As a hotel with history dating back to 1904, The Barracks Hotel exudes strong colonial charm. With only 2 blocks of guest rooms on each side of the reception and lawns in front of the buildings, this hotel offers a tranquil and luxurious experience. When I first saw the hotel, I knew I would plan a staycation here one day.

However, it was a staycation that had been postponed several times due to the Heightened Alert phase and 2-man dine-in rule that kicked in because of Covid in September 2021. When we are unable to dine-in as a family or have to be separated in different cable car cabins, I feel it defeats the purpose of a staycation which is meant for us to spend time together on a “holiday”. But eventually, we decided to go ahead with it because it has already been postponed too many times and fatigue was kicking in!

Our package came with complimentary breakfast, a pair of cable car tickets, $100 dining credit and late-checkout. It also included access to The Living Room private lounge (a more homely name for their restaurant) for all-day refreshments and evening cocktails and canapes.

We arrived at the hotel drop off point located at the basement carpark, which is quite interesting because most hotels usually have a beautiful porch right at their entrance instead. Drivers usually would not realise that it’s located at the basement and would wait at level 1, which in my opinion is prettier.

After completing our check-in on Trace Together, we were ushered into the reception which is a small cosy area and served welcome drinks and cold towels immediately. One hotel staff also surprised our girl with a balloon which she happily took over without hesitation! The balloon definitely did not cost much. But the simple gesture of helping to tie it on our girl’s hand was heartwarming.

There are only 40 guest rooms in this hotel. Hence, it has a very cosy intimate feel and staff addressed our girl by her name. On our way to our room at level 2, the staff who walked us up introduced us to the building’s history and amenities in the room. I love the fittings of the room which mainly came in rose gold hues. What I love most is the standalone bathtub sitting in the middle of the bathroom area! All rooms on level 2 have a balcony with very nice view of the swimming pool. Unfortunately, it was raining when we arrived, so we decided to head out for lunch first.

The hotel provides buggy services to the beach (very thoughtful!). We decided to head to the Good Old Days, a foodcourt situated next to the Beach Station, for lunch. Although I’ve been to Sentosa upteen times, that was actually my first time to this place for a meal! Honestly, I would still prefer dining at restaurants along the beach. But since we had to dine separately, a quick simple meal would do.

Luckily, the rain stopped by the time we finished our meal. We then headed to Imbiah for our cable car ride to Mt Faber. As expected, we had to keep to 2 people per cabin. To be fair, hubby and I decided to take turns to ride with our girl. Hence, we alighted at Mt Faber for a switch!

Fortunately, we were blessed with good weather the next morning! Hence, we headed out for a swim once we have washed up. It was good that we didn’t have to make any prior reservations for the pool as there are not that many guests to begin with! We had the pool to ourselves!

Breakfast was served at The Living Room. Food was good and I was especially impressed with bowl used to serve the congee for my girl, such homely feel!

Although the sky was gradually turning cloudy, we decided to make a quick trip to the beach for some sandcastle time! Our girl used to be afraid of stepping on sand and now she enjoys it! She was even able to slowly walk down the beach to have a dip in the sea!

Lunch was at Bedrock Bar & Grill at Oasia Hotel Sentosa. Oasia Hotel is under the same hotel group as The Barracks Hotel and hence we could utilise our dining credits here (which is awesome, cause they have superb weekday lunch deals!). My 3-course meal cost only $38!

However, it started pouring when we finished our lunch. We had to chuck away our plan to visit the Luge. Nonetheless, we managed to squeeze in 1 more cable car ride and hopped onto the Sentosa Line (which is currently having a $3 promo for locals) before we left.

Most of the time when we bid goodbye to a hotel, I would tell hubby that I hope to come back for a stay again. This is especially true for The Barracks Hotel! Although it is on the pricier end, the service was impeccable and refreshments at the lounge was awesome.

We were excited to go on our 1st staycation after the 2-month Circuit Breaker! We chose the Sofitel Singapore Sentosa Resort and Spa as it was stated on their website that they are not a SHN hotel. The booking via JTB also came with some promotions such as late checkout with all 3 meals provided. Yeah!

Unlike the pre-Covid days, everything had to be prebooked and arranged prior to arrival. If you are the kind of traveller who likes to go free-and-easy, you might have to make some changes to your expectations or you might lose out in pool or restaurant bookings!

