Combining Balinese cultural ambience with African Savannah, Bali Safari and Marine Park is home to hundreds of amazing animals representing more than 50 species, including some rare and endangered species. The park, which features the Sumatran elephants, Sumatran tigers, white tigers, leopards, komodo dragons and cheetahs, is officially designated as a wildlife conservation park, dedicated towards preserving endangered species through education and research programs coordinating with other zoological institutions around the world.

Hopped onto the safari bus and went for a 30-minute safari tour where some animals came right up to us, even the lions and tigers!

After the close encounter with the wild, we wrapped up the hot day by cooling off the heat in the waterpark.

As a result, we catered for, and spent an entire day at a water park called WaterBom Bali. With 22 exciting water slides that slice through 3.8 hectares of landscaped tropical parks providing hours of fun and entertainment for the young and the young at heart! It is the perfect water themed park for the whole family!

A rather non-descript entrance opens up to a world of exciting and fun-filled water activities set amid a lush tropical garden.

There are 22 exciting rides that cater to different thrill-level. Very popular rides that have long queue are “Climax”, “Boomerang”, and “Superbowl”.

If thrilling rides and slides are not your cup of tea, you can choose to while your afternoon away in the lazy river, constructed and decorated to make visitors feel like we are meandering through an amazonian river!

For wholesome family fun, WaterBom Bali is a very good attraction to spend a fun-filled day.

Totally unaware that Bangkok would eventually be inundated by the great flood, booking of air tickets to Bangkok, Thailand, was done in early September. As the situation got worse in late October-early November, a “window” was opened to change our travel destination. Bali was a no-brainer and our eventual choice. We have never been to Bali, so we were looking forward to this trip.

The island of Bali consists of too many exciting spots for us to explore with just 4 days in Bali (23 – 26 Nov). For this trip, we stayed in Kuta region, an area famous for its long sandy beach and great surf. The tropical weather made sure we had a scorching time during our stay.

In the month of October, I’ve been caught pointing my iPhone towards the sky one time too many, and here’s sharing some of them with you:

I’m very happy to score a PB in this race, and my next challenge will be to do a sub 1h 40m over the same distance.

As this year was the 20th anniversary of the SAFRA Singapore Bay Run & Army Half Marathon, there were many “Firsts” ranging from a refreshed running route, to a first “Father and Child Challenge” category. The 21km running route took runners past 20 of Singapore’s iconic landmarks, including Marina Barrage, Bay east at Gardens by the Bay, Old City Hall, Anderson Bridge, to name a few.

After exiting from Marina Barrage, we ran along the Gardens by the Bay that connects to Tanjong Rhu View. This section of the route was similar to that of Marina 21K run which I did back in July, and which I dislike due to having to run on grass patches in the dark, as well as on uneven footpath. Other than this little inconveniences, the running route was refreshing, and the myraid of colourful street-side performances at various locations along the route certainly provided the runners with much welcome relief.

My timing for this 21km run was 1h 40mins. I had an enjoyable time during and after the run, congrats to the organizer for a well-organized race and all the volunteers for their hardwork! Now it’s time to let some post-run pictures continue the story.

The race distance was 16.8km with the start point on Esplanade Bridge and finishing point at the Padang.

Coming on the back of some rather disorganized races earlier, this adidas kotr was a very well organized race, befitting this global sporting brand that is Adidas. The route, which brings runners past many icons in the Marina Bay area, was adequately marked with huge visible distance-marker, and water-points were long to accommodate the massive throngs of thirsty runners. Overall, I had a very satisfied race experience, and I’m sure most, if not all of the runners, local and overseas will agree with me.  Let’s take a photowalk of the post-race carnival.

I finished the race in 1h 17.05m, and was mildly surprised by this result.

Here’s a showcase of some of the memories I brought back:

The event site was rather inaccessible, somewhere in Tanjong Rhu area.

The scenery at the start point was indeed captivating, and was a welcome change to the usual start point set in the city center.

For the 1st km, runners were treated to the above scenery of the Marina Bay skyline, after that, my race experience started going downhill. If last week’s Tri-Factor Run was a disaster as a result of insufficient route marker and lack of race marshals at critical junction, leading to some runners eventually taking the wrong route, this Marina 21K was not any better.

The flag-off time of 10km run was a good 2hrs ahead of the 21km run, and this created a human-traffic jam at the clearly insufficient baggage deposit counters when 10km finisher and incoming 21km runners converged, which I believed many 21km runners were caught in the queue and were eventually late for the flag-off.

The route (sans the first km) was clearly not meant for a road race, much less a half marathon. In many stretches, runners had to run on grass patches, poorly-lit and uneven footpath and cutting across pedestrian path in the Tanjong Rhu residential area. The lack of distance-marker was really a sore point for me.

I’ve never been so critical of races I had taken part in, but the organization of Marina 21K bordered on being amateurish and my race-experience was at a low never felt before. With that said, I was glad to complete the race in 1 hr 48mins (gun time).