Penang, Phuket & Langkawi

Singapore is not really a port of call. Of the itineraries in our data that touch it, roughly seven in ten start or end here, so for most people this is the flight, the hotel and the day on either side of the cruise, not six hours ashore.

Which terminal you get changes the whole day. Big ships use Marina Bay Cruise Centre, out on Marina South about two miles from downtown; Marina South Pier MRT is a third of a mile away under cover, and the red line runs from there into the city in under twenty minutes. Smaller ships use the Singapore Cruise Centre at HarbourFront, where the MRT station and the VivoCity mall are attached to the building and Sentosa is across the street. The first needs a plan, the second does not.

Do not buy a transit card. Tap a contactless credit card or your phone at the fare gate and the fare, about S$1.30 to S$2.60, comes off directly. The tourist pass only pays for itself at eight or more trips a day, which nobody does.

Eat at hawker centers and ignore the restaurants. Maxwell, Lau Pa Sat and Old Airport Road are food courts where individual stalls hold Michelin listings and a plate of chicken rice or laksa runs a few dollars. Lau Pa Sat is a short walk from the Marina Bay side and closes its street to traffic in the evening for the satay grills.

Plan the middle of the day indoors. It is one degree north of the equator: high eighties every day of the year, humidity in the eighties with it, and a thunderstorm most afternoons. The Cloud Forest and Flower Dome, the museums and the MRT itself are all air-conditioned. Save the Supertree Grove and the free light show for after dark, which is when it is worth seeing anyway.

The rules are real and they are enforced. No eating or drinking on the MRT, including water, carries a S$500 fine, chewing gum is not sold anywhere, and durian is banned from public transit. None of it is a trap; the signs are everywhere. In exchange you get a city where nothing gets stolen and the tap water is fine.