Family travel,  Singapore,  TRAVEL/HOLIDAYS

Singapore Zoo and Night Safari

My family and I recently traveled to Singapore by car during the Hari Raya holiday to visit the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari. We, especially my son Yassin, had a blast exploring both the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari.

signboards to the zoo and night safari

signboards to the zoo and night safari

Set in a rainforest environment, Singapore Zoo’s world famous “open concept” offers the opportunity to experience and be inspired by the wonders of nature. Home to over 2,500 specimens from 316 species, 36% of which are threatened, the Zoo has attained a strong reputation internationally for its conservation initiatives and breeding programmes. Opening hours are from 8.30am to 6.00pm daily
(Last ticket sale at 5.30pm). Tickets are priced at S$20.00 for adult and S$13.00 for children between 3 to 12 years old. If you are not a Singaporean, you have to show your passport, so keep it inside your bag before you enter the zoo.

Daily shows include Splash Safari, Rainforest Fights Back and Elephants at Work & Play. We got to see the latter two and in the Rainforest Fights Back show there are a spectrum of animals ‘fighting’ back to restore their rainforest home to its full splendour when its serenity is disturbed by man. The Elephants at Work & Play show transports us to a Burmese elephant logging camp and reveals the incredible bond between the mahouts and their working elephants.

An Orang Utan peeling coconut in the Rainforest FightsBack show.

Yassin got to feed live insects to these Rainforest Fights Back casts.

Posing at the Elephants at Work and Play show.

 

Attractions and features of the zoo include Australian Outback, Cat Country, Critters Longhouse, Elephants of Asia, Fragile Forest, Hamadryas Baboons, Orang Utan, Polar Bear, Primate Kingdom, Proboscis Monkeys, Rainforest Kidzworld, Reptile Garden, Wild Africa and White Tiger.

White tigers, also known as Bengal tigers, are rare animals that possess an amazing combination of awesome beauty and impressive power. They have blue eyes, a pink nose, and creamy white fur covered with brown stripes. White tiger males range in length between 2.7 and 3 metres. They weigh between 190 and 260 kilogrammes on the average. Females are smaller, and range in length from 2.2 to 2.7 metres, weighing around 165 kilogrammes.

White Tiger

We didn’t really get to see wallaby or kangaroo skips about the Australian Outback area except for this very one–resting under a tree.

Australian Outback — we’re going for a ‘ride’ to see wallaby and kangaroo and whaddaya know, Yassin gets to ‘drive’!

We further meandered into the Zoo’s depiction of the Dark Continent and discovered a mosaic of fascinating animals: White Rhino, Cheetah, African Wild Dog, Zebra, Giraffe and African Lion.

Cheetah

Zebra

Overall, it was a great experience visiting the zoo and it lives up to its title, World’s # 1 Rainforest Zoo. Yassin surely wants to visits again, highlighting which area that his old parents skipped. He actually compares the zoo map and his encounters with all the animals and noticed that he had not seen few animals as shown in the map. We told him that we did it purposely to give him enough reason to visit again. Haha. OK maybe enough reason for us to visit Universal Studio next.

As for me personally, I love the fact that the lavatories in the zoo are very clean and I love the creative concept where the hand-washing area is actually an open area. Of course the toilets have doors, if you wonder. Lol.

I also love the fact that the zebra-crossing is really a zebra-crossing, not just straight lines of black and white stripes.

one happy mother about to walk on the zebra-crossing. Haha.

Last but not least, I just love the main illustration around the zoo.

Awesome!

After the zoo, we waited for an hour to visit the Night Safari as the opening hour starts from 7.30pm. Admission + Tram is S$32 for adult and S$21 for children between 3 to 12 years old. We got a 50% discount that day, so YAY!

Night Safari, the world’s first wildlife park for nocturnal animals is an nine-time winner of the Best Visitor Attraction Experience, awarded by Singapore Tourism Board. This internationally acclaimed leisure attraction embodies innovation and creativity in products and services, and service quality, thus attracting more than 1.1 million visitors yearly. Over 1,000 animals from 115 species (of which almost 30% are threatened) inhabit the 40-hectare park.

There’s no photos of animals taken as we were not allowed to take pictures with flash when visiting the animals. Here are some photos from the entrance area where we can see Thumbuakar performance for free. We wanted to see the Creatures of The Night Show but the queue was so long that we had to skip it.

       

       

 

 

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