the Main Dining Room gathered together to give all the passengers a thank you speech and sang the song ‘月亮代表我的心’ for us. After the song, 4 of the servers even danced 'Gangnam Style'! It was so entertaining! Really thank them for providing great service and go to the extend of providing a great show!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Servers gather to sing the song for us! The Main Dining Room looks so grand right!</td></tr>
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After the dinner, we went back the room to pack our luggage first. As for checked-in luggage, we were supposed to stick the luggage tag to the luggage and put it outside our room between 7pm to 10pm the day before. Then the next day we just depart the ship and collect our luggage in the Cruise Terminal. Guess what! We had a little surprise again when we were back in the room!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hello! Monkey!</td></tr>
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Of course, if you wanted to carry your own luggage is also ok, just refer to the instructions on the sheet of paper given to you in your room on the last second day to see what time you should leave the ship.<br />
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The featured show for the last night was a dance and singing show. It was entertaining too! Followed by a Disco party on the Royal Promenade. It was a fun night!<br />
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<u>Day 4</u><br />
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We had our breakfast in the morning and we had to vacate the rooms by 930am. According to the instructions on the paper, we were allocated to depart the ship at 1010am.<br />
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I was reluctant to end this cruise tour. This was my first cruise and I had a nice experience with RC. As for the food, hmmm.. don't put too high expectations, the western food are fine. Think for my next cruise, will try their newer and bigger ships when they sail to Singapore.<br />
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A big thank you to the crew members for providing great shows, great service and friendliness.<br />
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Ciao! For now!<br />
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<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-86529603109203911162016-11-30T18:11:00.000+08:002016-11-30T18:11:16.618+08:00New Zealand SI (part 5): Franz Josef Glacier, Hokitika Gorge and Castle HillIn my last post, we went for a <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-4-milford-sound-one.html" target="_blank">Milford Sound one day tour</a>, drove to Queenstown and stop over for a night before proceeding to our next destination, Fox Glacier and Franz Josef Glacier.<br />
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According to Googlemaps, it will take 4.5 hours to drive from Queenstown to our accommodation at Franz Josef Glacier town, and the time taken to drive from Fox to Franz Josef Glacier was half an hour. So our original plan was to explore Fox Glacier first as it was along the way. Then drive to Franz Josef Glacier to check in to our accommodation. But we actually took a lot more time because the drive from Queenstown to Franz Josef was simply amazing and we had to stop at many scenic points. In the end, we didn't have enough time and had to give Fox Glacier a miss. So a tip will be to cater more time for the drive. Although it only took half an hour to drive from Fox Glacier to Franz Josef Glacier, the route was very steep with lots of bends.<br />
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Below are some of the photos we took along the drive.<br />
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<b>Lake Hawea Lookout Point</b><br />
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<b>Lake Wanaka</b><br />
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<b>Blue Pool (30 mins walk return from car park) </b><br />
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<b>Thunder Creek Fall (5 mins walk to the waterfall from the car park)</b><br />
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<b>Roaring Billy (25 mins return walk from the car park)</b><br />
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<b>Haast Pass</b><br />
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<b>West Coast</b><br />
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<b>Bruce Bay</b><br />
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Finally we reached Franz Josef Glacier and checked in to our accommodation, Franz Josef Montrose.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Complimentary soup from Franz Josef Montrose served at 8pm in the kitchen</td></tr>
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Dinner was at Alice May, according to Tripadvisor, it was no. 1 in Franz Josef and they were really good!</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pork with apple sauce</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Beef Cheek in red wine sauce</td></tr>
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<b>Franz Josef Glacier</b> </div>
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The track to Franz Josef Glacier to and fro took 1.5 hours. It was raining when we were there so we again had to brave the rain through the track. But this time round, the condition was better than Hooker Valley Track as there wasn't any strong winds, just some rain. So it was much more manageable. We were told that as Franz Josef Glacier's situated within the rainforest, this area rained most of the time. </div>
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While walking half way, we saw some rocks rolling down the slopes! As the rocks rolled down, there's roaring sound. I initially thought some helicopter flew past, that's until I saw the rocks rolling down.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ice cave we saw along the way</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">That's Franz Josef Glacier up there. It has retreated quite a lot. Sad :(</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Panoramic shot of the surrounding half way through the track</td></tr>
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<b>Hokitika Gorge</b></div>
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After Franz Josef Glacier, we drove for about 2.5 hours to Hokitika Gorge. I love turquoise waters and Hokitika Gorge never failed me.</div>
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We had our dinner at Fat Pipi Pizza in Hokitika Town. The pizza was superb! We ordered a large half half pizza, Mariner (Fish, shrimp, mussel, smoked salmon, onion) and Portifino (shrimp, mushroom, bacon, garlic).<br />
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<b>The Country Cottage</b><br />
We have booked The Country Cottage for the night's stay, it's about 15 mins drive away from Hokitika Town. We loved this cottage a lot and the host was super friendly and nice! They live just next door. It was clean and cosy with a fire place! It was situated in the outskirts, very peaceful, quiet and serene. We could see stars at night as there's little light pollution here. We really love love love this cottage and highly recommend this! My favourite accommodation throughout my whole NZ trip.<br />
The Country Cottage can be booked through <a href="https://www.holidayhouses.co.nz/properties/25750.asp" target="_blank">this website</a>!<br />
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We also encountered the first earthquake of our life here, in The Country Cottage that night. On 14 Nov 2016 at 1202am. The cottage shook a little, could see the furniture shaking and our things on the table and water moving. I was shocked and hubby told me that it was earthquake. We were lucky that it stopped after about half a minute. We felt a few smaller after shocks after that. We immediately checked the news and realised that a magnitude 7.5 earthquake just hit Kaikoura area and the surrounding, including Wellington were badly hit.<br />
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After that we kept our eyes on the news for earthquake very closely and were shocked that there were a few hundreds of after shocks within a day. We still felt very very small tremors as and when. We will be driving back to Christchurch the next day and were relieved that Christchurch was not affected by the earthquake.<br />
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On the last day, we drove back to Christchurch, passing by <b>Arthur's Pass. </b>It was so foggy at Arthur's Pass that visibility was low. We drove through Arthur's Pass and stopped by Castle Hill for a short walk before arriving at Christchurch.<br />
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<b>Castle Hill</b><br />
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We spent the last night in Christchurch to catch our next morning's flight. Sob sob. A vacation that ended too soon.<br />
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<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-51664182182053824512016-11-30T15:55:00.000+08:002016-11-30T18:12:06.451+08:00New Zealand SI (Part 4): Milford Sound one day tourWe booked a one day <b>Milford Sound tour </b>with Jucy from <a href="https://www.bookme.co.nz/bookings/queenstown/activity/jucy-zest-ex-te-anau/278" target="_blank">bookme website</a> at a discounted price, starting of from <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-3-queenstown-te-anau.html" target="_blank">Te Anau</a>. The bus picked us up from our Te Anau accommodation, Shakespear House Bed and Breakfast at 815am. The group was small, only 7 of us.<br />
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One thing to note is that along the road to Milford Sound and at Milford Sound and on the cruise, our phone has no reception at all even though we bought the NZ SIM card from Spark.<br />
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The guide stopped at many points along the drive from Te Anau to Milford Sound for us to take photos.<br />
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<b>The Mirror Lake</b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Can you see the sign Mirror Lake purposely placed as the mirror image?</td></tr>
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Back in the bus, I took some photos too.<br />
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After a while, the bus stopped and we were captivated by the beautiful scenery around us.<br />
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We were booked for the 1115am cruise. Hence, the guide left a few scenic points for the return journey. We arrived at Milford Sound at 11am. The guide told us that at 1pm, it would be very crowded as the tours from Queenstown would have arrived so we avoided the crowd :)<br />
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The guide gave each of us a cruise ticket and a voucher to redeem a pita on the cruise. There were many small small flies, not sure if those were sandflies, at the deck while we were waiting to board the cruise and also at the top level of the cruise. But the flies disperse when the cruise start moving. The winds were too strong for the flies to handle. Haha. We were not bitten by these small small flies even though we did not apply insect repellent. I'm not sure if these were the legendary notorious sandflies or we were just lucky that they did not bite us. Lol.<br />
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The cruise starts!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bowen Falls</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wind was too strong. Hide behind the pillar haha</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cutie seal!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We were so close that the water hit us! Shiok! Haha</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Close up with the waterfall!</td></tr>
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Our cruise ended at 1pm and we boarded the bus for our journey back to Te Anau and some stops at the scenic places.<br />
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<b>The Chasm</b><br />
It's a 20 mins return journey to walk to the Chasm from the car park. It a nice short walk with lots of small small flies which I dunno if they were sandflies.<br />
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At the carpark of Chasm, we saw many Kea too!<br />
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On the return journey, just <b>after Homer Tunnel</b>. The guide stopped for about 20 mins for us to take photos and walked to the snow patches to act as if we were on glacier hahaha.<br />
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<b>Lake Gunn</b><br />
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Our guide was an expert in skipping stones!<br />
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We arrived back at Te Anau at 4pm and that ended our one day Milford Sound Tour!<br />
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There's another less known but bigger one called the Doubtful Sound. It's more inaccessible as compared to Milford Sound. It could only reached via helicopter or overnight cruise. If you have the time, you might wanna check it out!<br />
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We slowly made our way back to Queenstown, stopover for a night, and set off to Franz Josef Glacier!<br />
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Below are some shots we took on our way back to Queenstown! Enjoy! And stay tune for the last part, <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-5-franz-josef.html" target="_blank">part 5 Franz Josef Glacier, Hokitika Gorge and Castle Hill</a>!<br />