About 3 days before our stay, we were required to submit a pre-arrival form to indicate the time of our expected arrival. On the form, we also booked the pool and restaurants for our lunch and dinner which were included in our package. Everything was kind of set even before we stepped foot into the hotel.

The first impression we got when we stepped into the hotel was the greenery and the resort vibes it offered. We also spotted peacocks and monkeys roaming the grounds! Our room was located at level 2, with our window facing a little water feature right outside our window.

The baby cot and complimentary cake were delivered to our room shortly after we have settled down. Baby couldn’t wait to dig in! We then decided to explore the grounds with a bottle of bubbles in hand. I really love bringing my girl to places where she has spaces to run around. That’s what kids are supposed to enjoy too!

Every pool slot comes in 2 hours. Our slot on the first day was between 5pm to 7pm, perfect time for a dip in the pool! And our slot on the second day was from 11am to 1pm. We pretty much had the pool to ourselves on the second day! Baby enjoyed herself!

Breakfast was at Kwee-zeen, a restaurant in the hotel. As it had rained the night before, it was cooling. Hence, we chose an outdoor seat. Breakfast is no longer self-served buffet due to Covid. Instead, we got to choose the food items using a QR code and served by staff. Nonetheless, it was still a good meal!

Both our completmentary dinner and lunch on Day 2 were at The Cliff restaurant. There were both indoor and outdoor seating areas and we got to try both ! The meal portions were big and they were delicious! If you are heading there for dinner in the evening, it will be good to request for the outdoor seats for the nice sunset view! However, be prepared for peacocks coming near you though!

We managed to squeeze in one more staycation in early Apr 2020 before the Circuit Breaker kicked in. Hubby brought us on a 1-night stay at Capella’s 1-bedroom villa on our 10th dating anniversary. The moment we reached the hotel lobby, we were ushered to the sofa for a rest and given welcome drinks while the staff completed our check-in. Baby was also given a peacock souvenoir which accompanied her for the night.

Our check-in was completed very soon. It would have been a 2-3 mins walk from the lobby (along the road) but we chose to take the buggy there since the staff offered! We took some photos on the buggy before heading off to our villa!

I was pleasantly surprised when we entered the villa. It was much more spacious than I had expected! We were welcomed by a large living area with a lounger that was large enough for 2 people to lie down on! The bed in the next room also came with balloon decorations for our anniversay celebration! And the room on the other side of the bedroom was my favourite of all, a very very spacious and bright bathroom! The villa came with an outdoor shower area and bathtub. The highlight would definitely be our private pool. It was a little ‘leafy’ at first because the villa was surrounded by trees. After spending some time to clear the leaves, baby and I (who were already in our swimwear and excited to jump in) finally entered the pool!

I really loved the convenience of having a private pool within our own villa. By the time we were done splashing around, baby was tired and took a nap until it was time for dinner! Hubby and I enjoyed the movie selections from the 2 televisions in living room and bedroom (no need to fight over TV programmes!).

Back at our room, we received a complimentary cake for our anniversary. A staff also sent us a baby cot for the night. Honestly, it was (and still is) the prettiest baby cot we’ve seen at all our staycations! It has set such a high benchmark that we often got disappointed when we saw the other cots in other hotels.

Breakfast was also served at The Knolls. It was the last buffet breakfast where we could walk around freely to get our food! After breakfast, we took a short walk down to Palawan Beach. As we walked down the path from our hotel, we saw the other pools as well. But since we had our own private pool, we did not swim in these pools.

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Our room package came with late a check-out at 2pm. So, we had time for more swimming in our pool. Baby could even take 1 more nap while we ordered lunch via Grab!

24 hours passed by very quickly. Very soon, we were on our way home. It has been a truly enjoyable stay and I miss it! After this stay, it took us another 6 months before we packed our bags for another holiday (in Singapore)!

It has always been my wish to go on a yacht and have a day out at sea. I’ve seen others hold their wedding proposals, wedding photoshoot, birthday parties etc on a yacht. And in 2020, I finally had my chance to do so.

Hubby and I decided to bring my family on board a yacht we chartered for 4 hours with bbq services! It was a cloudy day with occasional drizzle, but that didn’t dampen our spirits at all! After we set off from Sentosa Cove, we anchored near the Lazarus Island and jumped into the waters very soon!

The interior of the yacht was not spectacular. Both rooms were very cramped and stuffy. Trust me, you will not want to sleep in there. The toilets also looked dirty. We merely used the 2 rooms for changing. Sitting outdoors on the deck was much nicer and also reduced the likelihood of sea-sickness!

