TANKS Travel Tales - a travelogue.......

Malaysia's KTM is currently the only service provider that runs regular trains between Johor Bahru in Malaysia and Woodlands in Singapore . Nothing spectacular or amazing, I personally consider this as just a regular inter-city train connection between Peninsular Malaysia 's southern most city of Johor Bahru ( JB ) with Singapore's northern region of Woodlands. The only difference between typical inter-city trains and this service, is that this train service actually crosses an international border between two countries even though the actual journey each way is less than 5 minutes. Therefore, passports and travel documents are required for immigration and customs clearance purposes. Named the  KTM Shuttle Tebrau , this train service is highly subsidised when tickets are purchased in Malaysia at JB Sentral Station's Ticket Counters . Return tickets from JB to Singapore generally cost only RM5 at the time of the publishing of this blog article.  Buying the tickets in...

I booked this cruise way ahead of the scheduled sailing and thus got quote a good deal because of the early booking. After almost two years of waiting, I finally boarded the ship on Monday morning of 24th February 2025. This will be an 8-night cruise on a return trip sailing from Singapore to Indonesia's Bali and Lombok before retuning to port in Singapore on 3rd March 2025. Previously, I had sailed four times onboard Spectrum of the Seas . This was my first sailing onboard Anthem of the Seas . Different ship, different vibes. Anthem of the Seas anchored on the sea during the port visit to Clean Bawang, Bali, Indonesia (2025) The ship left port and departed Singapore's Marina Cruise Centre in the late afternoon, around 4.30pm. Sailing southwards past Indonesia's Riau Island and across the Java Sea to the island of Bali. I am a frequent visitor to Bali for vacations. But this was my first time sailing to Bali instead of traveling there by flight! After two sunny sea da...

Thus far, my only cruises have been onboard Royal Caribbean's Spectrum of the Seas . Prior to this cruise, I had previously sailed thrice onboard the same ship, including a 12-night cruise from Yokohama to Singapore . These sailings had helped me made many friends including both fellow passengers and crew. I had met many wonderful people during these trips. Therefore, I decided to make one last sailing onboard the ship before it repositioned from Singapore to China in April 2024. This cruise was a 4-night sailing in March 2024 for a return trip from Singapore to Penang and Phuket . After three previous cruises onboard the same ship over a period of two years, I am rather familiar with the ship, its layout and its facilities. Thus, finding my ways around the ship was no issue. On the flip side, there was less exploring to do!  Entertainment-wise, I had actually watched all the onboard shows before but still watched them anyway during this trip. I did notice that even for the same ...

On my Train Journey from Bangkok to Singapore in May 2024, I decided that it made the most economic sense to fly budget one-way from Singapore to Bangkok . This was because my "return" trip will be via train routes. With this in mind, I searched for the most competitive fares and decided to book the flight with Thai Air Asia . Thai Air Asia is a low cost carrier formed via a joint venture between Malaysia's Air Asia and Thailand's Asia Aviation . From Singapore's Changi International Airport (IATA: SIN , ICAO: WSSS), Thai Air Asia fly to Bangkok's smaller Don Mueang International Airport (IATA: DMK , ICAO: VTBD). Thai Air Asia planes at  Don Mueang International Airport, Bangkok, Thailand (2024) Check-in My flight was on FD356 departing Changi International Airport Terminal 4 on 27 May 2024 at the scheduled time of 2pm. Checking-in was simple and hassle free. I arrived at the departure terminal about 2.5 hours before the scheduled flight time and cleared...

A 5-part mini series of videos on the topic of "Love the Seas" has been uploaded to the YouTube Channel of this blog at TANKS Travel Tales YouTube Channel. S.E.A. Aquarium, Sentosa, Singapore The idea behind the mini-video series is to focus on the wonderful world of life under the sea. The main underlying message is of course fo all of us to play a part in saving the seas; to use less plastics, stop pollution and work towards a more sustainable lifestyle in our everyday activities. The video footages and photos were taken at the S.E.A. Aquarium in Sentosa, Singapore. The links to all 5 videos are here: Link to Video - Part I Link to Video -Part II Link to Video - Part III Link to Video - Part IV Link to Video - Part V