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<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-12345215309079995542016-11-29T23:31:00.000+08:002016-11-30T15:56:47.807+08:00New Zealand SI (Part 3): Queenstown, Te AnauThe drive from <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-2-lake-tekapo-lake.html" target="_blank">Lake Tekapo</a> to Queenstown is a 3 hours drive according to Googlemaps, but we took 5 hours to reach Queenstown because the drive was too scenic and there were many photo opportunities along the way.<br />
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After driving for some time, we passed by a sign "<b>Lake Ohau</b>", and we turned into the road to get to Lake Ohau. After turning in, another sign told us Lake Ohau is 40km away. We hesitated a while as the distance was quite long but we still proceeded nonetheless. Someone told us that Lake Pukaki, Lake Tekapo and Lake Ohau are the 3 lakes that were fed by the glacier waters in Aoraki Mount Cook National Park. To and fro Lake Ohau added 1 hour to our time required to reach Queenstown. Lucky we had long day time when we were there.<br />
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Difference between Lake Pukaki, Lake Tekapo and Lake Ohau? Waters of Lake Ohau do not have the beautiful turquoise color like its brothers. Lake Ohau is blue. But over here at Lake Ohau, you find serenity, peaceful and calmness. Lake Ohau is off the beaten path and there's no one here except us. I love this feel.<br />
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Continuing our journey, we came to a town Omarama and we saw the sign <b>Omarama Glider Flight</b>. We did not do this activity. But if you are interested, you can go to <a href="https://www.bookme.co.nz/bookings/queenstown/activity/omarama-glider-flight/2806" target="_blank">this website for discount ticket for Omarama Glider Flight</a>.<br />
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After passing Omarama, we entered into a mountainous terrain, <b>Lindis Pass</b>. The views along Lindis Pass were great! We caught a scenic lookout point and stopped.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Shadow of us! </td></tr>
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We finally reached <b>Queenstown</b> in the evening. Queenstown is a small town and it is possible to walk around the main area by foot. There're many shops with activities such as bungee jump, helicopter rides, para gliding etc on sale. It's like the hub of adrenaline activities. If you have the time, you can use Queenstown as the base to do the activities you interested.<br />
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We checked in to Sir Cedric Tahuna Pod Hostel. We booked a double pod for the night's stay. Curtain could be drawn to ensure your privacy in the pod. The bed was clean and comfortable. Shared toilet and bathroom were clean too. Simple breakfast was served.<br />
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Our dinner for the night was the 'forever queuing' Ferg Burger. All the time while I was in Queenstown, I never see the queue stop at all. We ordered Ferg Burger with Cheddar cheese and Codfather Burger. The price was quite reasonable, Ferg Burger with Cheddar Cheese cost 12.50NZD while Codfather Burger cost 14.90NZD We waited for about 30 mins for our burgers. Check out <a href="http://www.fergburger.com/" target="_blank">Fergburger website</a> for the menu!</div>
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The burgers were big and tasted really nice! One of the nicest I would say. Generous amount of ingredients, juicy beef patty and cod fish with yummy sauce.<br />
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The next day, we continued exploring Queenstown before proceeding to Te Anau. We patronised Ferg again, Fergbaker, which is located just beside Fergburger. We ordered Pork with Apple pie and Venison with Portobello Mushroom pie. Personally, I preferred pork with apple pie more as the taste of venison in red wine sauce with portobello mushroom was a bit too strong to go with pie.<br />
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Queenstown was situated along the lakeside of Lake Wakatipu. It was nice chilling by the lakeside. There're also water activities for purchase at the booth by the lake.<br />
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Hubby tried skipping stones lol..<br />
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While walking in the main area of Queenstown, we saw cutie sheep!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The wool of the sheep was so soft and so nice to touch! I wanna cuddle..</td></tr>
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It's time for us to drive to <b>Te Anau</b>! We took around 2.5 hours to drive from Queenstown to Te Anau. Just before reaching the town of Te Anau, we stopped by at Alpine Centre Cafe and Bar to take photos of these cuties!<br />
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We booked the <b>Te Anau Glow worm cave tour</b> with <a href="https://www.realjourneys.co.nz/en/experiences/glowworm-caves/te-anau-glowworm-caves/" target="_blank">Real Journey</a>. We drove to Real Journey office in Te Anau and board the cruise to the Glow worm cave. The cruise took about half an hour. Finally, we arrived!<br />
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No phototaking is allowed in the Glow worm cave. We waited for a while in the hut before walking to the cave as the guides could only bring a certain number of people in each time. While waiting in the hut, the guide gave a presentation of the cave and the life cycle of glow worm. After about 20 mins, we were lead by our guide into the cave. At the entrance of the cave, we had to bend down quite low to pass through as the cave was quite low. We then walked through the cave with dim lights, so had to be careful while walking in the cave as the floor was quite slippery too. The guide did explain some rock formations, and waterfall to us, but it was too noisy inside the cave due to the roaring waterfall, we could not really hear what the guide said.<br />
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After walking through the cave, we reached a small jetty to take the small boat to see the glow worm. It was totally pitch dark after boarding the small boat. We must remain silent in through the journey as not to disturb the glow worm. However, I was a bit disappointed with the amount of glow worm in the cave, it did not give me the 'wow' sensation. And the time we spent on the boat to see the glow worm was only about 10 minutes.<br />
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After that, we walked backed through the cave and back to the hut and took the cruise back to Real Journey office in Te Anau.<br />
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Te Anau has a very small town with several eateries. We chose Ristorante Pizzeria Paradiso Da Toni for our dinner. We ordered seafood marinara and prawns with gnocchi. Both tasted really good!<br />
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After dinner, we went to the lake side of Lake Te Anau to take some photo of the sunset.<br />
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We checked in to our accommodation in Te Anau, Shakespear House Bed and Breakfast. I loved the stay here! The room was cosy, big and clean, the host was very friendly, it has on site free parking space and the breakfast was cooked by the host and it tasted exceptionally yummy! Other than the cooked breakfast, there's free flow bread, jam, cereal, milk, tea, coffee etc. This was the best breakfast I had throughout my stay in New Zealand!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our room</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The host cooking our delicious breakfast!</td></tr>
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We went for a one day Milford Sound tour with Jucy the next day! Stay tune for <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-4-milford-sound-one.html" target="_blank">part 4 of our NZ trip</a>!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-36305005093548839762016-11-27T22:21:00.002+08:002016-11-29T23:36:15.479+08:00New Zealand SI (Part 2): Lake Tekapo, Lake Pukaki, Mount CookAfter the <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-1-antarctica-centre.html" target="_blank">hot air balloon</a>, we're going to leave Canterbury and continued our journey to <b>Lake Tekapo</b> (according to Google maps 2.5 hours drive). However, the time required to reach a destination in NZ usually took longer than what was stated in Google maps as there're many scenic lookout points to stop and take pictures along the way.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Along the way to Lake Tekapo</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Panorama view of Lake Tekapo</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Panoramic View from Mount John </td></tr>
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We decided to drive up to <b>Mount John </b>to have a panoramic view of Lake Tekapo and Lake Alexandrina first before checking in to our holiday home. It took us about 30mins to drive from Lake Tekapo to the summit of Mount John. Note that there's a $5 fee for road access payable at the base of Mount John and the road up Mount John closes at 6pm. Hence, if you are planning to drive up Mount John to see stars in the night skies, you will have to sign up for the star gazing tour by <a href="http://www.earthandsky.co.nz/tours/night-tours#_=_" target="_blank">Earth and Sky</a>.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View from Mount John</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Observatory on Mount John</td></tr>
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Astro Cafe is located on Mount John. It's great sipping a cup of coffee or hot chocolate while admiring the great views. Don't pin high hopes on the food. They serve decent sandwiches and cakes, but that's about it.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Astro Cafe</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hot chocolate - Astro Cafe</td></tr>
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We then drove down Mount John and went back to Lake Tekapo. Lupins started growing along Lake Tekapo.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Beautiful turquoise color of Lake Tekapo </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Playing waters of Lake Tekapo. The water was so cold!</td></tr>
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We checked in to our holiday home at Lake Tekapo Holiday Homes office.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our cosy holiday home ensuite with fully equipped kitchen</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Home cooked steak in our Holiday Home!</td></tr>
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At night, we tried capturing some stars in the clear skies.</div>
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The next day, we drove along <b>Lake Pukaki</b>. Lake Pukaki was around 30 minutes drive from Lake Tekapo. The turquoise color of Lake Pukaki was more beautiful and stunning than Lake Tekapo! I super love Lake Pukaki!<br />
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We walked down to the lakeside of Lake Pukaki and took a close up view of the turquoise waters!<br />
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While driving along Lake Pukaki, we stopped by Lake Pukaki Visitor Centre. There's a Mount Cook Alpine Salmon shop here.<br />
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And so, we bought some salmon sashimi and ate by Lake Pukaki, admire the beautiful turquoise waters. The sashimi was so fresh and yummy!<br />
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After driving past Lake Pukaki, another 30 minutes drive brought us to Mount Cook area. We did 2 walks here. The <b>Blue Lake and Tasman Glacier View walk</b> and the <b>Hooker Valley Track</b>. You can find more walks in the <a href="http://www.doc.govt.nz/aoraki-walking-tracks" target="_blank">Aoraki Mount Cook village walking tracks website</a>.<br />
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<b>Blue Lake and Tasman Glacier View walk</b><br />
Time required: 45 minutes return<br />
Difficulty: Easy with steps to climb<br />
Height gain: 100m<br />
Start point: Blue lake carpark (Along the road to Mount Cook village, there's a sign "Tasman", turn into the road and drive for another 5 mins to reach the carpark)<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Blue Lake Carpark</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Starting of the walk</td></tr>
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After about 10 mins of walking. We've reached the blue lake. Errr... we were quite disappointed with the blue lake because it was not blue at all. There's a sign explaining why the blue lake was not blue anymore. Due to global warming, the Tasman Glacier has retreated so much that the glacier water could not reach the Blue Lake anymore. Hence, the blue lake is now being fed by rainwater instead of glacier water. That's sad :(<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Blue Lake that's not blue</td></tr>
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Continuing the walk, there're lots of stairs to climb. Endure and you will be rewarded with the beautiful view of Tasman Glacier Lake.<br />
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Tasman Glacier has retreated so much that it's no longer visible from here. All we could see is only the Glacier Lake with some ice bergs in the lake. Nonetheless, the view is still pretty.<br />
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<b>Hooker Valley Track</b><br />
Time required: 3 hours return from carpark<br />
Difficulty: Easy, mostly flat grounds with some slopes<br />
Height gain: 80m over 5km<br />