The charter came with 2 kayaks for use. We also rented a giant float for 10 pax at $100 for those who just wanted to laze around on the water. Of course, hubby and I stole some couple time on the kayak while my parents helped to take care of baby.

That night, hubby and I decided to continue with a staycation at one of the newest hotel in Sentosa: Village Hotel Sentosa. Under the same development, there are also the Outpost Hotel and Barracks Hotel. However, the Outpost Hotel is for adults (above 16yo) only. While the Barracks Hotel is open to families with children, we felt that the Village Hotel Sentosa would be more family-friendly!

We stayed at level 3 of the hotel, which was at the same level as the swimming pools, and that was really convenient for us. There are several pools in the hotel, including a Lazy River, shared between the Outpost Hotel and Village Hotel Sentosa. The Pamukkale Pool was the prettiest pool facing the sea. However, it was also adult-only. Hubby and I did not get to swim there because we had our baby with us. Nonetheless, that didn’t stop us from taking photos there while my family played with baby at the Children’s Play Pool!

Rooms at the Village Hotel Sentosa were small. All that we had was just a double bed and a tv console. There was no space for baby cot nor arm chair. Luckily, that didn’t prevent us from having a good night’s sleep!

The next morning, we decided to bring our baby for a swim at the Children’s Play Pool. It’s our baby’s first swim in an actual pool and we were really quite excited about it. We prepared her swimming attire and brought along the float we had bought for her! Look at her chill face! She was unfazed by the slide too!

And since the Amara Sanctuary Resort Sentosa was just next to the Barracks Hotel (yes they are all clustered together), we decided to head there to the glass pavilion and take photo at the same old spot again. It’s sort of like a photo I need to take once a year to add to my collection. As an afternote, I’m glad we did! Shortly after our stay, Singapore saw a rise in COVID-19 cases. We had to cancel whatever plans we had for our wedding anniversary. I’m glad we already took photo at the pavilion!

It’s day 2 at Pattaya. It was a free day for us as we did not book any shore excursion for the day. We were thinking of staying on board or going out on our own to explore the nearby areas because shore excursions aren’t exactly that worth the money it in my opinion. The 5-hour tour we had yesterday cost us about 70USD per pax. Since it was just 4 adults and a baby, I thought we could just grab a taxi if we really wanted to go out.

Another good thing about cruise was that we can disembark and board the cruise as and when we wanted since we had already cleared immigration yesterday! With a sea pass card in hand, we left the ship to explore the port. The port had a souvenior shop that also offered Thai massage services!

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We were hungry by the time we reached the mall at Pattaya beach. Traffic was really bad because of the road works on top of the narrow lanes. We settled for lunch at some restaurant that offered Thai food. We then strolled along the beach and took photos! Hubby then accompanied my parents to the shopping mall while I went for a foot massage and manicure on my own! I should really count my blessings for having such chill parents and doting hubby!

Luckily, the coach ride back to the cruise was a smooth one. After a satisfying dinner, we went for another show at the theatre! It also happened to be hubby’s lunar birthday! Having been friendly to our housekeeper for the past few days, she readily agreed to put up a surprise for my hubby the moment she found out it was his birthday! It was a magnet that would stay on our door for the rest of our trip! That night, we also went to an open deck area to see the cruise leave the port for Vietnam! It was really relaxing to see the cruise leave the port slowly at first, and gradually pick up speed once we hit the open sea!

As we had lunch at the buffet area, we could see that the cruise had already arrived at the port. Most people were finishing up their food and getting ready to disembark!

That morning, we had already collected our passports because Thailand required us to hold our passport in hand while clearing the immigration on the first day we port there. The process was fast as there were many counters opened. Very soon, we were on our bus and ready to go!

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Sanctuary of Truth was about 30mins drive from the port. It is a building built using very traditional methods, with no nails or screws holding the structure. Carvings were all done by hand! We had to wear helmets as renovation to some sections were still ongoing. It was really really warm there though!

Next, we went to the Pattaya Floating Market. It was not what I had imagine based on my idea of the floating market at Bangkok. I thought we would be on the boats. Instead, it was more of walking while the some food were being sold on the boats. At least we got to eat the mango sticky rice and grill squid. That made me feel a little more like I’m in Thailand! But because it was very touristy, things were quite pricely compared to other parts of Thailand too! We spent about an hour there before heading back to our cruise for dinner! By the time we were back, baby had fallen alseep in the bus!