Travelling to Phuket was an impromptu and spontaneous decision. The entire planning of this trip was held in secrecy, simply because it was a surprise birthday trip for Bryan from Sheryl. I still can recall how I almost let the cat out of the bag not once but on many different occasions! Every day was spend counting down, and when that day finally arrived, we had a difficult-fun time trying to avoid been seen by Bryan at the airport. I would say that it was a sweet success getting him surprised.

Our accommodation was also planned by la mademoiselle: Sheryl herself. And that’s how I landed myself at this beautiful 5 month old resort – U Zenmaya Phuket. Unlike my first trip to Phuket (read it here), U Zenmaya was one of our highlights for the trip. Having been 590 miles away from home, the least thing I needed was checking in to some filthy place to sleep my nights away. On contradictory to my previous accommodation, U Zenmaya is truly one of the best places for a healthy and revitalising break.

I didn’t mean to brag but we were seriously lucky because our package includes a 2 hours spa session EVERYDAY for ALL 6 OF US. In addition, with a mixture of deluxe seaview and junior seaview pool access rooms, we filled the entire level so we practically leave our doors open because it’s just us! And all the 3 room shares a private pool! Each room is equipped with in-room Jacuzzis, a large terrace/patio. I honestly have nothing but only praises for the place.

Dinner of the night was served at Number 6 Red Chair Seafood. Because J and I had such a yummy and fulfilling experience there previously, we brought the entire group over. With our heads filled with excitement, we kind of forgotten that the previous trip was 2 years ago and so we took quite a while to search for the stall. Despite all these, it was definitely an happy tummies night.

4 months back, I was "having the time of my life" in Taiwan. As much as I was excited for my first visit to the country full of delicious street food, I never expect to fall seriously ill and spend my days getting jabs and vomiting. But that is another story. The weather in Taiwan was a whole new experience, convinced that I was able to withstand the "breeze" there, I bravely wore a dress and suffered serious shivers the moment I alight at the airport and had to escape to the wash room to throw on more clothings.

Taipei York is a home-stay place (民宿) located within 7 minutes walk from XMD station and the rooms come in different themes, which makes the stay more enjoyable. Our minimalistic room was unexpectedly clean and looks like a totally new room. The modern and chic design of the room had me forgetting that this is a home-stay place, it could easier be tag as a boutique hotel room.

After unpacking, our very first activity of the trip was non other than EAT! That's practically the main activity to do in this gourmet filled country. S brought us to this famous Mala hotpot restaurant (马辣顶级麻辣鸳鸯火锅) which usually requires advance booking, but we managed to score ourselves a table through walk-in! #lucky

We ordered collagen and mala soup base for our hotpot, those lychee jelly cubes lookalikes are actually collagen cubes that were dissolved inside the soup.

From appetizers to desserts, their range of food is beyond explanation. Tired of the usual soda drinks? Here, they offer you a wide range of flower tea that helps to improve your health. Ready to pick some food for your pot? they have 2 whole shelves of ingredients for you to pick, from vegetables to seafood, get ready to be wowed. Oh yes, free flow crabs, something you can't expect from local hotpot restaurants. Even their beef are of such superior quality, my stomach growls just looking at the picture. Love desserts? No sweat, they have an entire row of Mövenpick ice cream flavours to choose from.

This meal definitely started my Taiwan trip right.

 
It's Thursday night and I finally found some time to blog about this (really) backdated post. Somewhere along the week of NDP, with our sleepy and au naturel face, we set off from Tanah Merah terminal to Batam for a mini getaway. 

We chose Turi Beach Resort as our accommodation for that short period of stay. Turi Beach really does take your breath away with it's green, beautiful landscape and hammock filled beach. Everything on the exterior was really fantastic. The room however didn't surprise us much, it was average in terms of comfort but utterly disappointing in terms of convenience. We were given a room at the far end of the long stretch corridor, which wasn't a pleasant walk when the night falls because some of the corridor light aren't working and so it was pretty dark, to the extent that we had to use our cellphone's lighting to open up the gate to our room.
Not to mention it was ghost festival, and we might/might not have encountered supernatural moment on the way back to the room that night. Sudden sounds coming from the back, chills, we didn't (and would not) turned back to confirm whatever it was.



Straight after we settled down everything, we head to Nagoya Hill shopping mall for some leisure time. Nothing can bring the joy that an arcade can bring to J. Immediately his face lit up with enthusiasm once his vision set lock on the arcade. Compared to Sg, their arcade is way bigger but there wasn't much machines that were operating. So in the end, we spent the coins on titbits catcher machines ha-ha!

A&W for lunch at Batam is too mainstream, but that's how we Singaporean do it. So can you imagine how devastated we were when our childhood fast food were served to us in this manner:

Oh yes, everyone loves a melted root beer float, dirty dinning environment and dwarf portion food. No seriously. A&W wasn't that great or wonderful as I remembered it to be after all. We were so hungry and unsatisfied, we went for "2nd round" at a greatly talk-about Ayam Penyet store which left we speechless. In a bad way. 



Went back and explore the resort before heading for dinner. Here's some visual enjoyment:


We settled our dinner at the resort's teppanyaki restaurant.