Start point: White Horse Hill campground and car park (drive past Mount Cook village and continue on the road to the carpark)<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Starting point of Hooker Valley Track</td></tr>
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The weather started to turn cloudy and rained as we began our Hooker Valley Track :( This made our journey difficult. It was cold at 6 degrees, and we had to endure the rain hitting on us and the super strong winds that blew throughout the 3 hours track. It's important to have waterproof and windproof jacket with hoodie. I think we would have gave up this track if we're not prepared with the jacket.<br />
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There were 3 bridges to cross for the track, it seems like one bridge marked one quarter of track completed. The views were great! Imagine walking in the mountains! The end point of Hooker Valley Track is the view of the Hooker Glacier and the glacier lake. We were a bit disappointed with the glacier lake though, as the icebergs on the glacier lake were quite dirty.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grey skies :( Could not get a clear picture of the skyline and the mountains</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The first bridge</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The second bridge</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Half way through Hooker Valley Track</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Finally reached the end point of Hooker Valley Track!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The white patch of snow on the mountain is Hooker Glacier</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Walking back...</td></tr>
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The Hooker Valley Track is quite an easy walk with superb views surrounding, if not for the weather. It's no doubt that this is one of the most popular walk in Mount Cook region. Even though at the end point, I'm a bit disappointed with the dirty icebergs on the glacier lake, I would still highly recommend this walk as the views are really great and I love the feeling of walking in the mountains! Choose a day with good weather and you will be able to enjoy the mountains and scenery with leisure. Click to check out the <a href="http://www.yr.no/place/New_Zealand/West_Coast/Hooker_Valley_Track/" target="_blank">weather conditions for Hooker Valley Track</a> beforehand!<br />
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After another night stay at Lake Tekapo, we said bye bye to Lake Tekapo and proceeded to Queenstown, Te Anau, Milford Sound! Stay tune for <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-3-queenstown-te-anau.html" target="_blank">Part 3</a>!<br />
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-4105943083086931872016-11-25T23:56:00.002+08:002016-11-29T23:36:58.042+08:00New Zealand SI (Part 1): Antarctica Centre and Hot Air Balloon at CanterburyOur 2016 Vacation: New Zealand South Island!!<br />
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Getting prepared for the trip, we've booked our rental car online and checked for discounted tickets for the activities! New Zealand time is 5 hours ahead of Singapore. We went in early November which was Spring time for New Zealand and the sun set at 9pm! It's long day time and it's good for us as we had more time for the activities!<br />
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<u>Rental Car</u><br />
The mode of transport for this trip was totally via rental car. In New Zealand, the cars are right hand drive, same as Singapore. One point to note is that the highway in New Zealand are mostly made up of single carriageway roads with one-lane each way.<br />
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Before we flew, we reserved a rental car from Jucy online. The cost of the rental for 9 days (i.e. from 6 Nov 12pm to 15 Nov 12pm) is S$400. The car we got was Nissan Tiida. This cost include the standard insurance which has an excess of S$2,000. GPS will require additional cost and we did not take the GPS as we intend to buy a NZ SIM card and use the data and our phone GPS to guide us on the road. We bought the Zero excess insurance, also known as 'stress-free cover', for an additional $153 for a piece of mind.<br />
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After driving on the road, we were happy that we bought the 'stress-free cover' as it was quite easy to cause 'injury' to the car body as there were small stones on many of the roads and we also met a few Kea which flew onto our car and used their beak to 'poke' the car.<br />
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<u>Discounted tickets for various activities!</u><br />
I found a website which offer discounted price for various activities in New Zealand! I've booked many of my activities through this website prior to my trip! <a href="https://www.bookme.co.nz/" target="_blank">https://www.bookme.co.nz</a><br />
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The start of our vacation! Yoohoo!<br />
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We took a direct SQ flight on 5 Nov 2016 to Christchurch. It was a 10 hours flight.<br />
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Upon arrival at Christchurch Airport, first thing we did was to buy a NZ SIM card. There were 2 booths located side by side at Christchurch airport, Vodaphone and Spark. After comparing the 2, we bought the <a href="https://www.spark.co.nz/shop/mobile/travel-pack.html" target="_blank">tourist package from Spark</a>, which cost NZD49 for 3GB data, 200 minutes NZ call time + 200 minutes International call time (check the website to see if your country is included). 200 NZ text + 100 International text. The staff at the booth helped us changed the SIM card on the spot and the NZ SIM card could be used immediately.<br />
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We followed the signs in the airport to the rental car shuttle pick up point. After getting the rental car, our first stop is <b>Antarctica Centre</b> which is just minutes away from Christchurch Airport. I bought the ticket of the Antarctica Centre from <a href="https://www.bookme.co.nz/" target="_blank">bookme website</a> for just NZD29 per person (original price NZD59)! The catch for the discounted ticket is that there is specific timing to visit the Antarctica Centre. We bought the slot for 3pm.<br />
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<a href="http://www.iceberg.co.nz/" target="_blank"><b>Antarctica Centre</b> </a><br />
38 Orchard Road, Christchurch Airport<br />
Opening hours: 9am to 530pm<br />
Free on site parking for visitors<br />
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At the entrance of Antarctica Centre, the staff actually helped to plan the sequence of the activities for us so that we were able to try all the activities within the 2 hours.<br />
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Activity 1: The Antarctic Storm<br />
We had to slip on a rubber cover on our shoes and put on the jacket provided before entering the Antarctic Storm room. It was freezing cold in there. They simulated the strong winds and coldness of an antarctic storm which lasted for a few minutes.<br />
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I could not stand the wind and coldness of the Antarctic Storm and went to hide in the Igloo until the storm was over. lol.<br />
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Activity 2: Hagglund Ride<br />
It was so fun! We were seated in the Hagglund which brought us through different terrains, slopes, into pools of water, over piles of wooden logs etc. Beware! You might bump into the stranger sitting next to you!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In the Hagglund</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Hagglund</td></tr>
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Activity 3: Penguin Encounter<br />
Penguin Feeding Show! Cute!<br />
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Activity 4: 4D Theater<br />
We watched Ice Voyage. It was quite a nice show, not much of motion though. But the graphics were nice.<br />
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After the activities, we walked through the Antarctic Gallery to understand how is it like to live on Antarctica. People living in Antarctica will face 24 hours of sunlight during summer months and 24 hours of darkness during winter months.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Now I can say I have stepped on North and South pole</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Instruments used in Antarctica</td></tr>
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Finally, our visit of Antarctic Centre ended with a 17 minute show 'Beyond the Frozen Sunset'.<br />
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After visiting the Antarctica Centre, it's time for us to return to our accommodation for a rest. We stayed overnight at Rolleston - <span style="color: #2d2d2d;">Warm Spring Rural Retreat + Breakfast which</span> we booked through Airbnb. The hosts were very friendly and the room was clean and comfortable. It was in a quiet residential area and we could see stars in the night skies. Highly recommended!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Saw a double rainbow from our accommodation in Rolleston!</td></tr>
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We woke up real early the next day at 430am for our <b>Hot Air Balloon </b>experience with <a href="http://ballooningcanterbury.com/" target="_blank">Ballooningcanterbury</a>. I bought the tickets for the hot air balloon through <a href="https://www.bookme.co.nz/" target="_blank">bookme website</a> as well for NZD275 per person (original price NZD395)!<br />
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Ballooning Canterbury called us the day before at 7pm to confirm if the flight will proceed the next day and informed us of the meeting place and time.<br />
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Upon arrival at the meeting place, we boarded a bus and proceeded to a big grassland to set up the hot air balloon!<br />
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The set up was almost done and we climbed into the basket. The fire roared! And the hot air balloon slowly rises!<br />
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Soon, we saw beautiful views of Canterbury from the hot air balloon!<br />
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It was foggy that day, but it's still a beautiful sunrise.<br />
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This hot air balloon experience made me understand that a lot of knowledge is required in handling a hot air balloon. They need to feel the wind direction, decide when to lit the fire to let the hot air balloon fly higher. We were at the mercy of the wind direction, and at the same time there's this difficulty of finding a suitable spot to land. Mike, the owner of Ballooning Canterbury was very experienced and I felt safe in their hands. It was a wonderful morning flying in the hot air balloon, enjoying the scenery, the sunrise, the breeze. I love the feel.<br />
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After we landed, we all helped to keep the huge balloon. It was no mean feat.<br />
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YEAH! We did it finally! That calls for celebration! A little champagne, muffins and fruits to end the awesome hot air balloon experience!<br />
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We continued our journey to Lake Tekapo, Lake Pukaki and Mount Cook next! Stay tune for <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2016/11/new-zealand-si-part-2-lake-tekapo-lake.html" target="_blank">part 2</a>!<br />
<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-11732856314643902962016-11-24T22:33:00.000+08:002016-11-24T22:33:45.503+08:00My first Op ExperienceHoly Shit!<br />
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There's a lipoma on my left shoulder, and the MRI scan showed the size is 6.2cm x 5.8cm x 2.8xm. It's not small and the doctor suggested a surgery to remove it. I will be going under General Anesthesia (GA) as the lump is too big for me to go under Local Anesthesia.<br />
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This is the first time I'm going for an op and I am so so scared and don't know what to expect.<br />
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My operation was fixed on 21 Nov 2016 at 830am in the morning. The doctor told me that he put me as the first operating patient that day. It will be a day surgery and I was given a surgery booklet to read through to have a better understanding on what to expect.<br />
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According to the booklet, make-up, manicure, pedicure, contact lenses, fake eyelashes are not allowed on the day of the surgery. Surgery also cannot proceed if I am down with flu, cough or fever on the day of the surgery and I am not supposed to eat and drink from 12 midnight onwards the day before, not even plain water. The nurse called me one working day before to inform me the time to report to the hospital on the day of the surgery. <br />
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On 21 Nov 2016, I arrived at TTSH, Level 3 Day Surgery Center at 7am to prepare before the surgery. I slotted the surgery booklet envelop into the slot and waited for the nurse to call my name for registration.<br />
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At the registration counter, I made the payment and waited a while before a nurse brought me to a one bedder room to change and prepare. A card 'Day Surgery Ward' was hung on my bed, I was in Room 32, Bed 32.<br />
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I was asked to take off everything and changed into the disposable underwear and operation robe. I asked the nurse out of curiosity and understand that surgery can proceed even when it's the menses period.<br />
