roaming around Singapore's Botanic Gardens

I was stoked to find out that we have time visit a UNESCO World Heritage Site while I was touring Singapore with Mommy and Daddy. We went to the Singapore Botanic Gardens! It's high up on my to-visit list and I finally had a chance to see the place. The bonus was that the parents were with me. 

Mommy wasn't so keen on walking but there's not much of a choice (no vehicles inside the gardens). She had to put on a grin and bear it. It was a good thing that she's wearing good walking footwear this time around.

As we walked deeper inside the gardens, we were wowed by the diversity of the plant collection. For instance, there was a garden for bougainvilleas, for bamboo, for succulents, and for medicinal plants. We came around the right time because many of the flowers were blooming. This may not be sakura but we enjoyed seeing many flowers.

We first encountered the bougainvilleas. I've always thought that these plants were pretty ordinary and didn't bloom so much (case in point: the hanging bougainvilleas on the Greenbelt walkway). Hence, my jaw dropped when I saw how heavily the plants bloomed when we were in the gardens. And it wasn't just a bunch of pink flowers. There were other colours too!

I'm not much of a botanist so I'm not sure what the plants I'm seeing were. There was a plant with red fruit (or flowers) that resemble rambutan.

There were grasses with pretty blooms as well.

And then there were lobster claws scattered across the gardens. These reminded me of our backyard garden because we used to have a lot of Heliconia plants. 

I mistook these plants as bananas. In fact, these are Heliconia plants that were allowed to grow tall and start bringing shade on the walkway. I'm afraid to have something like this at home because it's difficult to maintain.

One of the highlights of our visit was the trip to the National Orchid Garden. During this walk, I learned that this is one of the world's centres for orchid breeding. There were so many different types of orchids... I am mostly familiar with the Vanda and the Dendrobium because my dad used to grow them in the backyard. However, I am not an expert.

This garden was so well-trimmed that it was a joy strolling in it. There were so many colours popping out of nowhere.

It was so relaxing, despite the Singaporean heat at noon time. I wish that I have a green thumb so I can grow flowers like these too. So far, I was able to grow rice, lemongrass, basil, and one orange jasmine tree. But I don't have the time to maintain Bermuda grass in the backyard. 

I was telling Daddy that I wish to have a garden as well-manicured as this one. However, he doesn't have a green thumb as well so we just contented ourselves with drinking this view in. 

Inside one of the buildings, we found a pot of these striking pink orchids. Not sure what these are but I want to grow this particular variety at home. 

After a while, we started getting overwhelmed with the huge collection of orchids. The National Orchid Garden is said to house around 1000 species and 2000 hybrids! That's a lot to see in one day. At some point, though we still thought that the flowers were very pretty, we already got desensitised. So we opted to get out of the garden and see the rest of the place.

On our way out, though, we were also able to spot other non-orchid flowers. These made for pretty pictures because of the striking contrasts with the green background. And the clouds started gathering overhead... these effectively removed shadows from the flowers but made photography a bit of a challenge.

My favourite part of the orchid display was the pathway leading to the exit because the tiny yellow orchids were grown in such a way that we were going through golden archways.

We then started walking towards the bandstand. Along the way, we spotted another field of orchids. I couldn't resist taking a photo of my parents, trying to mimic a photo I had in Japan (but in a canola field).

As we continued our Botanic Gardens exploration, we started seeing trees with giant vines hanging from the branches. Somehow, these reminded me of Grandma Willow and the Whomping Willow.

We also saw sculptures that didn't seem to be integral parts of flower pots, but were rather on display on their own. One of them is called "Girl on a Swing" (1984), a piece by Sydney Harpley. I was fascinated by how it seems to float in the air without any support... almost like magic!

While my parents were resting on a grassy knoll, I had a nice view of "Chang Kuda" (2011), a piece by Chong Fah Cheong depicting kids playing horse-riding... reminding of the games I used to play with my neighbours on the street.

On Swan Lake, we saw "A Flight of Swans" by Eng Siak Loy (2006). I found that it's aptly placed on the lake. I didn't have energy to take a closer look because by this time, we were already on our eighth kilometre of walking. 

And so we started going back to the train station. The shortcut led through heritage trees and eventually into a rainforest walk.

Mommy was starting to feel the beginnings of knee pain so we had to slow down and rest each time we saw a bench. One was in the middle of the rainforest. But after this, we couldn't make a stop so she had to tough it out until we reached the visitors' centre. But still no complaints; all smiles.

On the last leg of our trip in the Botanical Gardens, we saw yellow flowers. One was on a plant that resembled the makahiya... but it's not Mimosa pudica. I didn't note what it was.

And then, there's one plant with lots of yellow flowers in the healing garden. It looked so friendly on an increasingly cloudy afternoon.

As we exited the gardens, the raindrops started falling. It was good that we had our umbrellas with us; otherwise, we'd be a bit wet. The rain didn't fall in full force though... so we were able to continue with our adventure. 

Up next: Singapore's Super Trees.