Singapore Flyer

The Singapore Flyer offered travel agents a free ride on the Singapore Flyer. The offer ends on Tuesday so I decided to take the day off and be-a-tourist-for-a-day.

I am generally quite interested in Observation Wheels. I usually give them a try (if they are not too expensive!) when I am travelling. One of my favourites is the one in Tokyo near the Tokyo Sea Life Park. Anyway, I've been putting off trying our own Singapore Flyer coz I guess I couldn't bring myself to spend $30 for a 30min ride.

Below are some of the pics from my ride. You can see more if you click my Flickr album on the sidebar.

The F1 track was closed to cars/buses so I had to take a long scenic walk from Suntec to the Flyer. Quite a nice view walking up to the Flyer. Feels big & kinda grand.

Just before entering the Flyer Complex, I was quite taken by the moorings which were holding the wheel in place. Reminds me of some phaser canons on a galactic cruiser in scifi shows.

And here, we have lift off! Being a weekday afternoon, there weren't many people around. I had the entire carriage to myself. Shiok.

First main sight as the wheel rotated was the F1 complex & Grandstand. You've gotta be impressed how fast Singapore can build stuff! Just imagine, all these structures weren't around a year ago!

Here's a view from somewhere near the top of the wheel's rotation cycle. I think the area behind is the Kallang area where the National Stadium (which never seems to get demolished) is.

Coming down the other side (ie. after the wheel has rotated about 200 degrees or so), I had a nice view of the CBD area as well as the up and coming Integrated Resort (*cough* CASINO *cough*). As the carriage returned to the starting point, there was a nice model of the whole resort. You can see it in the Flickr Album.

And here's the view as the carriage is returning to the boarding point. Whole journey did take about 30mins.

The nice thing about the F1 road closures is that the Flyer actually provided a FREE water taxi from Flyer to Clarke Quay. It was like getting a free river cruise! I think after the F1 period, it will cost $5 to take it. Not too expensive and might be worth a ride to complete the whole experience.

I have only one complain. I was kinda disappointed that they didn't have any onboard commentary in the carriage. It would have been nice to hear some commentary on what I was actually looking at. At least they did try to provide a map-like handout to show us what the main sights were. Better than nothing I guess. I was however quite irritated at the CONSTANT F1 car-revving sounds that was being piped through the speakers. They had an F1 promotional video looping on the LCD screen and the noise did take away a little from the whole experience.

OK, so generally, I did enjoy the Flyer. To be frank, I wouldn't mind getting some membership if they allowed me to take unlimited rides on the Flyer. I think it would be interesting to take it at different times in a day, especially at night. Hmm.. since the travel agent free ride ends on Tuesday, maybe I should try to take another ride on Monday evening.... :)