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After changing into the operation robe, the nurse came to take my temperature to ensure that I have no fever. She also asked a few questions like whether I had surgery before, whether I am on any long term medication, whether I had flu or cough or took any medicine in the last one week, and also took my blood pressure.<br />
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After all the procedures, I just rested on the bed and waited for the nurse to bring me to the operating theater. While waiting, my hubby took a photo of me.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I was actually very scared and nervous at this time.</td></tr>
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At about 8am, the nurse came and pushed me to the operating theater. My hubby could not follow me anymore and so, he had to wait in the room. The nurse told him that my operation will take one hour, but they will bring me back to the room only after I am awake from the GA, which will usually take around 3 hours.<br />
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I was pushed to a small room before entering the operating theater. There, the nurses helped me put on a warm air blanket to keep me warm. The Anesthetic doctor also came to prepare me what is going to happen. He told me that a needle will be poked to my hand and this is where the Anesthetic medicine will be injected to my body. He also told me that during the surgery, a breathing tube will be inserted to my mouth and this might cause slight injuries to my mouth or gum.<br />
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Being a super hum ji and scared of pain person, I told the anesthetic doctor that I would like to have an injection to numb my hand first before poking the needle. After the needle was poked into my veins, there's no feeling, no pain whatsoever. The nurses and the doctors were all very nice. Seeing that I very scared, they did their best to comfort me.<br />
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After a while, the surgeon came and I was pushed into the operating theater. My bed was placed beside the operating bed and I slowly moved over to the operating bed. The anesthetic doctor came and tell me that he's now going to give me the anesthetic through the needle on my hand. Upon hearing what he told me, I replied him 'ORHH'. I have not even finish my 'ORHH', I fell into unconsciousness already.<br />
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The next thing I knew was someone trying to wake me up. I felt groggy and I just felt like continue sleeping. I was in a room with some others, I think they just had their surgery too and was waiting to wake up too. Once I regained my conscious, the nurses pushed me back to room 32 where my hubby was waiting.<br />
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I felt sore at the wound and my throat hurts terribly. There's an ulcer near my lip too. My hubby tried asking the nurse to give me some water but the nurse said have to wait for a while before drinking in case I vomit as I just regain conscious.<br />
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After half an hour, the nurse brought a bread with ham, milo and a cup of water for me. I drank a sip of plain water and my throat hurts terribly. I guessed the sore throat and the ulcer near my lip was caused by the breathing tube that was inserted during the surgery.<br />
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Because of the terrible pain in the throat, I could only swallow soft food. My hubby helped to dip the bread into the Milo to make it soft before feeding me. The nurse told me to try standing and walking. I could go home when I don't feel giddy while walking. Okay, that was like 3 more hours later and I left the hospital at around 4pm.<br />
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The nurse taught my hubby how to change the dressing too. The doctor told me that the stitches he used for me will dissolve on it's own, hence, I dun have to return to remove the stitches. I was given some alcohol wipes and 2 waterproof dressing to change. The nurse also told my hubby that there's some steri-strips inside the dressing and he do not need to remove the steri-strips when changing the dressing. The steri-strips should only be removed after one week.<br />
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I will be writing a post on my post-op experience after this!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-12615024945605896852016-09-16T23:15:00.001+08:002016-09-16T23:15:49.832+08:00Ramen Keisuke Tonkotsu King @ Orchid HotelTGIF Dinner at a very Japanese feel and cozy ramen shop at Orchid Hotel, 1 Tras Link, Tanjong Pagar.<br />
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I have been wanting to try the ramen at Tonkotsu King as every time I walked pass it, there's a long long queue. Finally today, we decided to just queue no matter how long it takes.<br />
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There is free cold barley tea outside the shop for patrons who are queuing, quite a nice gesture! While queuing, you can decide what to order. Take the order form and a pen from the table outside the shop and tick according to your preference. Oh! Take one order form for each bowl of ramen. They will cook according to your preference.<br />
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There are mainly 3 types of ramen, the normal one, black spicy and red spicy. We both ordered the normal and add $4 for Special All Toppings (consists of a big piece of seaweed, a flavoured egg and a thinner piece of chashu). If having all the toppings is not what you want, you can just tick seaweed for $1 or flavoured egg for $2. There's also choices of light, normal, strong for the soup. No oil, less oil, normal or more oil. Hard, normal or soft for the noodles. You can also choose not to have spring onions, black fungus or chashu if don't like these ingredients. We love such customisation!<br />
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So finally, it's our turn! it's a bit squeezy in there but that's fine, you will concentrate just on the freebies and ramen anyway.<br />
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What freebies do they have? Free water, free barley tea outside the shop which can be brought into the ramen shop, free hard-boiled eggs, chilly sesame bean sprouts, japanese mayonnaise and there's a little bowl of sesame which was really fragrance after we ground it.<br />
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Here comes the main lead. Ramen!<br />
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The broth was heavenly! One of the best I have eaten in Singapore and it's comparable to the ramen standards we had when we were in Hokkaido! The chashu is nice too! It's different from the chashu we've seen in other ramen shops in Singapore. The flavoured egg was OMG nice! It was totally worth the half an hour queue!<br />
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We will be back!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-60680649871749433222016-08-02T21:03:00.001+08:002019-05-07T12:20:32.083+08:00My Favourite Salon: Studio M Hair Salon @ KSL City MallDo you have the same problem as me? Want to dye, perm, rebond or do treatment for your hair but after looking at the price of the established hair salon in Singapore you just wanna shake head and walk away from the salon.<br />
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Lucky for me, I found a good, cheaper hair salon with excellent service and experience just across the Straits! At KSL City Mall at JB!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Govin has changed it's name to Studio M, located at the same location. Ground floor of KSL City Mall.</td></tr>
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I had gone thrice and I was very happy with my every experience there!<br />
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My first and third time there was for hair and scalp treatment and they were really good! The scalp massage was so comfortable, I literally could fell asleep while they worked on my hair! The most special experience was during the wait at the hair wash area. They provided aroma therapy there by dripping some lavender essential oil into the hot water and I nearly slept.<br />
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My second time there was to colour and cut my hair. Oh my! Their hair colour has no ammonia smell at all and I love it! Previously, whenever I colour my hair at other hair salons, the colouring has a smell that makes me giddy when the hairdresser applied the dye, but not my colouring at Govin Hair Salon! My hair was so soft after the colouring - no dryness whatsoever. And I totally love the hair colour my hairstylist, Jason, specially concocted for me.<br />
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Another best thing was the friendliness of the staff there and the drinks they offered. I could choose between several yummy tea such as chrysanthemum, rose tea, green tea, etc.<br />
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And of course, the best part is the price! With top notch service and quality, the price was almost the same as, if not cheaper than those salons at HDB estates or home salons. As a gauge, the second time when I was there, I did hair colouring with highlights, cut and mucota hair treatment for about RM500, approximately SGD 170!<br />
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I am so happy that I found Studio M Hair Salon. Don't think I will do my hair in Singapore anymore. Lol..Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-29324248714475628042016-08-02T20:01:00.002+08:002016-08-02T20:09:52.447+08:00Jiufen and Shifen in one day!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Getting to Jiu Fen / Jin Gua Shi:<br />
From Taipei Main Station, take the train and alight at Ruifang Station.<br />
Express train journey time: 35mins, NT 76 per person.<br />
Normal train journey time: 55mins, NT 49 per person.<br />
Do note that if you are taking the normal train, you can tap your EasyCard at the gantry to pay for the train. However, if you are taking the Express Train, you cannot use EasyCard, you need to buy the ticket at the counter at Train station. This information is not clearly shown at the train station nor in the website and we learnt the hard way. We tapped our EasyCard as we thought it can be used for Express Train as well and we were fined when the conductor was doing his check in the Express Train. The fine was 50% extra on top of the Express Train ticket price.<br />
Refer to <a href="http://twtraffic.tra.gov.tw/twrail/English/e_index.aspx" target="_blank">this link</a> for timing and other information of the train service.<br />
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Alight at Ruifang, follow the signs in Ruifang station which show you where to exit to take the bus for Jin Gua Shi and Jiu Fen.<br />
Take the bus to Jiu Fen and Jin Gua Shi at the bus stop opposite Ruifang Train station. The bus stop is not directly opposite Ruifang train station, will have to walk down along the road for about 3 mins to get to the bus stop. The bus will have a signboard at the front window screen stating 往九份,金瓜石. The bus journey is about 20 mins ride.<br />
Jin Gua Shi is the last stop. Jiu Fen is a few stops before that. The cost is NT 15 per person.<br />
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Alternative is to hire a taxi for a one day tour around Jin Gua Shi and Jiu Fen. There were many taxi drivers waiting outside Ruifang Station.<br />
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We started late that day and hence, we gave up Jin Gua Shi and head directly to Jiu Fen.<br />
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<u><b>Jiu Fen</b></u><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jiu Fen Old Street</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Famous Jiu Fen fishballs</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Peanut crumps and ice cream roll. It's yummy!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Big Sausage!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The sausage shop is located just beside a fortune cat shop.</td></tr>
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There are alot of taro balls shop along Jiu Fen Old Street but the nicest one is Lai Ah Po Taro Balls. It's all the way into the Old Street. Be patient and walk all the way in! </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Super yummy and generous portion of the various flavours of balls (Taro, Pumpkin, Green tea, Black Sesame, Red Bean). I couldn't find back that same taste anywhere else. Miss it.</td></tr>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-39LgsB1z2nE/V6A3e2FjYoI/AAAAAAAAL6Q/F5ZQjRwFQ4UJkJdEXbDWRx7HZJVP9in-QCLcB/s1600/IMG_1317.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-39LgsB1z2nE/V6A3e2FjYoI/AAAAAAAAL6Q/F5ZQjRwFQ4UJkJdEXbDWRx7HZJVP9in-QCLcB/s400/IMG_1317.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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Walking all the way to the end of Jiu Fen Old Street, not only you will be rewarded with Lai Ah Po Taro balls, you will also be rewarded with nice scenery..<br />
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We settled at a tea house overlooking the scenery of Jiu Fen and ordered a hotpot for high tea. Hahaha.</div>
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It's time to proceed to Shifen!</div>
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<b><u>Shi Fen</u></b></div>
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Take a bus from Jiu Fen back to Ruifang station. If you are unsure of where to take the bus, you can check with the people at the Tourist Information Counter at Jiu Fen. Bus 788 or 826 both go back to Ruifang station.</div>
