Batam Trip Day 2 - Nov 2014

We had a nice lazy morning and could actually sleep in before we had to go down to breakfast. And because Batam was one hour behind of Singapore we were able to sleep in and wake up at 8am Singapore time and still be early for breakfast! How nice if all tour groups would let you wake up past 7am?

The Buffet Breakfast at the Harmoni One hotel was pretty good. Loads of choices including cereals, Chinese porridge, fried noodles, rice, sausage, potatoes, fruits, pastries, egg, and some really good waffles.

Really sweet cordials - not juice at all

I would never eat a salad as a breakfast....except at a buffet!

After breakfast we went back to our room to pack and check out. The tour guide had offered some massage packages and some of our group members signed up. The price was pretty steep, we knew we could get cheaper at the mall. So the rest of the group was dropped off at Nagoya Hill shopping centre. We only had 2.5 hours, it wasn't enough. Turns out the mall was bigger than I first thought. When I first went in, I thought there was nothing much, but turns out there were quite a bit of good shops around the back and the basement. There's a big Hypermart at the basement which is a big supermarket, so don't forgot to check that out if you have time, plus a Timezone.

One of the reason we didn't have much time to shop was because we decided to get a foot massage done at one of the shops outside the mall. The shop's name was City Fresh and it was really cheap, we only paid about SG$10 for a 1 hour foot massage! If you're worried about not being able to speak the language, don't worry, they always have menus for massages with price clearly stated. And most of the reception can speak English and/or Chinese.

And that concludes our trip. We were then rushed back to the ferry terminal to take our 3pm ferry back to Singapore.

So will we be back?  Yes most likely :)

Batam Trip Day 1 - Nov 2014

Having lived in Singapore for over 10 years, can you believe I had never once visited Batam?! Batam is easily accessible by a 45 minute Ferry ride from Singapore Cruise Centre at Harbourfront.

our ferry....raining raining

The ferry ride was somewhat smooth even though it was drizzling. There were a couple of big waves which literally rocked us up and down. Freaked me out cos I was totally worried of getting sea sick. Have had bad experiences with ferry going to Macau previously. When we arrived at the ferry terminal I was surprised at how clean the waters were. There are a few ports of entry on Batam, the one we went to was Sekupang Ferry Terminal. Looks like most tour groups would take this ferry terminal because there are less people and also seems because they get to go through the 'Express Lane'. By the way, there are some countries that require visas on arrival to Indonesia. If your stay is less than 7 days it's USD15. If you don't have exact change, they will give you back the change in Rupiah. And also in the past lots of merchants would accept Singapore currency as payment. That's now illegal under law since the new Indonesian President was elected. So do make sure you have enough Rupiahs or exchange some when you get to there. The ferry terminals have them and most malls would have them too.



That's pretty clean and clear water!

Made me wish we were staying at a beach resort instead. 

So upon arrival we were met with our tour guide from Nusajaya agency. Since this was a company trip we were all going together on a tour package with a guided bus tour. Honestly there's really nothing much to see in Batam by way of sight seeing. And the places they took us to were...pretty uninteresting and lame.

First stop was the Balerang Bridge. It's a bridge that connects all the Batam islands together (there's a few, but we only saw 1). Ok, this was picturesque...and probably the only scenic thing you can find in Batam.

What's more interesting was the street vendors. There were a couple who was selling some kind of cooked mudcrab. It's not recommended to eat anything from the streets, but if you're truly a risk taker...then go for it!

Next was the Kue Lapis factory. The shop is called Diana, and honestly this is one of the nicest Kue Lapis we've had. Only missing was the cinnamon flavour (which some people like and don't like). If you're in Batam and want to buy Kue Lapis, go to this place. Not sure if the people speak english though. One Kue Lapis full square is Rp290,000 for the Prune one and Rp270,000 for the original one. Both were good. And that's pretty cheap. The cakes are freshly made upon ordering, so what they do is take the order and then bake the cakes ready for collection the next day.

The special thing about this place is you can watch them make the cakes and they use a Gas Oven, see the little dancing flames on top of the oven, so cool. Have not seen one of these in a very long time, I think my mother used to have one in the 80s. 

After that we were all starving, we left Singapore at 8.30am and hadn't eaten anything and it was almost 1pm Singapore time. So they took us to a place that sold another type of Kue Lapis and this one was drier. You can really taste the difference, Diana's one you can taste the quality. Just nearby was a local snack shop selling all sorts of prawn crackers, tapioca chips, etc, etc. The price is definitely more expensive than what you'd probably find at other places, but because of the high turn over, I believe the crackers are fresh. Plus you also get to sample a lot of them before buying. If you don't intend to go to a supermarket, make sure you buy some of your local snacks here.

The snack shop exits to our lunch restaurant called Golden Prawn 933 restaurant. This looks like one of those restaurants that they bring every tour group to. Food was abundant and was okay tasting.

We had half scallop shells in some kind of sweet spicy sauce, steamed/boiled prawns with garlic (tiny but very tasty prawns), steamed fish, kangkong in chilli, fried squid, pepper crab (tiny crabs), corn and egg drop soup. Drinks were included, we ordered Coke...but it was King Cola and King Sprite...ummm...okay....

 

After lunch they took us to another tourist shop selling tshirts. The shirts are cheap...but don't expect real brands. But eventhough they were knock offs, the quality was surprisingly good. We got matching Abercrombie shirts for $15 a shirt. Outside there is a GoKart course, I can't remember how much it was but we didn't try it. Was so loud. Thought that it was only single Karts, but then later on we saw a two seater, so maybe next time we can bring the girl on it.

Next was the Batik Shop. Nobody from our group bought anything...

Finally at after 3pm we went to our hotel, the Harmoni One hotel, to check in. Supposedly check in was at 3pm, but when we arrived the rooms weren't ready. So we waited quite a while till one by one they allocated our rooms. We had a deluxe room and it was great! Big comfy King size bed, big enough to fit 2 adults and 1 child or maybe 2 small kids. There was a day bed cum in room massage bed, mini fridge with free contents (a packet of peanuts and 2 cans of drinks). The bathroom was spacious with a big tub and separate standing shower. The buffet breakfast was very good too.

Basic bathroom amenities...bring your own.

nice big tub

separate standing shower

daybeds/massage beds

The view from our 5th floor room overlooks a quirky hotel. 

cute statues outside the hotel restaurant

tea and coffee plus free bottles of water. I really appreciate it when hotels provide free bottled water.

King Bed, very comfortable.

I was impressed with these tress....till I realised they were fake.

The hallway makes you feel like you're on a cruiseship...titanic?

Great rooftop swimming pool on Level 6. One big pool, one kiddy pool and one heated jacuzzi.

The hotel itself is pretty much in the middle of nowhere. There is literally nothing within walking distance of the hotel, except Padang restaurant across the street. Our guide doesn't recommend walking around the streets either. The good thing however is that it has a free shuttle bus to a few of the shopping centres. Staff at the hotel are very friendly, always greeting you when you pass them by. They also served a welcome drink.
After a quick swim and rest, we then had to go to dinner. The group had organised a buffet dinner at Novotel hotel. It was pretty disappointing. There was hardly enough variety of food for them to legitimately say that was a buffet. Really bad for Novotel standards. I don't recommend it at all. It was a normal buffet setting, plus a bbq buffet and a steamboat buffet. The bbq was alright only, we had squid but it was undercooked. We later on wanted the steamboat but guess what, they ran out of gas stoves, and the restaurant wasn't even crowded!!

So that was the end of our First Day in Batam.