Go everywhere, Do everything

Sentosa Island is on the southern tip of Singapore, reached by road bridge or cable car and is the beach and holiday destination part of Singapore.

Sentosa is even greener than Singapore and has everything you need for either a relaxing or action packed vacation. Sentosa has a lot to offer for a tiny island, its home to Resort World Sentosa which includes the Universal park, beach resorts, indoor skydiving and various other activities and the historical fort at Siloso Point.

The island has a main centre at Resort World Sentosa where Universal, Adventure Cove and the Aquarium are. There are also several hotels here, restaurants, shops and the casino. There are several other hotels, activities, beaches spread across the rest of the island all connected by excellent transport links.

Where we stayed:

We stayed at Sofitel Singapore Sentosa Resort and Spa which was slightly away from the main areas but was a beautiful resort and we really appreciated somewhere quiet to have some down time.

What we did:

Adventure Cove Waterpark

The Adventure Cover water is located in the main area of Resort World Sentosa behind the Aquarium. It’s not a massive water park and like the other attractions at Resort World Sentosa its opening hours are limited (10am- 5pm)so it is perfectly doable in one day.

There are a mixture of rides for all ages with some larger adrenaline rides, relaxing lazy river, wave pool and splash areas for younger children. There is also Rainbow Reef where you can snorkel with fish and also shark and dolphin encounter. We found there was plenty to do to fill our day and we only did the rides and wave pool we didn’t do any of the swim with fish/ dolphin/ shark activities.

You can find more details about Adventure Cove water park here.

Universal Studios Singapore

Pip was most looking forward to our day at Universal and it was really interesting to compare it to Universal Orlando. Singapore has only one park divided in to New York, Sci-fi City, Ancient Egypt, The Lost World, Far Far Away and Hollywood.

We had the express pass so were able to do all the rides that we wanted to without having to wait too long. We also managed to meet Gru and some of the Minions and Pip got her shopping fix. As it is a much smaller park we felt we had managed to do everything we wanted and we even managed to ride Battlestar Galactica: Cylon twice in a row at the end of the day as there was no queue.

Fort Siloso

Sentosa might currently be a holiday destination but it has a really fascinating past. Fort Silos houses a small but really interesting museum telling the story of the islands role in various battles and wars and the history of the British forces that were based there. The museum is spread out over several of the original buildings including some of the underground defences. The fort is free to enter and we took about and hour to wander the trail around the buildings.

Siloso Point is worth a visit if you are not staying nearby as the beach is lovely and there are lots of activities other than the fort.

Pool day

One of the days we were there we just completely ran out of steam and decided to have a pool day which was lovely. Sentosa is so green and and there are lots of places to chill out if you don’t want to stay at your hotel. We were too lazy to bother to explore further afield but there are beaches you can visit as well.

Cable Car

There are several cable cars on the island, you can take one from across to the mainland or up to Siloso Point. While most of the transport on the island is free there is an additional charge for the cable cars, however it is definitely worth it for the views. We took the cable car up to Siloso Point and then took the free bus back.

Food

The area around Resort World Sentosa was quiet on an evening after everyone had left the parks and we ate there a few times without having made reservations. We had lunch at Universal, Adventure Cove and our hotel. There are plenty of food options all over the island.

Din Tai Fung

This was our favourite place to eat, not just for the delicious food but also because we were shown to our table by a robot! The menu is a selection of noodle dishes, dumplings and steamed buns. Pip has fried rice and pork, Andy had a hot and sour soup and I had steamed vegetarian buns, all completely delicious.

McDonalds

Sometimes you just need something familiar and then are several fast food options on the island. There wasn’t much in the way of vegetarian options but the ice creams were very welcome to combat the heat.

Getting around

Transport on Sentosa is really easy although for some reason it did take me a while to get my head around it. There are several bus routes which stop at all the hotels and other main places. There is also the Sentosa Express which is a monorail that services 4 main stations. This is all free and runs regularly from early morning until late at night. There are also cycle routes and a beach shuttle.

Full details of the island transport can be found here.

Getting there

We took a taxi from our hotel in Singapore to our hotel on the island which was quick and easy. There is a small fee for cars driving on to the island if you are driving yourself.

You can also get a cable car from the main land (although luggage isn’t allowed in the cable car) or a bus or the Sentosa Express.

We visited in April 2023 when Pip was 10, the resort was still fairly quiet after Covid.