In a recent visit to the ArtScience Museum in Singapore's Marina Bay Sands, I toured an exhibition about "lights". Titled "Future World-Where Art Meets Science", the exhibits featured the wonders of light and allowed visitors to immerse themselves in a world of digital arts, all powered by lights. I had a fun time strolling through the halls, marvelling at the wonders of light and at times, immersing myself in the exhibits. Yes, some of the exhibits were structured such that visitors may actually "immerse" themselves. Unlike traditional museum visits where one could only view exhibits from a distance, this was one place where one can enjoy some the exhibits physically. Each exhibition at the ArtScience Museum is exhibited for a pre-determined period. Most of these so-called travelling exhibitions will be closed and taken down after the pre-determined period, to be taken over by another travelling exhibition. One can thus visit the ArtScience Museum reg...

This is a review of my experiences when I flew on Business Class (i.e. 'J' Class) onboard Singapore Airlines (SIA) flight SQ163 from Siem Reap International Airport to Singapore's Changi International Airport in May 2022. I had just a week ago, flew the outbound sector on SQ164 from Singapore to Siem Reap. The flight tickets were redeemed using my frequent flyer miles accumulated through retail purchases during the pandemic-induced stay-at-home period between March 2020 and April 2022. Selfie of myself sitting at the Departure Gate waiting to board SQ163 from REP to SIN, Krong Siem Reap International Airport, Siem Reap, Cambodia (2022) Check-in Check-in at the SIA Business Class counter at the Siem Reap International Airport was a breeze. During the check-in process, I noticed that passengers in Economy Class were processed just as quickly. Probably because the flight was not full and most leisure travellers were still hesitant to travel because of COVID. As usual, the coun...

It has been a while since I last wrote a review of my inflight experiences. In hindsight, "inflight" is actually a rather incorrect term for this series of reviews because the experiences include pre-boarding and at times, disembarking from the plane. So, the reviews do not exclusively focus on just experiences that occur inflight.  In-between my last inflight review posted in this blog sometime in 2020, I had flown on a small number of flights, both for work and for vacations. However, during the period from Feb 2020 to May 2022, I stayed totally grounded because of worldwide travel restrictions due to the COVID pandemic. Thankfully, for everyone and especially for the industry, those days are over. This is a review of my experiences when I flew on Business Class (i.e. 'J' Class) on Singapore Airlines (SIA) from Singapore's Changi International Airport to Bali's Denpasar Airport in December 2023.  The flight tickets were redeemed using my expiring frequent fl...

Singapore, Turtle Island Off the southern coast of Singapore lies many small and beautiful islands that one do not normally associate with a high-tech driven city. But herein, havens of tranquility, nature, beautiful beaches, turquoise-coloured waters and wide-opened spaces offer unique escapades from the busy city-life of mainland Singapore. That all these islands can be reached within half an hour by ferry makes traveling there even more appealing. UNESCO World Heritage Sites these islands are not. But they definitely do qualify as  personal Bucket List items . In this blog post, I am featuring one of these island. Kusu Island is where one can find several shrines, nice beaches and yes, many turtles (mostly red-eared sliders,  Trachemys scripta elegans). ****************** Kusu Island, a.k.a. Turtle Island in the local dialect, is also known as Pulau Tembakul in Malay. Lying less than 6 km from mainland Singapore, Kusu I...

Singapore, Sentosa, S.E.A. Life Sometimes, we travel far and wide in search of new experiences and new sights. But, right in our backyard, literally, are new experiences and sights that we had totally overlooked. Before I get mistaken, I am a huge proponent of international travel. I am a firm believer of the benefits of travel to far and distant lands. But, I am also an advocate in discovering experiences and sights unknown to ourselves in our own country, city, town and so on. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when international travel was more or less near impossible, I took to visiting local sites that I had never been to before. Visiting the S.E.A. Aquarium at Singapore's Sentosa resort island was one such experience. The visit left me both amazed and bewildered at the amount of sea life on display. What impressed me most were the efforts of the Aquarium to (as close as possible) present the animals in their natural environments and their efforts at encouraging conservati...