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From Ruifang Train station, take the Pingxi Line to Shifen. There is no express train for Pingxi Line so you can use EasyCard to tap at the gantry to pay for the train fare at ease.</div>
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Train journey from Ruifang to Shifen is about 30 mins.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Q0uP94j5YNw/V6B0KduR2EI/AAAAAAAAL7Q/8t32WV4g_783tqrAZ2Q9z-kkLcB9JBjewCLcB/s1600/t28.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Q0uP94j5YNw/V6B0KduR2EI/AAAAAAAAL7Q/8t32WV4g_783tqrAZ2Q9z-kkLcB9JBjewCLcB/s400/t28.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hello! From Pingxi Line Train</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Arrived at Shifen train station</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">放天灯!</td></tr>
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There are many <span style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">天灯 </span>stalls along the main street of Shifen. So just choose one! Different sides and different colours of the <span style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">天灯 </span>represent different categories of life. The people there will explain to you. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So many <span style="font-size: 12.8px;">天灯 in the air!</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Shifen Old Street night view.</td></tr>
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Near to Shi Fen Old Street is the famous Shi Fen waterfall. Walk all the way to the end of Shi Fen Old Street and continue walking for another half an hour to reach the waterfall. We were too late when we reach Shi Fen Old Street and hence have to give the waterfall a miss. </div>
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Entrance fee to the water fall is NT100 per person.</div>
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Opening hours: Nov - Jan (0800 to 1830); Feb to Oct (0800 to 1900)</div>
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That's all for Jiu Fen and Shi Fen! Stay tune for my other posts on Taiwan, including Kao Hsiung, Cing Jing and Tai Chung!<br />
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Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-8385419997253025122016-08-02T13:17:00.001+08:002016-08-02T20:17:18.786+08:00Taiwan: Taipei - Travel information and foodie!This is my 4th time back in Taiwan. Love the shopping, foodie here and that explains why I kept coming back.<br />
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It is very easy to stay connected with internet access in Taiwan. You can either rent a <span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Taiwan WIFI router at Changi Airport, or buy a Taiwan Sim Card from one of the Telecom counters located at the airport when you arrived at Taiwan (usually is Chung Hwa or </span><span style="background-color: rgba(4 , 4 , 180 , 0.027451); color: #333333; font-family: "microsoft jhenghei" , , "hopensans" , "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 700; line-height: 21px;">台湾大哥大).</span><span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">If you decided to rent a Taiwan WIFI router which allows you to connect up to a maximum of 5 devices, do remember to reserve online at least 3 days before departure to ensure that there is stock for you. We forgot to reserve online beforehand and on the day when we reached Changi Airport, the lady at the counter told us that it was out of stock. For more information and promotion for the WIFI router, check out <a href="https://www.changirecommends.com/owifi.aspx" target="_blank">Changi Recommends Website.</a></span><br />
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The other alternative is to buy a Taiwan Sim Card when you touch down at the airport in Taiwan. The Data packages provided by the 2 major Telecoms in Taiwan, i.e. <span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18.4px;">Chung Hwa and </span><span style="background-color: rgba(4 , 4 , 180 , 0.027451); color: #333333; font-family: "microsoft jhenghei" , , "hopensans" , "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 700; line-height: 21px;">台湾大哥大</span><span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;"> have really good deals. But when you compare this to the option of having a WIFI router, the downside is Sim Card can only be used by one device. In order to share the data, you have to open your personal hot spot which drains the battery really fast. So if you are travelling in a group and you prefer everyone to have data, WIFI router is still the best option.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;">For more information on the location of the Telecom counters in Taiwan Airport and the various data packages provided by the 2 Taiwan Telecom, you can refer to this <a href="https://guidetotaipei.com/article/cell-phones-and-sim-cards" target="_blank">guide.</a> </span><span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;">Upon arriving at Taipei Taoyuan International Airport, we proceed to buy the bus tickets from the bus counters at the Airport. You might be confuse by the many bus counters as each bus brings you to a different place. It is best to double check with the bus counter operators if their bus will bring you to your destination before buying the tickets. Our hotel is located very near Taipei Main Station and so we took the Guo Guang bus which took us directly to Taipei Main Station. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">Guo Guang bus from Taoyuan International Airport to Taipei Main Station -</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">Fare: 125NT per person</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">Bus Interval: 15-20mins</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">Bus Journey: approximately 1 hour</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span></span>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kJK4nGCoBXk/V4HcY2nXXTI/AAAAAAAAL1w/TiZa53fx3ucxpwOfNB1RkApl1B-QS2xpACLcB/s1600/Taiwan1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kJK4nGCoBXk/V4HcY2nXXTI/AAAAAAAAL1w/TiZa53fx3ucxpwOfNB1RkApl1B-QS2xpACLcB/s400/Taiwan1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Queuing up for Guo Guang bus</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">We check in to our hotel:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;"><u>Main Inn Taipei</u></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">Add: 2F, No. 12, Lane 21, Zhengzhou Road, Datong District, 103 Taipei, Taiwan </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">6 mins walk from Taipei main station, walk through the Taipei underground mall, exit Y13. It's just very near to the exit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 18.4px;">A down side of this hotel is that it is located on the second floor and the steps are quite steep and narrow. It's quite dangerous when you still have a bulky luggage to carry up and down. I won't recommend this hotel if you have elderly travelling with you as they might have problems climbing the stairs. Nonetheless, the service is good, staff is friendly and the room is modern and clean.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 18.4px;">Our hotel is near to Ningxia night market and hence, that's our first stop!</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><u>Ningxia Night Market</u></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.12px;">Add: Ningxia Rd, Datong District, Taipei City, Taiwan 103</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Mu92-puAuRk/V6AkSjawcAI/AAAAAAAAL2Y/RXbea6zfDNkrhqqK83un44DdyED8jaSfwCLcB/s1600/IMG_1287.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Mu92-puAuRk/V6AkSjawcAI/AAAAAAAAL2Y/RXbea6zfDNkrhqqK83un44DdyED8jaSfwCLcB/s400/IMG_1287.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-423Kru0jvZ4/V6AkShGQBhI/AAAAAAAAL2c/7gqWUhmZ5ZU_Efv-rFMsVmQpXG9PfB7dwCLcB/s1600/IMG_1298.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-423Kru0jvZ4/V6AkShGQBhI/AAAAAAAAL2c/7gqWUhmZ5ZU_Efv-rFMsVmQpXG9PfB7dwCLcB/s400/IMG_1298.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It's fun looking how they cooked the beef cubes. It's quite tasty but the beef cubes were not as tender and soft as I thought it should be. Most of the night markets have this. </td></tr>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YDkHGOk6xSI/V6Akl9bJ6VI/AAAAAAAAL2k/_DGAmPgrg1Yizf3sv_zlKAsZ5y5sezpcgCLcB/s1600/IMG_1290.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YDkHGOk6xSI/V6Akl9bJ6VI/AAAAAAAAL2k/_DGAmPgrg1Yizf3sv_zlKAsZ5y5sezpcgCLcB/s400/IMG_1290.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nice as always. I like Taiwan's 臭豆腐!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-x-Pg_Oi-z98/V6Akl2hY9BI/AAAAAAAAL2o/MGyQY-PvGeAIIetAdmJfHNl8aNzIhZd2QCLcB/s1600/IMG_1288.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-x-Pg_Oi-z98/V6Akl2hY9BI/AAAAAAAAL2o/MGyQY-PvGeAIIetAdmJfHNl8aNzIhZd2QCLcB/s400/IMG_1288.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">啊宗面线 still the nicest!</td></tr>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vzqEBoFt9BA/V6AkmlsteII/AAAAAAAAL2w/KVuqUFo2zs0w7GX-7k5ovKr2PxISi0JygCLcB/s1600/IMG_1293.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vzqEBoFt9BA/V6AkmlsteII/AAAAAAAAL2w/KVuqUFo2zs0w7GX-7k5ovKr2PxISi0JygCLcB/s400/IMG_1293.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MW8Chq6vzEc/V6Akm-Nf6VI/AAAAAAAAL20/D8EB5lqjIcYpV0Bq2epxQm6xwqe7VMCEgCLcB/s1600/IMG_1294.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MW8Chq6vzEc/V6Akm-Nf6VI/AAAAAAAAL20/D8EB5lqjIcYpV0Bq2epxQm6xwqe7VMCEgCLcB/s400/IMG_1294.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yummy! Long queue but must try! Glutinous rice stuffed in squid. This will be a very filling dish though.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x2usI2PLfq8/V6AknQtLbhI/AAAAAAAAL24/DzMnnAZ4lRc9kKhtI2xhvoVDR9jWvv_RQCLcB/s1600/IMG_1296.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x2usI2PLfq8/V6AknQtLbhI/AAAAAAAAL24/DzMnnAZ4lRc9kKhtI2xhvoVDR9jWvv_RQCLcB/s400/IMG_1296.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Muah Chee Ice. Special and yummy. Nice to have a bowl in a hot day!</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><u>上引水产 Addiction Aquatic Co. Ltd</u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">台北市民族东路410巷2弄18号, zhong shan district.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Opening hours: 0600 to 2400.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Getting there: Nearest MRT station – 行天宫站 OR 中山国中站, then walk another 15mins or 1.3km.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">行天宫站: Take bus 642, 3 stops; 中山国中站: take bus 74, 5 stops</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Prices are quite steep here. You will have proper seats if you dine at the restaurants. If you decide to just buy food from the counter, like us, you will have to find seats yourself. When we were there, it's very crowded, we could not find a table and have to eat while standing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><u>Raohe Street Night Market</u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: times, times new roman, serif;">Nearest train station: Song Shan</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jelly stick!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This was so nice! It's crispy on the outside and when I put in my mouth, the fragrance milk just flowed out. Tasty and special! </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Very juicy chicken thigh. It's quite fattening though as you have to eat it together with the chicken skin that's wrap around the meat.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There were many stalls selling grilled squid in various night markets. It's a tad salty as they sprinkle too much seasoning on the squid. The best grilled squid I have eaten was at Qi Jin in Kao Hsiung. Check out my post on Kao Hsiung!</td></tr>
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Talking about foodie in Taipei, how can we miss out the all time favourite, 阿宗面线 at Ximending!There were long queues no matter what time of the day.<br />
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Check out my other posts on other parts of Taiwan!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-12268708675658353472016-06-11T15:28:00.002+08:002016-06-11T15:29:20.129+08:00Can't See Dinner @ NOX Dine in the DarkThis is a blogpost that will have minimal photos because I am in total darkness most of the time during the dinner time except at the lounge.<br />
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So what to expect for dining in the dark?<br />
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We were first greeted by the staff at the lounge. No worries, there's light at the lounge. We were served a small appetizer and presented with the drinks menu. You can order wine, beer, cocktails to drink in the lounge or to go with the food later. They also have still or sparkling water. We, the stingy couple, tried to ask the staff if they serve tap water and the answer is no, they don't serve tap water. So we paid $8 for a bottle of still water.<br />
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After we are done with ordering the drinks, wait for the staff to call us to walk through the door to the dining area. Before we enter, we were asked to put our belongings and anything that is likely to emit light such as mobile phone and watch in the locker. We were then greeted by our guide who will guide us through the door and to our table.<br />
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Wah! That's a really challenging one. Once we pass through the door, it gets dark, and you can hardly see what's around you. The even more challenging part is there's a flight of stairs to climb before we can reach the dining area.<br />
