San Francisco

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California Travelogue – (Part 4): Golden Gate Park, California Academy of Sciences, Facebook, Googleplex, Stanford University, Big Sur and Solvang Village

September 21, 2019 katongkidsinc

Time passes so fast, it would have been a year before we complete our US travelogue. We had a magical experience visiting the Golden Gate Bridge the day before.

And we were ready to leave San Francisco, but not before collecting our rental car.

We had 5 pieces of luggage and were told that we had to take a Buick Enclave to fit our family inside..

Wasting no time after the car collection, we hit the Golden Gate Park.

The San Francisco Botanical Garden is a living museum within Golden Gate Park where it houses landscaped gardens containing over 8,500 different kinds of plants from around the world.

A short distance away is the California Academy of Sciences. We heard that it’s a must to check out this discovery centre as by far, it’s an educational experience that every kid will never forget.

The California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park has three combined attractions where we could explore the aquarium, planetarium, and a natural history museum.

Our first time seeing a white alligator, one of the rarest in the world!

There was a school excursion and many curious kids are here at the rainforest exhibit.

The building just offers endless fun! We spent about 2 hours here which was rather short before hitting the road.

We drove along the Pacific Coast Highland where there are 13 incredible stops on your visit to California. Well, we tried our best but it was challenging to visit every single attractions.

We stopped by Silicon Valley to visit Facebook Headquarters and Googleplex.

Continue our journey and checked Stanford University.

Hit the road again..

We passed by Santa Cruz, Monterey and on our way to Big Sur, cattle feeding on the hills.

Taking a breather and had our lunch before moving to our next accommodation.

Finally arrived at our Airbnb!

The landlord provided instruction how to retrieve the keys.

A big house where we stayed together with the landlord.

The next day, we hit the road again (as usual) where we covered about 450km per day.

Stopped at rest points to have our meals.

After driving about 300km, we finally reached Denmark. Did we hear correctly? More than a 100 years ago, a group of Danes settled in a corner of this idyllic place.

The beautiful Solvang is a city in Santa Barbara County, California. This charming Danish village is nestled in the Santa Ynez Valley that looks and smells like Christmas year-round.

Every spot is so tempting for us to pause by to take photos.

Yummy! We were seized by the delicious scent of freshly-baked pastries.

Small M was thrilled to see the famous windmill!

Solvang town where visitors will see all kinds of shops and bakeries, as well as windmills, which everyone loves.

Just one of their growing up years.

It was a perfect day to sit out and map out our Solvang plans for the day.

Just finding joy in the little things. Click here to follow Katong Kids Inc Facebook Page to stay tune on the next travel post.

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Golden Gate Bridge, Photography, San Francisco, United States

California Travelogue – (Part 3): Golden Gate Bridge

September 2, 2019December 16, 2019 katongkidsinc

One of the best highlights of our trip to west coastwas the visit to the Golden Gate Bridge, an iconic structure connecting the city of San Francisco to Marin County, California.

The seafloor features including large sand waves and rock pinnacles.

A stroll down the bridge can get pretty busy and touristy during the day. We just need to be patient to get the perspective shots we need.

And this makes her a really happy girl.

The Golden Gate Bridge is known as the engineering feat and iconic of so many aspects of American culture and history.

We were glad to carve out the time to pay this iconic site a visit. For both, they finally made a mark on this special spot in San Francisco.

Just finding joy in the little things. Click here to follow Katong Kids Inc Facebook Page to stay tune on the next travel post.

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California Travelogue – (Part 2): San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park, Maritime Museum, Ghirardelli Square, Lombard Street and Chinatown

June 12, 2019 katongkidsinc

Soak into the sights, sounds and smells of San Francisco. We did a tour of the Fisherman’s Wharf neighborhood, San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. The Park includes a magnificent fleet of historic ships, a Visitor Center, Maritime Museum, Maritime Research Center, and Aquatic Park Historic District.

It was an easy tour as the place wasn’t huge.

A short walk further down was the Maritime Museum which was located in the Aquatic Park Bathhouse Building.

Ghirardelli Square is a convenient stop for chocolate and ice cream while already visiting at Fisherman’s Wharf.

No trip to San Francisco is complete without tasting sweet chocolate from those chocolate dream-makers at Ghirardelli. Ghirardelli’s sundaes are real special.

We did not drive during our stay in San Francisco. Instead, we walked, walked and walked.

As you can see, the roads here were steep and it was a test of endurance and good form of exercise.

This picture is a good example to get a sense of how steep the streets were.

We did have the chance to see the splendor of the West Coast, here was what San Francisco looked and felt like.

