What we enjoy most about travelling is that it is full of opportunities to enjoy new, fresh experiences at every turn. I’m particularly afraid of feeling a bit too comfortable, because it’s a good indication that things are about to turn stale very soon.
However, as much as we would love to be constantly jetting around the world, circumstances don’t allow us to be in a new place every month (though that might change very soon!). As we all know too well, travel can be painful on the wallet, and sometimes work, family, and other important things collude together to prevent it from happening.
Which brings us back to Singapore, where we spent at least 90% of our time in.
Let’s rip the bandage off: it gets really boring here in Singapore. And yes, I get to say this as a Singaporean who has lived here for close to three decades, and exhausted everything that she has to offer – both old-fashioned and newfangled.
Or so I thought.
We were pleasantly surprised to be proven wrong recently, thanks to an invitation from Tall Ship Adventures to experience a dinner cruise aboard their Royal Albatross tall ship.
Sound swanky? That’s because it is.
A brief history of the Royal Albatross
A big part of her charm lies in the fact that the Royal Albatross isn’t some random ship that they refurbished, redesigned, and rebranded to look and feel regal.
In fact, her origins began on the other side of the world – all the way in Chicago – where she was featured in the The Dark Knight in 2008, as the private yacht of Batman himself. Or more accurately, his alter ego, Bruce Wayne.
Fun fact: around 40 Filipinos were hired to work on refurbishing the tallship, which took roughly 360,000 man hours!
Afterwards, eight of them were handpicked and trained to be part of the crew. Half of them were originally carpenters, which explains some of the intricate design work we spotted throughout the tallship.
Much like its cameo in The Dark Knight, the Royal Albatross has hosted numerous VIPs, such as Princess Anne, the second child and only daughter of Queen Elizabeth II. Here is their “wall of fame”:
The Sunset Sail
Today, we’d be enjoying their Sunset Sail dinner cruise.
As the name suggests, this trip would take us on a 2.5-hour chase after the sunset along Sentosa, and around the Southern Islands:
It doesn’t look like much on the map, but it turned out to be more than sufficient for a 3-course sit-down dinner that we enjoyed as part of the Platinum package. There were moments in between courses where we even felt a bit bored – more on that later.
Before setting sail
Registration for the cruise starts at 530pm, but the boarding gate only opens at 6pm – we arrived closer to the latter.
An easy 15-minute walk from VivoCity will take you to the tallship, via the Sentosa Boardwalk.
Still, we felt like we arrived a tad too early. We were served a lovely welcome drink upon boarding, and we were done with them way before the tallship left shore.
If we were to do it all over again, we’d definitely arrive just before the boarding gate closes instead, and enjoyed the drink on the journey out of Sentosa.
This did give us plenty of time to take a stroll around the Royal Albatross, though, and snap lots of great shots.
The Royal Albatross has two decks, and most of the action happens on the upper deck, where we were seated.
Since we had some time, we decided to check out the air-conditioned lower deck.
The lower deck has its own bar as well (there’s another one the upper deck), but as expected, most guests prefer to sit on the upper deck to enjoy the views and the breeze.
And then we set sail. After a safety briefing by the captain, a singer took over to entertain us with renditions of, well, quite a variety of music.
This might be nitpicking a bit, but some of the songs chosen didn’t quite fit the romantic, laid-back vibe of the journey. However, the singer performed well, and she also accepted song requests, which was a nice touch.
As we rushed out of the Sentosa area, we were occasionally treated to views of the sun going down in the distance. It was quite cloudy that evening, however, so most of the view was obscured.
We settled for watching the staff skillfully clambering up and down the masts to work the sails, which turned out to be rather entertaining. We found out later that half of the job is done by the sailors, while the rest is operated by the onboard motors.
The food
As mentioned earlier, we were offered a 3-course sit-down dinner – comprising of a salad, main platter, and dessert – as part of the Platinum package ($195 for adults, $145 for children). If you opted for the Gold package ($165 for adults, $125 for children), you’d enjoy the international buffet instead.
Here was the menu for the night:
By now, we were plenty hungry. Dinner service spans almost the entire duration of the 2.5-hour journey, so some waiting time is to be expected in between courses.
The dishes were well worth the wait, though. The salad was suitably light and refreshing, and prepared our palates well for the generous, meaty platter.
Our favorite, however, were the desserts – especially the bread butter pudding, which was lavish with the butter and a great way to end the dinner service.
The view
As you can see, the pink and purple neon lights installed all across the tallship will take over the scene entirely by nightfall, giving it a “lounge” vibe – which is nice.
Sitting back with a drink in hand, enjoying the sea breeze, and listening to soothing tunes was certainly a charming experience.
Unfortunately, for the better part of the journey, there really wasn’t much to look at except for dark waters and shadowed land.
At least, until we hit the mid-way mark, where we were treated to a view of the Marina bay area in the distance. And a passing cruise ship!
Towards the end of the journey – at around 8pm – we were also audience to a small fireworks display (the Wings of Time performance) along Sentosa’s beaches. Certainly, a nice way to cap a relaxing trip.
We were also given a tour of the en-suite cabins, of which there are five. Each of them was as good as 5-star hotel rooms, fully decked out with designer toiletries and luxurious furniture.
However, it costs a pretty penny to stay in any of them for even a night – our guide wouldn’t even mention a price!
Still, we think just spending a few hours on the tallship, enjoying a drink or two and sumptuous dinner, is more than enough to get the full Royal Albatross experience.
Worth a try
For those of you who are looking for something fresh and memorable to try out in Singapore, we would definitely recommend taking this trip at least once.
This is especially so if you’re celebrating a special occasion. There were several parties on our sail celebrating various occasions – a birthday, an anniversary, a work event – and thoroughly enjoying themselves. The crew even brought out a birthday cake for the lucky birthday girl, too!
And at the end of the day, you’d get bragging rights for sailing in the same yacht that Batman did.
