One of the countries I visited last year was Singapore. My sister lives here, and my parents came over as well from Cebu, Philippines so we can have our yearly reunion. My parents and I also flew to Bangkok, Thailand for a little city trip, and as a family we had a relaxing holiday finale in Bintan Island, Indonesia.
Considering that I live across the world from my family, I am quite grateful that I am able to see and spend holidays with them at least once a year.
In Singapore, my mom’s wish was to visit the Flower Dome at the Gardens by the Bay in the Marina Bay area. Like most moms, she adores flowers. There are 2 conservatory complexes at the Gardens by the Bay, and these are the ‘Cloud Forest’ and the ‘Flower Dome’. I was not so keen on going but I promised to accompany her.
Read here for more information on facts and figures, ticket prices and opening hours: Conservatory Flower Dome
Since we were there in November, the flower dome was designed with the Christmas celebrations in mind and I saw a lot of poinsettias being used as decorations. Poinsettias are tropical flowers originally from Mexico, and they only bloom, rather changes its colour to red, during the Christmas holiday season. I remember having these in our garden at home in Cebu when I was a kid. We would sometimes have them as flower pots on the table during the holiday season.
Well, I am sure they change the decoration, as well as the exhibitions in the Flower Dome regularly, so perhaps on other months they might have a different theme going on.
So what do I think of the Flower Dome visit?
Well the mother was quite happy to see the flowers, so that’s good. Mission accomplished, hehe.
Honestly, I was not so enamoured of it. Maybe because I am from the Netherlands, the land of innovative horticulture and that I have visited Keukenhof (many years ago though), the biggest and most beautiful garden in the world. It’s difficult you see when you have seen better =)
I however loved its sister conservatory, the Cloud Forest and I highly recommend anyone visiting Gardens by the Bay to check this place out. Here is an old blog entry with lots of pictures during my visit together with my sister 3 years ago: The Cloud Forest is Not for the Acrophobics
Nevertheless, as per order by the mother, I took loads of pictures of the flowers and plants in the Flower Dome. I was not able to take down notes of the names of the lovely things though, so I will leave it up to you to guess what they are called. Good luck!
I made the pictures into set collages and I hope you like them.
My favourite flowers in this set are the blue bells (see left most flower) and the orange tiger-like flower (see second from left).
Travel Period: November 2015
Destination: Central, Singapore
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Happy Travels! Enjoy Life =)