Strolling down one of America’s crookedest streets in the form of Lombard Street is a blessing! The steep, hilly street was created with sharp curves to switchback down the one-way hill past beautiful Victorian mansions.

Lombard Street is definitely one of the most photographed spot in San Francisco. Tourists just couldn’t resist its charm and uniqueness.

This street has eight tight hairpin turns through the neighborhood where guests can either drive, or walk, down for an interesting adventure.

After exploring Lombard Street, we walked to the Chinatown.

San Francisco’s Chinatown is the oldest one in North America (surprisingly well maintained) and covers 24 city blocks.

Trying out the delicious and yummy dim sum!

We finally found the the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory after getting lost! Located in Ross Alley, formerly called the “Street of the Gamblers”; the little factory here makes fortune cookies.

We had no idea why it was so popular among tourists. In fact, we don’t think there is anything special about fortune cookies. Nevertheless, it was a pleasant sight watching the lady sitting at the assembly line, folding and filling the cookies by hand.

Big and Small M at the Dragon Gate, the official entrance into Chinatown on Bush Street, where Grant Avenue takes you into the heart of Chinatown.

Another Macy’s in San Francisco 🙂

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California Travelogue – (Part 1): San Francisco Cable Car, Powell Street and Fisherman Wharf

May 2, 2019 katongkidsinc

After our New York trip, we took a 6.5 hour flight to San Francisco.

San Francisco, in northern California, is a hilly city on the tip of a peninsula surrounded by the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay. It’s known for its year-round fog, iconic Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars and colorful Victorian houses.

Our first impression of San Francisco was its cleaniness. The tram was really clean and a big contrast to NYC in which it was not crowded.

Thanks to our friends staying in California, we were recommended to take the BART train to Powell Street.

So clean and fresh!

We would be staying at Axiom Hotel, which was just located above the Powell Station. It took about 2 to 3 mins walk to the hotel.

The reason we chose Axiom Hotel was it’s close proximity to the train station. The place was centralised to every tourist activities but we were cautioned that it was near to the Tenderlion neighbourhood where the streets were shady and you wouldn’t want to bump onto people you wouldn’t want to meet. Glad that there was a right soul who walked up and told us not to cross the street, else we would be venturing into the neighbourhood. Yes, the google map did fail us at times.

Cute robot to attend to our needs.

Burger King was beside our hotel.

We were glad that the cable car station was outside our hotel. During peak hour, the queue could linger till late into the night. The ticket cost $7 each.

We are going to the Fisherman’s Wharf. Fisherman’s Wharf, on the northern waterfront, is one of the city’s busiest tourist areas. Souvenir shops and stalls selling crab and clam chowder in sourdough bread bowls appear at every turn.

The streets of San Francisco was just amazing. It would take a lot of energy just to walk up the slopes and they were appearing at every junction we stopped.

Slopes again. How to survive without owning cars here?

No experience is more uniquely San Francisco than a ride on a cable car. A must-try experience here!

It’s convenient to travel here and we don’t really need to drive.

The Ross store is a great place to find cheap stuff.

Love these laundry buckets so much (only $13) but how to bring back home 😦

The crab meat and prawns were very juicy. It cost about US$70.

Spent the afternoon exploring the streets.

If In-N-Out Burger comes to Singapore, it will beat all the fast food restaurants hands down.

Our favourite pasttime. Buying a loaf of cheap bread when visiting the harbour to feed the birds.

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Fly LegsUp Flight Hammock for Kids

December 22, 2018January 5, 2020 katongkidsinc

With travelling up to a total of 48 hours on economy seats, seeking comfort during these long haul flights is a priority. The Fly LegsUp Flight Hammock provides the answer as the ultimate travel companion for adults and children.

Fly LegsUp Kids — Photo Credit: Fly LegsUp

The hammock enables Small M to elevate her feet and legs into different positions, supported by comfortable inflatable pillows. Experimenting it for the first time, it greatly made her flight more comfortable.

Fly LegsUp Flight Hammock is washable, folds compact, and weighs less than 500g. Its versatile design accommodates for the differences in kids and airline seats. This is a travel essential to be ticked in your itinerary.

