July 2025 - Melbourne, Penang, Hua Hin and Singapore
What a busy month July has been! So busy that I am typing this on the plane home from Singapore to Melbourne on the 31st of July! The WiFi isn’t working particularly well so photos may be added later!! Edit – had to post on 1 August as the plane WiFi wasn’t playing ball!
We finished June by coming home from Europe for not quite two weeks before we headed off to Asia. We’ll be home for only two weeks before we head off again (!!) but more on that trip next time.
We had left Melbourne in mid-May still wearing short sleeves then had seven weeks in Spring and Summer in Europe so coming home to mid-Winter was a shock! Still and all, it was nice to dig out the coats and boots if only for a couple of weeks.
We did some family and friend catch ups and waved our second son, N. and fiancée, K, off to Europe where they’ll be holidaying for three months.
My mother-in-law needed an operation suddenly and, luckily, we were home for that too. She is recovering well.
Then, we jetted off to Penang, Malaysia, Hua Hin, Thailand and Singapore. This trip started with an offer to be a guest at the iconic Raffles in Singapore (!!). We built the rest of the trip around it and were planning to do this trip in October/November. As we were about to book airfares, we found out about our baby granddaughter (due early November) so we hastily reorganised the trip. No way did we want to miss out on Baby J’s arrival!
We added on Penang as it is integral to my childhood. Andrew has never been and I hadn’t visited for over forty years! My Dad used to do some work in Penang and Mum and my younger sister and brother would spend the long January school holidays holidaying in Penang whilst Dad worked. It was a win/win as Dad loved Penang and Mum and us had a holiday. As I got older, I may have complained that I just wanted to go to Rosebud like my friends (!!) and I was particularly grumpy one year when we flew on Christmas Day (!!) but my love of travel was ignited by these trips. And also my realisation that I was so lucky to be born in and live in Australia. I still firmly believe that to this day.
We started in Penang as guests of the Eastern and Oriental Hotel in Penang. This historic hotel dates from 1885 and was built by the Armenian Sarkies brothers, the same men who started Raffles in Singapore two years later. To bookend the trip with the E&O and Raffles was quite special.
We loved our time at the E&O. A seafront hotel, we enjoyed some time lounging by the pool and we also spent a few hours exploring the capital, George Town. George Town is UNESCO-protected and is worth at least a couple of days but we will need to go back as we didn’t have two days this time.
The hotel is famous due to its age and location (it’s the only seafront hotel in George Town) but also due to the celebrated people who have stayed there. People like King Charles III, Noel Coward and Somerset Maugham. More recently, it’s Heritage Wing Lobby was the pretend London hotel lobby featured in the opening scenes of “Crazy Rich Asians.”
The hotel is also beautiful with preserved colonial architecture and modern comforts, all within an all-suite hotel. We had a gorgeous sea-facing Heritage Wing Deluxe King Suite – one of the best hotel rooms we had ever stayed in! As Heritage Wing guests, we had access to the seafront pool (there is another Infinity Pool which is on the sixth floor of the other Wing and has views over the Andaman Sea – we just didn’t have enough time to try it out). We also had free cocktails and tapas-style canapés every night. The E& O was a fantastic start to the trip - we loved it there!
From the E&O, we moved to another hosted stay. This time, the beachfront hotel I always stayed in as a girl – the Shangri-La Rasa Sayang on Batu Ferringhi beach. I remembered this hotel as having large gardens and being a lovely hotel but it has been basically rebuilt and the hotel is now luxe five star and the gardens are superb! I think Andrew had been secretly bemused at my “fascination” with the Rasa Sayang. He was super impressed and couldn’t stop telling me that I had undersold the hotel to him all these years!
It helped that we were upgraded to a Junior King Suite in the Rasa Wing! Another fabulous suite overlooking the beautiful gardens and the sea. The Rasa Sayang threw in an aromatherapy massage for each of us at the gorgeous CHI spa complex. As guests of the Rasa Wing, we also had free afternoon tea each afternoon and free cocktails and canapes in the evening. No need to pay for dinner if you don’t want to!
We deliberately stayed within the Rasa Sayang, hardly venturing out. We loved the Rasa Wing pool (only for Rasa Wing guests over 16). We went next door once to the nine-hole Pitch ‘n Putt and explored the Gardens. It was a few days of nostalgia for me, tinged with a bit of sadness as Dad is no longer here to share my memories with. I am very glad we stayed there and I look forward to returning and showing the kids and, now, grandkids, a beautiful resort where I spent weeks of my childhood.
Next stop – Bangkok airport. We met up with our daughters here for a week in Hua Hin. This was a treat for them as they do a lot for us, especially looking after our two gorgeous Golden Retrievers, when we are away. It was also a treat for us – having unrushed time with adult children is priceless. We are very lucky this year to have spent time with M & A in Oxford and London and now time in Thailand with the girls. In August and September, we will see M & A again in Paris and Oxford and we will see N & K in Paris and then have a week together in Morocco! How lucky are we!
