I recently completed the Kingdoms & Dragons: Singapore to Bali tour. I thought I’d post a review in three parts. Part 1 - Timing and Tips; Part 2 - Hotels; Part 3 - Daily Sights and Activities.
Part 1a - Timing and Tips
This tour is offered from May through October. That establishes the general timing of when you can take the tour. Within that window several factors drive what 14 day window is the best for each person. Here are some factors to consider:
A) Personal availability
temperature/humidity/precipitation historical data
C) desire to include or exclude certain events, holidays, etc
D) cost and availability of desired airline routing
Per our Tour Director (Debra Grant), who has led these tours for years, July/August are the best months for the chance of lower temperatures, lower humidity, and lower precipitation as a whole. This statement, matched the research I had done and is why we selected the August 17 - August 30 tour.
Temperature/Humidity - this tour takes place from a few degrees north of the equator to a few degrees south of the equator. This tour was the most humid of any of the 20 tours (13 with Tauck) that I have taken. The humidity, for me, didn’t deter my enjoyment of any of the scheduled activities, but it did dampen my enthusiasm for doing additional activities in tour free time. I found myself enjoying hotel amenities (pools, A/C, etc) in tour free time to escape the humidity vs adding in extra activities. If you’re a veteran of humidity (eg. live on the east coast or in the southeast) then the humidity might not be a large factor for you. The temperature/humidity also impacted our decision on restaurants for meals on our own. We had identified a couple of restaurants to consider prior to the trip, but opted for hotel restaurants instead.
Another thing that drove some of our decisions was seeking routes to places that maximized the route within air-conditioned walkways.
I found myself taking a wash cloth from the hotel with me to help dry my brow. The TD provided cheap foldable fans for use throughout the tour. I used it a lot. One couple brought personal cooling devices (not sure what they are called, but they fit around the neck and provide a source of air). Other people brought portable hand held fans. I think some thought in this area as what would be the best option for you be considered.
One thing for people that bring SLRs or point and shoot cameras to keep in mind is that at the start of each day it took my camera about 45 minutes to come to equilibrium with the hot/humid weather. Sitting in the cool air conditioned rooms over night resulted in the lens becoming foggy and unusable until the equipment reached equilibrium.
Lastly, hydration is a key element to remember on this tour. A couple of times people got a bit light headed, likely due to lack of sufficient hydration. Water is provided on the buses that can be taken on activities and upon return to the bus following activities.
Precipitation - we weren’t seriously impacted by rain. We only had short rain showers on a couple of days. The only heavy rain we had was on our drive from the airport to the Raffles hotel in Singapore, so no real impact except slowing down the drive a bit. For dealing with the rain the TD provided cheap disposable ponchos on a couple of times. I put one on for a short while. Just remember that the area is hot and humid so adding additional clothing may not be the best option. On one other time I used a small, collapsible umbrella that I had brought with me. Some visited sites provide umbrellas as well, if needed.
Another thing to remember about rain is that it can impact activities in various ways.
If it rains very much during scheduled visits to areas where seeing monkeys is a highlight it could impact their availability. The local guides say that any significant rain tends to make the monkeys seek shelter, many fewer photo ops. We were scheduled to visit the Monkey Forest one afternoon. It rained some in the morning so we were worried, but the rain stopped by lunch and so the monkey viewings were plentiful.
We did have a minor impact due to rain because a portion of our Volkswagen Thing tour was cancelled due to rain. They were replaced by vans. Fortunately the bulk of the Volkswagen Thing drive was included. It turned out to be one of the unexpected treats of the tour.
Part 1b to follow