Our Fly LegsUp for Kids pack, includes:

– Our patented Fly LegsUp Flight Hammock

– 1 small pillow and 2 large pillows

– Travel bag

– Kids instruction sheet with suggested positions

Fly LegsUp for Kids

Website / Booking: https://www.flylegsupsingapore.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/flylegsupsingapore/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=g4pJhAjQDjg

Phone : Yvonne +65 8661 1226

Email : yvonne@flylegsupsingapore.com

Retailers

Lilliewoods Social
I12 Katong Mall
112 East Coast Road
#01-24
Singapore 428802

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Recommendation – Why You Should Rent Traveler WiFi Router for Overseas Travel

December 22, 2018December 18, 2019 katongkidsinc

Our overseas trips have been much dependent on buying SIM cards at airport terminals or tapping into free wifi connection at hotels or cafes. In our recent travel to UK and the States, we decided to rent a portable WiFi router from Traveler Wifi to give it a try for the first time and after trying it out, we are very impressed and will definitely tick it as a travel essential in the future.

These are the top 5 reasons why you should be using Traveler Wifi:

#1 – Hassle Free with Worldwide Connection

Traveling across different continents require us to purchase multiple SIM cards which can be a hassle as it could only be tagged to a mobile device. With Traveler Wifi, it offers secured global coverage which support 4G networks. We are looking for hassle free and plug-and-play connection. All we need to do is to switch on the wifi router and it can automatically be detected in the network after keying in the password provided.

#2 – Long Battery Duration

We were told that Travel Wifi router offers up to 15 hours of connectivity. Based on our experience during the trip, it could easily last 13 hours without a single charge (with 3 mobile devices connected) before we returned to the hotel which we will change to hotel’s wifi. The pocket router could also be charged from a powerbank when we are on the go.

#3 – Cost Savings

The wifi router can connect up to 5 smart devices at the same time! It offers unlimited data with fair-use policy. If daily data usage exceeds 500 MB, router speed will slow down but can still connect and use. Data usage count is reset on daily basis. This provides cost savings when comparing to purchasing a SIM card which can only connect to 1 smart device and not forgeting you may need to figure out how to activate the SIM card.

#4 – Multiple Service Counters to Collect

To make collection easier, Traveler Wifi has different service counters conveniently located at the following locations:

Service Counters Islandwide:

(NO reservation required; customers can rent Wifi Routers directly at any of the retail service counters)

Orchard Road
- Lucky Plaza, 304 Orchard Road #B1-108 (Perfumes & Cosmetics Gallery: 11:30am-9pm daily; Friday 12.30pm -2pm – Closed)
Chinatown
- People’s Park Centre, 101 Upper Cross Street #08-19 (Incredible Odyssey: 11am-6pm; Sat & Sun – Closed, Public Holiday – Closed).
  [you may message 91065688 before coming to Chinatown service counter]
Lavender
- 322 Lavender Street (Gap Year Hostel: Daily 8am-8pm)
  [Please note only for Singapore WiFi routers rental/return at Lavender service counter]

#5 – Happy Memories

Big & Small M were probably the biggest beneficiaries of this trip. With Traveler Wifi router, they were allowed to use our mobile phones during the long road trips to keep themselves occupied.

We drove from San Francisco – Silicon Valley – Big Sur – Solvang – Santa Monica – Las Vegas – Los Angeles which we will blog about the journeys later so stay tune. These would not be possible without the wifi router which was certainly a life saver as it provided us with google map directions during the long, long and long drive.

And we went places before hitting the books after the holidays.

From London Bridge and Tower Bridge.

To New York – Statue of Liberty.

To San Francisco – Golden Gate Bridge.

To Silicon Valley – Googleplex.

To Las Vegas – Bonnie Springs Ranch.

And Los Angeles – Hollywood Boulevard.

Enough said. First time using wifi router and we were convinced of it’s convenience. Planning your upcoming trip soon and need a wifi router? Do not forget to check out Traveler Wifi!

Traveler Wifi

Website / Booking: http://traveler-wifi.com/cms

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/travelerwifi/

Service Locations: http://traveler-wifi.com/cms/service-locations

Call for Enquiries) –

(65) 66528470 (General Enquiry) – [Mon-Fri : 9am – 6pm]

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Road Trip: Pacific Coast Highway

August 25, 2018August 26, 2018 katongkidsinc

It is not often we can get a chance to be across the globe. As evidenced by the beautiful scenic pictures that keep cropping up in our trip planning, the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) promises unique landscapes and plenty of places to stop and explore. However, we are still toying with the idea of whether to take a domestic flight or drive along the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH).

The distance stretches up to 800 km and it does not seem possible to complete the route within a day without exploration.

A tad daunting, perhaps.

An initial thought was making interval stops before hitting Los Angeles (LA). That means shortening the time we have in LA, an itinerary that we felt are not conventional to many travellers as they prefer to spend more time in LA with the availability of amusement parks. After some research, it seems hard to miss out attractions along PCH.

All thanks to Outdoor Blueprint, they made trip planning easier with these attractions laid out neatly.