We stayed on the beach at Hua Hin at the AVANI + Hua Hin. The hotel was lovely and we had Pool Access Rooms which opened straight out onto the pool. We had some treats thrown in by AVANI – an AVANIWell half day of pampering and an AVANIPOPUP beachfront dinner for all of us.
We also went on an elephant safari one day and saw elephants in the wild at Kui Buri National Park.
Mostly, we did nothing much and just enjoyed being together. The girls also enjoyed the respite from Melbourne winter!
Bye bye to the girls and we flew to Singapore and a magic few days as guests of Marina Bay Sands Hotel and then Raffles Singapore. Each of these hotels is iconic. To experience both is a treat that will take some beating!
Marina Bay Sands (MBS) has fast become a symbol of Singapore. It is a visual masterpiece from the outside and the inside. A massive, multi-year refurbishment has just been completed and we had a very sophisticated and luxe Sands Premier Room. Facing the sea and literally hundreds of ships sitting at anchor in Singapore Strait, it was a super luxurious room.
Before we got to the room, though, we had a special thrill and complete surprise when we were picked up at Changi airport by a stretch Maybach Mercedes limousine. Andrew thinks the car alone was worth about AUD $450,000!
The star of MBS, though, is the infinity edge pool on the 57th floor. We couldn’t get enough of it! At times, it was pretty busy and there were a lot more kids than I expected. To be honest, I didn’t expect any!! Despite the squealing and the splashing, this pool is epic. At 151 metres long, there is also plenty of room for the splashing kids and us!
We loved the pool and the al fresco restaurant adjacent, Spago Bar and Lounge.
MBS threw in entry to the ArtScience Museum. This was a surprise – the Exhibitions were fascinating. We were able to view the Iris Van Herpen Exhibition and see the incredible imagination and technique that fuses art with fashion with sculpture.
I really wanted to revisit my childhood so we took the MRT (the subway) to Orchard Road and had a wander through Lucky Plaza. Forty years ago, I spent many hours there whilst Dad bartered for electronics and tennis racquets. He bought for himself, for us and for anyone who asked him to bring back a camera or a tennis racquet. Dad loved haggling the price – something I did not inherit. I think he also loved being the conduit for friends and colleagues from suburban Melbourne to exotic South East Asia and the then super cheap prices. Times have changed!
We loved the buzz of MBS. They kindly chauffeured us (in a very nice but more ordinary van this time!) to Raffles, Singapore. In that fifteen-minute drive, we were transported from new world to old world, from dazzle to chic, from sparkles to effortless class. Wowser!
At Raffles, we had a Palm Court King Suite. Similar to the room we had at E&O. Beautiful and spacious, we were pinching ourselves. Raffles also organised various experiences for us. We were kept so busy that we didn’t leave Raffles until their E-class Mercedes took us to the airport. Honestly, we were treated like A-listers this whole trip but Raffles took this to another level.
We started with a Singapore Sling experience at the historic Long Bar, then a Tasting Menu at the Butcher’s Block, breakfast both days, a Tasting Menu lunch at Yì by Jereme Leung, cocktails at the Writers’ Bar and Indian dinner in the Tiffin Room. I also had a luxuriant massage at the Spa. In between, we managed to film a YouTube episode. No wonder I am typing this blog entry on the plane!
The meals, particularly at Butchers’ Block and Yì by Jereme Leung, were fine dining extravaganzas. Food that I would never think to create let alone be able to was presented to us, course after course. We were blown away.
We’ll be busy now – me writing some stories about our experiences and Andrew editing four YouTube episodes (E&O, Rasa Sayang, Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Raffles). A small price to pay for such a memorable couple of weeks and, to be honest, a lovely way to re-live the amazing experiences we had.
My published travel writing has been minimal this month but I have a lot in the queue so there’s some bumper months to come! I am proud of the two pieces which were published. The first on,e “Fearless Foodie,” in July’s edition of “Peninsula Essence” was done with little notice and a quickly-organised Zoom interview when I was in York https://issuu.com/peninsulaessence/docs/pe_current (pp34-39). The second was a story about afternoon tea at Raffles at OWO. I hope that I get a chance to stay there one day. So much history resides in the walls of the Old War Office. The story is called “Spies like Me” (like the current afternoon tea offering) - https://thepaige.au/spies-like-me-afternoon-tea-at-raffles-london/
I also had three little fiction stories published by Impspired – Living, Going Troppo and Snuffing out the Light - https://impspired.com/2025/07/25/leonie-jarrett-6/
Last but not least, our "little" YouTube channel has crossed 35,000 subscribers!!!! We'll release some hotel reviews soon...a new concept for the channel.
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