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We were asked to put our hands on the shoulder of the person in front and follow the guide to walk up the stairs. We kept ahh.. ahh.. ahh.. and asking the guide to slow down. Finally, we heard the guide say the end of the stairs and we were so relieved. The guide gave clear instructions on directing us to our table and when I feel my chair, I immediately slump into it and felt so relieved! Haha..<br />
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From this point onwards, all you can use was your sense of touch because it was total darkness in the dining area. The guide guided us to touch the utensils on our right and the glass in front of the utensils. Okay, the bottle of still water we ordered has come and we have to pour the water into the glass ourselves! Slowly reach out to the bottle, grab the bottle, feel the bottle cap and open it. The use your right hand to get the glass that is in front of your utensils, and pour the water. How do you know the water is full? Use your finger to dip in the cup to feel it. Oh my!! such a simple task of pouring water become so difficult when I can't see!<br />
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Here comes the interesting part. The food! The dinner is a 3 course dinner and there are 4 small bowls of dishes in each course. No worries, it is not so challenging to the point of asking you to cut your steak or fish in the dark. The dishes were all prepared in the small bowl in small pieces with no bones etc. So you can just scoop the food up with a fork or spoon and put it in your mouth.<br />
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The first course was served.The guide informed that there are 4 small bowls in front of us and that we should eat them in clockwise direction starting from the dish that is nearer to us. The fun part is guessing what is it that we ate! We were surprised that what I think I was eating and the actual food differs!<br />
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<b>What I thought I am eating</b><br />
First course (Appetizer):<br />
Dish 1 - Rocket salad with nuts<br />
Dish 2 - Smoked meat with olives (I have no idea what meat is that haha)<br />
Dish 3 - Calamari with pepper and some taste-like mayonnaise sauce.<br />
Dish 4 - Fatty pork with fruits cocktail ( I was still thinking why they give me the fats of pork as appetizer)<br />
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Second course (Mains):<br />
Dish 1 - Beef cubes with long beans<br />
Dish 2 - Some pork with those Indian green peas curry sauce<br />
Dish 3 - Cod fish with mushroom and sauce<br />
Dish 4 - Pork belly, Sio ba, with sweet potato<br />
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Third course (Dessert)<br />
Dish 1 - Grapefruit sorbet ice cream<br />
Dish 2 - It sounded like plastic when I poke my fork. There's also kiwi fruit (have no idea what is this)<br />
Dish 3 - Cheese cake with a crunchy thing (dunno what is that)<br />
Dish 4- Chocolate lava cake but inside is cold instead of hot<br />
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After each course, the guide came automatically and asked if we were done, then he would clear the dishes and send us the next course. When the guide wanted to serve the food, he said 'hands off the table', and we guai guai cleared our hands off the table for him to put the food.<br />
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After we had all the 3 courses, the guide is here to led us back to light. I must give credit to the guide, it is really not easy to maneuver around in darkness and they still have to serve the food. They were great! Oh, I was initially quite worried of walking down the stairs in darkness but luckily, I was able to see the steps when walking down, guess they open that door to let some light through.<br />
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After walking out of the dining area, we shook hands with the guide and thanked him, and he told us to take care of our sight. This is really a nice experience to let us realise how important it is to protect and take care of our eyes and to understand that it is not easy to perform daily chores for the visually impaired people.<br />
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We need to blink our eyes for a while to get used to the light again. We were then seated at the lounge and the staff presented to us what we really ate earlier.<br />
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<b>What I am really eating</b><br />
First course (Appetizer):<br />
Dish 1 - Rocket salad with nuts [Bingo! I'm correct]<br />
Dish 2 - Beef tartare [Okay, i dunno what meat is that when i was eating]<br />
Dish 3 - Calamari with pepper with honey peach mustard [I only guessed the sauce wrongly]<br />
Dish 4 - Foie gras [OMG!!! What a waste!! I thought of foie gras as fatty pork!!]<br />
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Second course (Mains):<br />
Dish 1 - WAGYU Beef cubes with long beans [It's wagyu!!]<br />
Dish 2 - Duck Confit [This one is ridiculous, I thought its pork with indian green peas curry!]<br />
Dish 3 - Cod fish with mushroom and sauce [Bingo!]<br />
Dish 4 - Pork belly, Sio ba, with sweet potato [Bingo!]<br />
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Third course (Dessert)<br />
Dish 1 - Grapefruit and blood orange ice cream [half bingo!]<br />
Dish 2 - Waffle biscuit with strawberry [Okay, i mistook kiwi for strawberry]<br />
Dish 3 - Cheese cake with milo cubes [ohh.. so thats the crunchy thing]<br />
Dish 4- Chocolate lava cake but inside is cold instead of hot [forgot the last dish, let it be a mystery lol]<br />
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Be sure to make a booking before you come as they are quite full usually and you must indicate what food you do not eat in the booking because you will not know what are the food that will be served before hand.<br />
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Overall, for $88++ per person, I would say it's a nice experience. The food were nice too! Even though you can't see them hahaha. Recommended to go experience it!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">TATA!</td></tr>
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<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-58240538180770346622015-11-21T13:43:00.000+08:002016-07-09T13:48:53.033+08:00Korea: Itinerary for 8 days Jeju and Seoul (Part 2 Seoul)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This post is continued from another post <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2015/11/korea-itinerary-for-8-days-jeju-and.html" target="_blank">Part 1 Jeju and other travel information</a>. We took Jejuair from Jeju and arrived at Seoul on 12 Nov 2015.<br />
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<b><u>12 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
Arrive at Gimpo Airport and take AREX airport rail to Seoul station with T-money card.<br />
Journey from Gimpo Airport to Seoul station is 20 mins, cost is about 1450 KRW per person.<br />
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Checked in to our hotel<br />
<u>Seoul N Hostel</u><br />
139-20 Ojang-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul 100-310. Free WIFI, free breakfast.<br />
I highly recommend this hostel! It was new and modern, the host were friendly and they made yummy breakfast!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yummy sandwich for breakfast!</td></tr>
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The hostel was near Dongdaemun History and Culture park station. Take Exit 7. Turn right and walk straight till a crossroad, walk past it and immediately turn right.<br />
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<u>Dinner at Jinokhwa Halmae Wonjo Dakhanmari (Jin Ok-hwa Original Chickem Restaurant)</u><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , "tahoma" , "arial" , "geneva" , "georgia" , "malgun gothic" , "dotum"; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Add: 18, Jong-ro 40ga-gil, Jongno-gu, Seoul</span><br />
We chanced upon this restaurant while roaming around. It was after that then we realised that it was a famous restaurant there. It's located in an alley at Dongdaemun. It was so crowded when we were there and we were attracted by the crowd to go in.<br />
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It was a hot pot with one whole chicken in it, there's only one size. The staff asked if we wanted noodles or rice and we chose noodles. The soup was really flavourful, it was really nice! We saw the Korean patrons putting the chili provided in the chicken soup pot. I think that's the Korean way of eating it but as I cannot take spicy stuff, I skipped that step.<br />
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After dinner, it's shopping time.<br />
<u>Myeongdong</u><br />
Take the subway and alight at Myeongdong station. There you are!<br />
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<u>Hongdae (go there for nightlife as well)</u><br />
Hongik University station – take exit 9 and walk.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you have the chance, do try out this hot stone grilled meat shop at Hongdae!</td></tr>
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<b><u>13 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
<u>Everland (Ride + Safari + Zoo + Botanical gardens) Outdoor</u><br />
Opening hrs: 1000 to 2100<br />
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Admission fee: 52000 KRW per person (Check out Everland website for periodic promos) We got our tickets at 33000 KRW per person<br />
Check out the <a href="https://everland.com/web/multi/english/everland/everland_guide/transportation/Transportation01.html" target="_blank">directions to Everland</a>. We took the shuttle bus to Everland as it is the easiest.<br />
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A must do at Everland is this Safari tour which brings you to see white tigers and bears. There are also other thrilling rides which include a wooden roller coaster and it's always with long queue.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bear doing stunts for us!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I love such fairy tale sights!</td></tr>
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<u>Jjimjilbang at Siloam Sauna</u><br />
After the day at Everland, we went to a Jjimjilbang to relax. It's the sauna place where you often see on korea dramas where they stayed overnight and hang out. We went to the one near Seoul station. It's called <a href="http://www.silloamsauna.com/" target="_blank">Siloam Sauna</a>.<br />
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We went after 8pm and paid 15000 KRW per person. For this price, you can stay there till the next morning. For more information, details about Siloam Sauna and what to do in there, check out my post on Seoul Jjimjilbang <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2015/11/jimjilbang-in-seoul.html" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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<b><u>14 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
<u>Free Hanbok Experience @ Myeongdong Tourist Information Center</u><br />
This is free so usually there will have a queue there. The staff there helped us put on the Hanbok and took picture with a green background.<br />
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Thereafter, we chose the background scenery we liked and sent the photo to our email.<br />
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Err.. The end result is a bit unnatural with the fake background, which is why we decided to take another Hanbok shot at Bukchon Hanok Village later on.<br />
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<u>Bukchon Hanok Village </u><br />
Directions: Anguk Station (Seoul Subway Line 3), Exit 2. Go straight for about 300m to arrive at Bukchon Hanok Village.<br />
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We took another Hanbok Experience here at Hanok Village at 7000 KRW per person. The result is quite nice.<br />
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<u>Insadong & Ssamziegil mall</u><br />
Opening hrs: 0930 to 1830<br />
Directions: Anguk station, exit 6, walk 100m forward then turn left onto Insadong street, go another 180m you will see the mall on the left<br />
Insadong specialize in wide variety of goods that only can be purchased in Korea. You can also have have tea at a traditional tea house in Insadong.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9l2RmvFYy1Q/V3kogcEHH6I/AAAAAAAALx0/NHIuDRP3Aaw_U9-3ms6xkgledGVvzhtMwCLcB/s1600/seoul20.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9l2RmvFYy1Q/V3kogcEHH6I/AAAAAAAALx0/NHIuDRP3Aaw_U9-3ms6xkgledGVvzhtMwCLcB/s400/seoul20.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alley along Insadong Street</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Insadong Street</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cKQ4qRnLRc0/V3kof2YeLvI/AAAAAAAALxw/kUTtchbMMEAp64wS3MVpSy-4WPWAPnqmACLcB/s1600/seoul18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cKQ4qRnLRc0/V3kof2YeLvI/AAAAAAAALxw/kUTtchbMMEAp64wS3MVpSy-4WPWAPnqmACLcB/s400/seoul18.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ssamziegil mall. There are no steps or escalators in this mall. It's slope all the way up.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">At the top of the mall, there's a couple lock corner.</td></tr>
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<u>Dinner Korean Namchon Set Menu @ CHON</u><br />
It's located in an alley along Insadong street. The taste of the food, I would say, it's just so so, but it's an experience to see so many variety of dishes filled up the whole table in front of you!<br />
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<b><u>15 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
