Travelers Tips

Shopping in Singapore

By Christy Stegall | June 1, 2009

Shopping Centre in Orchard Road

There are various shopping belts in Singapore, Marina Bay, Bugis Street, Chinatown, Geylang Serai, Kampong Gelam & Arab Street, Little India, North Bridge Road, Orchard Road, Riverside, Shenton Way & Raffles Place and The Suburbs.

Singapore seeks to be the business hub of Southeast Asia and has an expansive shopping precinct located in the Orchard Road district. Many multi-store shopping centers are located at Orchard Road; the area also has many hotels, and it’s the main tourism centre of Singapore, other than the Downtown Core. The local populace also use Orchard Road for shopping extensively.

Other than Orchard Road, Singapore’s largest shopping center, VivoCity, has also attracted millions of people since its opening in 2006.

To further encourage tourists to shop at Singapore, the Singapore Tourism Board and various organizers organize the Great Singapore Sale yearly. Shoppers can enjoy great discounts and bargains at participating outlets. The Singapore Tourism Board introduced “Late Night Shopping” in 2007. Tourists can catch “Late Night Shopping” on Orchard Road up till 11pm every Saturday and enjoy special deals or promotions by participating retailers.

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The Ring

By Backpacker | May 29, 2009

The Nürburgring, simply known as “The Ring” by enthusiasts, is a motorsport race track in Nürburg, Germany. It was built in the 1920s around the village and medieval castle of Nürburg in the Eifel. Nicknamed The Green Hell by Jackie Stewart, it is widely considered the toughest, most dangerous and most demanding purpose-built race track in the world.

Originally, the track featured four track configurations: the 28.265 kilometres (17.563 miles) long Gesamtstrecke also known as the Whole Course, which in turn consisted of the 22.810 km (14.173 mi) Nordschleife or the Northern Loop, and the 7.747 km (4.814 mi) Südschleife or the Southern Loop. There also was a 2.281 km (1.417 mi) warm-up loop called Zielschleife or the Finish Loop or better known as Betonschleife, around the pit area. Between 1982 and 1983 the start-finish area was demolished to create a new GP-Strecke, and this is currently used for all major and international racing events. However, the Nordschleife is still in use.

The Nürburgring also plans to build a massive Air Thrust Coaster by S&S Power in 2009. It will be called Ring°Racer and will reach speeds of nearly 135 mph (217 km/h), making it the fastest roller coaster in the world, claiming the record from Kingda Ka.

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Xcaret Eco Park

By Martin Bryant | May 28, 2009

A privately owned and operated ecological park, resort and tourist attraction located in the Riviera Maya, a portion of the Caribbean coastline of Mexico’s state of Quintana Roo that has been designated as a zone for tourism development. It is situated about 47 mi south of Cancún, 4 mi south of the nearest large settlement of Playa del Carmen. It is named after the nearby archaeological site Xcaret, a settlement constructed by the pre-Columbian Maya some of whose structures lie within the boundaries of the park’s 200 acres of land holdings.

This eco-archaeological park shows different aspects of the Mayan culture of Quintana Roo, and it also has ecological importance due to its labor for the conservation and reproduction of regional flora and fauna. In addition to the archaeological remains the park has within its limits a large variety of tropical animals and plants, and a series of attractions to practice water activities, as well as a beach.

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Travelers Stories

Quick visit to Tijuana

By Kell Pearson | May 30, 2009

This will have been the quickest visit of Tijuana!
We will cross Tijuana Sunday morning while the drug lords and their family are at church praying for their sins.
We had a great day yesterday in San Diego with Astrid. We enjoyed a bike ride, picked up the “apparently required insurance certificates for Mexico”, enough pesos to get us to “La Paz” so we can cross to the mainland (Mazatlan) with the 12 hour ferry. But one step at a time. It will take us 4 days to get there!

Yesterday, we met Richard, a San Diego born gentleman, at this glorious Irish bar in San Diego so we could send us off the proper way to Mexico. Connecting is what matters… and we had fun meeting folks at the MMMMMM. Another gentleman was impressed enough about our journey that he felt compelled to buy us Canadians a round.

Thank you sir!

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India right now

By Sharon Fleming | May 30, 2009

Joachim and I have arrived at our project in Tamil Nadu after our long and unpredictable journey. Travelling in India at the moment is so much hassle. There are lots of Indian families and getting tickets on such short notice is hectic; our journey has been dictated to us by what is available.

We flew into Mumbai on the 18th arriving at eleven pmish and spent three nights there. It was hot and hectic. As our introduction to India it was full on, the heat and the pace were hard to adjust to, but I am looking forward to spending more time there on our return journey. I think it’s a place that you have to get over that initial shock to enjoy. There is a lot of poverty, whole families sleeping on the street and, as Karem said, unlike Ghana where people had a certain grace the people in Mumbai were just depressing, withered bodies lying alongside the streets or beggars following you pleading. What can you do? You can’t give them all money, but it feels arrogant to ignore them.

We got a part in a Bollywood movie as extras, staring Shah Rukh Khan and Kylie Minogue.

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On my way to France

By Camille Foisy | May 28, 2009

Today, I woke up early, around 5:00, I can’t to sleep more, why? Because today I will go to France, for to discover news places. After to shower me and to shave me with nervous, I leaved home, I started the car, I prepared my cd player and I listened the first song: Get to France (Mike Oldfield). Emotion in my skin, I needed to disappeared some days. I acrossed the French border at 8:30 am.

Oh my god !! Here it’s raining, the rain doesn’t break my planes. I must to reduce my speed, not only for the rain also for the french´s radar. What emotion! I´m in France again. When I stay in France I feel me better, really here everything is magic, everything has a special charm. I like too much France, everything is perfect, less the coffee milk.

I arrived around Montpellier at 10:00 am. In the same time in my cd player is singing Sting (Englishman in New York) -be yourself no matter what they say- .

I follow the motorway; and I arrived to Nîmes, here I let the motorway and I caught the
Alès road: (N106). From Barcelona until here, I needed around 4 hours, now to travel by car is cheap.

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