Last day before we flying back to Singapore. So of course, more shopping today!<br />
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Just before sunset, we decided to go Namsan park and N Seoul Tower.<br />
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<u><b>Namsan park and N Seoul Tower </b></u><br />
Getting there -<br />
Cable car and Namsan Oreumi (transparent box slanted elevator):<br />
Directions to Namsan Oreumi:<br />
- Myeongdong Station, Exit 4,<br />
- Walk straight towards Sogong Ro (main road) at the Hoehyeon intersection (Myeongdong & Hoehyeon stations, Subway Line 4)<br />
- Walk towards Namsan Tunnel #3 and take the free Namsan Oreumi elevator to the cable car station.<br />
Cable car fee: 8500 won return for 1 pax; 6000 won one way for 1 pax<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F_dHiB1gN7c/V4B4wyc4WlI/AAAAAAAALzM/NO02v5s6wG8xSdRqw-LbPM5xn-Qk_V8NACLcB/s1600/seoul41.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F_dHiB1gN7c/V4B4wyc4WlI/AAAAAAAALzM/NO02v5s6wG8xSdRqw-LbPM5xn-Qk_V8NACLcB/s400/seoul41.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Queuing for Namsan Oreumi</td></tr>
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We queued for about half an hour for the Namsan Oreumi. You can actually climb the stairs to reach the cable car station if you don't want to queue for Namsan Oreumi, climbing the stairs is actually faster than queuing for half an hour. Lol.<br />
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When we reached the cable car station, there's super long queue! Have to queue for one plus hour to take the cable car. So what do we do? We climb up Namsan Park to reach N Seoul Tower. It took us around 1 hour to climb up to N Seoul Tower. Good exercise eh, and you can admire the scenery of Seoul along the way. The climb was quite tiring too, it's just a bit easier than the 'Shiongsan' in Jeju.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DQQ33-To6FI/V4B7Tj9AQZI/AAAAAAAALzs/o2wMykIPwkcA1yIgyj_IWdpYLVDbOHCXQCLcB/s1600/seoul%2B42.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DQQ33-To6FI/V4B7Tj9AQZI/AAAAAAAALzs/o2wMykIPwkcA1yIgyj_IWdpYLVDbOHCXQCLcB/s400/seoul%2B42.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Views we saw while climbing Namsan Park</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F3C0adLq9wY/V4B7LZ9eh0I/AAAAAAAALzY/FPpdIL14IG4gdYha-8JoMKICs58Ckbj3QCLcB/s1600/seoul43.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="223" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-F3C0adLq9wY/V4B7LZ9eh0I/AAAAAAAALzY/FPpdIL14IG4gdYha-8JoMKICs58Ckbj3QCLcB/s400/seoul43.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Views we saw while climbing Namsan Park</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YgFGvMHoVyQ/V4B7LZh2CnI/AAAAAAAALzg/JfG6sVQ_2pgxwWq8Oh7yFB1Op9McW3m-ACKgB/s1600/seoul44.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YgFGvMHoVyQ/V4B7LZh2CnI/AAAAAAAALzg/JfG6sVQ_2pgxwWq8Oh7yFB1Op9McW3m-ACKgB/s400/seoul44.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The pavement up to N Seoul Tower in Namsan Park</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5DwO9zvkRV8/V4B7LeuKxwI/AAAAAAAALzc/82E1YalBMhQGxV7eHm2dx8bW647ThO_IgCKgB/s1600/seoul45.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5DwO9zvkRV8/V4B7LeuKxwI/AAAAAAAALzc/82E1YalBMhQGxV7eHm2dx8bW647ThO_IgCKgB/s400/seoul45.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just several flight of steps more! *Panting*</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2lZ7fNcfcbc/V4B7LytV_QI/AAAAAAAALzk/68qgVaymqOYY0b-aNoJk4Gy75xu8ZAqUACKgB/s1600/seoul46.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2lZ7fNcfcbc/V4B7LytV_QI/AAAAAAAALzk/68qgVaymqOYY0b-aNoJk4Gy75xu8ZAqUACKgB/s400/seoul46.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Finally, we reached!!!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OpC7wmEigLg/V4B7L2_Xb5I/AAAAAAAALzw/-C6HeMCMqSIOB7mO_hXbYpUrzEpOH4G2wCKgB/s1600/seoul47.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OpC7wmEigLg/V4B7L2_Xb5I/AAAAAAAALzw/-C6HeMCMqSIOB7mO_hXbYpUrzEpOH4G2wCKgB/s400/seoul47.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Night view of Seoul!</td></tr>
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It's quite crowded at the foot of the N Seoul Tower. To go up to the N Seoul Tower Observatory, there's an admission fee of 9000 KRW per person. There's set dining options for you to dine at the Observatory. The cost of the dinner set includes the admission fee to the Tower Observatory as well. So if you want to have a romantic dinner, this is definitely a nice place!<br />
Ohh!! This is where Do Min Joon and Chien Song Yi have their dinner in the Korean Drama "My Love from the Star"!!<br />
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But for people like us who don't feel like spending that money to go up to the Tower Observatory, there are several dining options at the foot of N Seoul Tower as well. We settled for a diner and ordered what Chien Song Yi loved in the drama "My Love from the Star" - Fried chicken and beer!! OMG! I tell you, you must eat fried chicken when you are in Korea. I don't know why but their fried chicken tasted really GOOD!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dlwAy3FhvPk/V4B-G9G7dfI/AAAAAAAALz4/nXGzR5ioUSoeF2gKZGLC27xIKUjy3VjBwCLcB/s1600/seoul48.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dlwAy3FhvPk/V4B-G9G7dfI/AAAAAAAALz4/nXGzR5ioUSoeF2gKZGLC27xIKUjy3VjBwCLcB/s400/seoul48.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These tasted really GOOD!! The fried chicken was one of the nicest I've ever eaten!!</td></tr>
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We roamed around N Seoul Tower for a while and came to the place where Do Min Joon and Chien Song Yi locked their love lock.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-t0ARls-2wQg/V4B_atfMngI/AAAAAAAAL0M/nkL58D7ZISwlPyfjdh2tKrZ5VpfIFNygwCLcB/s1600/IMG_1623.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-t0ARls-2wQg/V4B_atfMngI/AAAAAAAAL0M/nkL58D7ZISwlPyfjdh2tKrZ5VpfIFNygwCLcB/s400/IMG_1623.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There's a whole lot of locks there!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Il7P6KEG4Cg/V4B_atpB5OI/AAAAAAAAL0I/wRzNlkVz1C0-mv6SNnLpdXR8sLtAf877ACLcB/s1600/IMG_1625.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Il7P6KEG4Cg/V4B_atpB5OI/AAAAAAAAL0I/wRzNlkVz1C0-mv6SNnLpdXR8sLtAf877ACLcB/s400/IMG_1625.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Poor Do Min Joon kanna vandalised. Lol!!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nice portrait!</td></tr>
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On the last night, we went Jimjilbang again! Final sauna and massage to pamper ourselves. You can find my post on Jimjilbang here!<br />
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That pretty much sums up our 8 days tour in Seoul and Jeju!<br />
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Tata!!Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7332056994188152654.post-2188285273120542672015-11-21T13:41:00.000+08:002016-07-09T13:45:25.226+08:00Korea: Itinerary for 8 days Jeju and Seoul (Part 1 Jeju)A summary of our 8 days Seoul and Jeju itinerary with some useful information for you to know before travelling. This post is part 1 of the itinerary, from Singapore to Jeju.<br />
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Before flying off, we bought a Korea Sim card for S$38 (Micro Sim) at Changi Airport. 1 GB of data and 30 mins talk time valid for 30 days use.<br />
The counter is at Changi Airport Terminal 2, Departure Hall Row 10, Entrance 5, near Starbucks.<br />
<i>*After changing to the Korean SIM card, you have to do some APN settings on your phone and send your details for registration before the SIM card will be activated. So, we did this when we were still at Changi Airport as there's WIFI. You can find more details at <a href="https://www.changirecommends.com/deal.aspx?id=1748" target="_blank">Changi Recommends</a>.</i><br />
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<b><u>8 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
- Arrived Seoul Incheon airport at about 930pm.<br />
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- Booked <a href="http://www.booking.com/hotel/kr/incheon-airport-oceanside.en-gb.html?aid=357004;label=gog235jc-hotel-XX-kr-incheonNairportNoceanside-unspec-sg-com-L%3Aen-O%3AwindowsS81-B%3Achrome-N%3AXX-S%3Abo-U%3AXX;sid=a6b9b424fe67cb7f3ae2c2286dac56f2;dcid=1;dist=0&sb_price_type=total&type=total&" target="_blank">Incheon Airport Benikea Oceanside Hotel</a> near the airport which provided free shuttle service to and from the hotel to the airport.<br />
<i>*For free airport shuttle, call the hotel upon arrival at Incheon International Airport. Since we have our Korean SIM card, we called them with our mobile. But if you do not have a Korean SIM card, you can proceed to the hotel information centre on the ground/arrival floor near gates 7 and 10 at Incheon Airport and request them to help you call the hotel. The hotel shuttle bus will pick you up at gate 7 on the departure floor within 10 to 15 min. Upon check in, check with the hotel staff on the timing for shuttle bus back to Incheon Airport the next day.</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our Airport Hotel room</td></tr>
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<u>Alternative to staying at Airport hotel</u><br />
Spending the night the Korean way. You will need to buy the T-money card to take the AREX. Take the AREX from Incheon Airport to Seoul station, deposit your luggage at the Seoul station and walk to the nearby 24 hours Jjimjilbang called <a href="http://www.silloamsauna.com/" target="_blank">Siloam Sauna</a>. It's 5 mins walk after you exit from Seoul Station Exit 1. We went on other nights when we were in Seoul and this was the best thing we found in Seoul. You can read our Jjimjilbang experience <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2015/11/jimjilbang-in-seoul.html" target="_blank">here</a>. After 8pm, the cost is 15,000 won per person, you can use all the facilities there.<br />
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<b><u>9 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
- The hotel shuttle bus send us to Incheon Airport.<br />
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- At Incheon Airport, we bought the T-money card priced from 2,500 won and up.<br />
<i>*T-money card is sold at Convenience stores (GS 25, CU, 7-Eleven, Mini Stop, With Me, Buy The Way, Story Way) bearing the T-money logo, and ticket vending and card reload devices inside subway stations. Load more money in the card if 2,500 won is not enough for your trip. </i><br />
<i>If there's still remaining balance in the T-money card when you are leaving Korea, you can get the refund back, they will deduct 500 won as service charge.</i><br />
<i></i><br />
<i>Bring the T-money card home, it's not returnable.</i><br />
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- Take the AREX Airport Rail service from B1 level of Transportation Center in Incheon Airport<br />
(To alight at Gimpo Airport, take the all stop train. The express train skips all the in between station and goes straight to Seoul station)<br />
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- Train journey from Incheon Airport to Gimpo Airport is about 35mins.<br />
Fare: 3,750 won per person (Use T-money card to tap)<br />
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- We took Jeju Air from Gimpo Airport to Jeju Island.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hello! Kim Soo Hyun!! Doo Min Jun!!</td></tr>
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- We self drove in Jeju Island. Do remember to apply for your International Driving Permit from AAS Singapore before travelling. <a href="http://www.aas.com.sg/?show=content&showview=8&val=461" target="_blank">AAS Singapore</a> is located at 51 Ang Mo Kio Ave 3 #02-02. It's just beside AMK Hub. Upon reaching Jeju Airport, we took the shuttle bus to Jeju Rent A Car.<br />
<i>*There are several car rental companies in Jeju. We chose Jeju Rent A Car after comparing the car models and prices. All of the car rental companies are located a few minutes drive away from the airport, so will have to depend on the rental car shuttle buses to send you there. The interval for these shuttle buses is around 15mins.</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our small cutie rental car!! Pardon me.. That's me with messy hair at the back.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Add caption</td></tr>
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- With the car and GPS, we were all ready to start our journey in Jeju! If you have used google maps to search for routes in Jeju before, you will realise that google maps have no use in Jeju at all, it does not show you any driving routes. You have to depend on the GPS totally. The addresses can be quite confusing to key in the GPS, so the easier way is to key in the last 7 digits of the phone number of your destination.<br />
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- <u>Columnar Joints (Jusangjeollidae Cliff) at Jeju Jungmun Daepo Coast </u><br />
Address: 2663, Jungmun-dong, Seogwipo-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 7381532 in GPS<br />
Admission Fee: 2,000 won per person; need to pay for parking<br />
Closed at 1800<br />
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<u>- Cheonjeyeon falls</u><br />
Key 7381529 in GPS.<br />
Free parking, opening hrs till 1730, 2500 won entry fees<br />
<i>*Estimated time to spend at Cheonjeyeon Falls: 45 – 60 minutes (there is a trail to walk and see 3 waterfalls – there are photo-taking opportunities along the way too)</i><br />
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<u>- Teddy Bear Museum</u><br />
Add: 31, Jungmungwangwang-ro110beon-gil, Seogwipo-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 738-7600 in GPS<br />
Opening hrs: 0900 to 2000<br />
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Entrance fee: 9500 won; free parking<br />
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- Check in to hotel<br />
<u>Chagall Pension</u><br />
2850-2, Sangye-dong, 695-854 Seogwipo, South Korea<br />
Phone: +821046911351<br />
Free WIFI, free parking, with kitchen in the room<br />
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<b><u>10 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
<br />
<u>Green Tea Museum (O'Sulloc Tea Museum)</u><br />
Add: Western Seogwipo, Jeju Island<br />
Key 794-5312 in GPS<br />
Opening hrs: 0900 to 1700<br />
Free Admission, free parking<br />
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There's an Innisfree shop there too. But we realised that the price here was not cheap. We bought several Innisfree products here then realise that there's 50% sales at the stores in Seoul! Would recommend to buy skin care products at Seoul where the shops will have sales periodically.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">And we tried making our own soap at Innisfree! It's a bit ugly though..</td></tr>
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<u>Dinner @ Black Pork Street</u><br />
There are many black pork bbq restaurants along this street.<br />
We had our dinner at Hwaro Hyang Restaurant (BBQ pork)<br />
Key 724-4050 in GPS<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Beautiful leaves!! But it's acquire taste i think. We still prefer lettuce to go with the bbq meat.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">The Kim Chi soup and steam eggs were nice! And the small abalone, so yummy and fresh! The pork was of course great too!</td></tr>
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<u>Dongmun Market</u><br />
Add: 20 Gwandeong-ro 14 (sipsa)-gil, Jeju-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 752-3001 in GPS<br />
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There were many many fishes and seafood in the Dongmun fisheries market. It's interesting to see some seafood which I have never seen before.<br />
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- Check in to our value for money hotel! It's only S$116 or 98000 won for 2 nights!<br />
<u>Haeden Hotel</u><br />
1750, Doduil-dong, Jeju City, 690-241 Jeju, South Korea<br />
Tel no: +82647488862<br />
Free WIFI, free parking, no breakfast<br />
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<b><u>11 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
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- <u>Manjanggul Lava Tube</u><br />
Add: 3341-3, Gimnyeong-ri, Gujwa-eup, Jeju-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 783-4818 in GPS<br />
Opening hrs: 0900 to 1800<br />
Entrance fee: 2000 won per person; free parking<br />
Time spent: 45mins walking to and fro in the Lava Tube<br />
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Manjanggul Lava Tube is a UNESCO World Heritage site. It is one of the finest lava tunnel in the world. It has several interesting structures like lava stalagmites and stalactites and stone pillars. The temperature in the tunnel is between 10 to 20 degrees celsius. It's very dark at some parts of the tunnel, so watch your steps and walk with care. The floor tends to be uneven due to the natural lava formation.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hmNtR7LLB4k/V3j9n7HVXnI/AAAAAAAALso/lujWrz_xTp8IvFHfymhYlm2eArBQY-XbACLcB/s1600/jeju33.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hmNtR7LLB4k/V3j9n7HVXnI/AAAAAAAALso/lujWrz_xTp8IvFHfymhYlm2eArBQY-XbACLcB/s400/jeju33.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Enter the Lava Cave through these steps</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lcygl0tn0ys/V3j9nexGagI/AAAAAAAALsc/mbf-pWFSI-sISerPcqcHRa6_S-dosfDBACLcB/s1600/jeju32.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lcygl0tn0ys/V3j9nexGagI/AAAAAAAALsc/mbf-pWFSI-sISerPcqcHRa6_S-dosfDBACLcB/s400/jeju32.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Walking in the Lava Cave</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gRKZjShJoxU/V3j9oMWtRAI/AAAAAAAALss/ni2usLtH0nMd2vkK06n0rXMKAs8mKF7qACLcB/s1600/jeju34.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gRKZjShJoxU/V3j9oMWtRAI/AAAAAAAALss/ni2usLtH0nMd2vkK06n0rXMKAs8mKF7qACLcB/s400/jeju34.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Walking in the Lava Cave</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kXaJjN6E8_g/V3j9nuRgZXI/AAAAAAAALsk/R5JHCKbyCk0cFdHP2LKUvvRADHrCIrK8ACLcB/s1600/jeju31.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kXaJjN6E8_g/V3j9nuRgZXI/AAAAAAAALsk/R5JHCKbyCk0cFdHP2LKUvvRADHrCIrK8ACLcB/s400/jeju31.jpg" width="266" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Final stop of the Lava cave</td></tr>
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<u>Spicy Seafood Stew for lunch</u><br />
It is located just along the street before entering the carpark of Seongsan Ichulbong.<br />
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Seafood stew is a must try in Jeju! We ordered a big pot of seafood stew and there were only 2 of us. But we managed to finish it!! You could imagine how yummy it was.The pot were full of assorted seafood! It has more than 10 abalones, more than 10 big head prawns, squid, crabs, the clams were big, and some other shell stuff. The ingredients were really worth the money! All the ingredients were fresh too! Did I mention that the abalones were alive and squirming when the pot was served. I felt sinful about it. I really am. That explains my expression in the photo below. But the abalones were just too delicious to not eat it.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tuJ5ZPCw4e0/V3kC_aZapSI/AAAAAAAALtA/bgjIpBHhsdc-yRSRpKPMlTxbyebh5IdgACLcB/s1600/jeju37.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tuJ5ZPCw4e0/V3kC_aZapSI/AAAAAAAALtA/bgjIpBHhsdc-yRSRpKPMlTxbyebh5IdgACLcB/s400/jeju37.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: start;">A seafood pot cost 45,000 KRW (about S$55).</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-e7tXcHkD7ws/V3kE890QFeI/AAAAAAAALtU/eovkmzx8SawR1rAACFGDysc-0tOHNrUGACLcB/s1600/jeju39.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-e7tXcHkD7ws/V3kE890QFeI/AAAAAAAALtU/eovkmzx8SawR1rAACFGDysc-0tOHNrUGACLcB/s400/jeju39.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Victory! Clearing the whole pot of seafood!</td></tr>
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After the sumptuous seafood stew pot, there's always space for dessert. There's a stall selling peanut ice-cream directly opposite.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The famous UDO peanut ice cream. Yummy! Fragrant peanut flavour with milk ice cream.</td></tr>
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<u>Seongsan Iichulbong</u><br />
Add: 284-12, Ilchul-ro, Seongsan-eup, Seogwipo-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 783-0959 in GPS<br />
Entrance fee: 2000 won<br />
Open till sunset<br />
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Seongsan Ichulbong is another UNESCO world heritage site not to be missed in Jeju.<br />
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After eating so many stuff, it's time for workout - climbing Seongsan Ichulbong (I gave it a name: Shiongsan Ichulbong, as climbing it was really shiong and tiring). But we were rewarded with beautiful scenery and satisfaction at the top of Shiongsan.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Finally!! At the top of Shiongsan!!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We conquered the stairs!</td></tr>
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<u>Dinner at Myeong Jin Jeon Bok</u><br />
Add: 515-28 Pyeongdae-Ri, Gujwa-eup (1282 Haemajihaean-ro), Jeju<br />
Enter 7829944 in GPS<br />
Closed on Tuesdays<br />
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Look at the location of this dinner place. It's seems ulu but it was so crowded and there were long queues with lots of cars lining along the streets.<br />
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We collected our queue number and waited for about 45mins for our turn.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Traditional Korean setting</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Abalone hot stone rice that comes with a mackerel fish for 13,000KRW. Totally worth it!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Abalone porridge for 10,000 KRW</td></tr>
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Just as we were finishing our meal, we saw a Korean patron doing something which caught our attention. He was pouring hot water into the almost finished abalone hot stone rice and cover the lid for a few minutes before eating it like mui fan (rice in soup). Ohh! We suddenly came to our senses as we were wondering why was we served with a pot of hot water. Sooo, this was the reason. We monkey see, monkey do and follow what he did.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Erm, I think this is acquired taste. I personally don't really like. But it is fun and it's worth giving it a try to eat like a local!</td></tr>
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<b><u>12 Nov 2015</u></b><br />
Checked out hotel and flying back to Seoul!<br />
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Along the way to airport, we decided to stop by the famous Yongduam Rock to see see.<br />
<u>Yongduam Rock (10mins drive from airport)</u><br />
Add: Yongduam, Yongdam 1-dong, Jeju-si<br />
Key 7283918 in the GPS<br />
Parking fee required at the carpark. Approximately 250won for 30mins<br />
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There were a lot tourist bus at Yongduam Rock. In my opinion, there's nothing spectacular about the rock. But what interest us was the Mermaids of Jeju, the Korean Female Divers or Haenyeo, who dive into the ocean to gather seafood. Follow the path way, walk down the many flights of staircase to the sea side to find them selling their catch. This is a diminishing trade, so it will be good to support them!<br />
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There were some other places which I have listed in my itinerary for Jeju but I didn't have enough time to explore. You might be interested to know. Here's the list.<br />
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<u>1. Udo Island</u><br />
Drive to Seongsan Harbour or 20mins walk from Seongsan Ichulbong and take ferry to Udo Island.<br />
Round trip ferry + Udo Island entrance fee: 5500 KRW per person, journey of ferry is 15 mins.<br />
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Travelling around Udo Island options:<br />
(a) Go to Udo Tour bus counter and take the tour bus around Udo Island: 5000 KRW per person, unlimited rides (Tour bus stations: Udo-bong (peak), Geommeolle Beach, Dongangyeonggul Cave, Sebin White Sand beach.) Keep your tickets, when you board the bus at the last stop, the driver will collect your ticket and send you back to the ferry terminal.<br />
(b) Rent bicycle or scooter or ATV: 5000 KRW per hour for bicycle; 15,000 KRW for scooter per hour and 20000 KRW per hour for ATV<br />
(c) Ferry your car over, at 17600 KRW return trip for small car + 4000 KRW entrance fee for the car.<br />
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Things to see at Udo Island:<br />
<i>- Udo-bong</i>: A path leading to Udo Lighthouse. From here, you could see Seongsan Ilchulbong.<br />
<i>- Geommeolle Beach:</i> A beach with black sand and rocks, and Dongangyeonggul Cave. This was a spot for diving women.<br />
<i>- Sebin White Sand beach: A</i> beach that had beautiful white corals.<br />
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<u>2. Hallasan National Park</u><br />
Add: Hallasan N.P Visitor Center San 200-1, Haean-dong, Jeju City<br />
Key 713-9953 in GPS (Otherwise try 713-9950 to 9952)<br />
Parking fee 1,800 won<br />
Opening hrs: close at 1600<br />
There are several hiking trails which you can choose from and the scenery is beautiful. You can visit the <a href="http://www.hallasan.go.kr/english/?sso=ok" target="_blank">Hallasan National Park website</a> for details on the hiking trails.<br />
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<u>3. Ecoland Themepark</u><br />
Add: 1278-169, Beonyeong-ro, Jocheon-eup, Jeju-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 8028000 in GPS (Otherwise key 802-8020)<br />
Entrance fee: 12,000 won<br />
Opening hrs: 0840 to 1700<br />
Time required at Ecoland: About 1.5 hrs<br />
Take the Ecoland train to tour Ecoland<br />
Ecoland Train route: Eco-bridge Station – Lakeside Station – Picnic Garden Station – Lavender, Green Tea & Rose Garden Station<br />
Attractions: Eco-bridge, café on the water, Don Quixote and windmill, Kid’s town, picnic garden, eco-road, eco-road café, barefoot scoria experience, topiary, place for wild animals<br />
You may refer to the <a href="http://www.ecolandjeju.co.kr/" target="_blank">Ecoland website</a> for more details.<br />
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<u>4. Hello Kitty Island</u><br />
Add: No. 340 Hanchang-ro Andeok-myeon Seoguipo city Jeju<br />
Key in 7926114 in GPS<br />
Opening hours: 0900 to 1800<br />
Admission fee: 12000 won<br />
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<u>5. Maze Park </u><br />
Add: 122, Manjanggul-gil, Gujwa-eup, Jeju-si, Jeju-do<br />
Key 782-9266 in GPS<br />
Opening hrs: 0830 to 1800<br />
Entrance fee: 3300 won<br />
It's located along the way to Manjanggul Lava Tube.<br />
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That's all for part 1 of our itinerary on Jeju. Click <a href="http://idylsherry.blogspot.sg/2015/11/korea-itinerary-for-8-days-jeju-and_21.html" target="_blank">here for part 2 Seoul</a>!<br />
<br />Sherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06605986875344974903noreply@blogger.com0