How do you plan a trip to Singapore from India on your own instead of a guided tour? Singapore is one of the most sought after destinations for holiday with family and kids. Even more so with kids. It’s particularly loved amongst Indians. Since the country has a substantial Indian populations. Thus, Indian food and Indian culture is all over Singapore 🙂 . And it is also located at a flying distance of just 4 hours from India.  Moreover, Singapore makes for an idle destination to visit in May and June, when it’s kid’s summer vacation time in India!! As we took a 5 days trip to Singapore from India, we realised it is very easy to plan a 5 days trip to Singapore from India. And you can do all the planning on your own. So, in this blog post, we will tell you how you can plan your own 5 days trip to Singapore from India, while we were pondering where to go next after our beautiful Meghalaya trip. 

Prior to your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Prior to your trip, you need to do your bookings and obtain your Singapore VISA. Bookings would include:

• A round trip flight ticket to Singapore from your starting city in India
• Your accommodation
• Tickets to the attractions that you want to visit

Booking your flight for your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

To book your flight, compare different flight options at skyscanner.in or similar website. And choose the one that suits you the best. Since there are many flights from Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore and other major cities of India to Singapore. Do try these tips and tricks to score cheaper flights. We flew scoot airlines on our own trip to Singapore, having booked the tickets through makemytrip . It is an economical airlines. Here, we had the choice to just book a round trip ticket with a cabin luggage only option. And then later we could top it up anytime, up to a couple of hours before flying. The top-ups included:

1. Buying a check-in luggage option by paying a nominal fee.
2. Choice of a meal from the given options online on scoot airlines website at a minimal cost.
3. Web check-in with reserving the seats of our choice.

For a 5 days trip to Singapore, if you pack wisely, you can easily accommodate your luggage in a cabin only backpack or small trolley bag. We did the same for our trip, and easily accomplished it using our travel packing tricks that we use frequently now. The best advantage of a cabin only luggage is that you need not wait for your checked in luggage, which often wastes more than half an hour of time.

Singapore VISA for your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Indians require a VISA to visit Singapore. Singapore VISA is applied online. But in India, there are authorized agents who do it. You will definitely find one in your city. For South India, the VISA applications are processed from Chennai embassy while for North India from Delhi embassy. The VISA application costs around INR 1500 at the time of this writing. And the agents add a small application processing fee on top of it. We went with Thomas Cook to get our VISA application processed, however, we didn’t have an idle experience with them. Read this article for the details of how to get the Singapore VISA from India, what documents are required etc.

Read: How to get Singapore Tourist VISA for Indians

Booking an accommodation for your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Singapore has many different accommodation options. Depending on what suits you, choose one at least 3 months in advance and book online to get better deals. There are hundreds of accommodations (hostels, hostels, apartments, B&Bs) listed on Booking.com and Agoda.com, our favorite go to sites for accommodation booking. 

If you are traveling with friends or backpacking solo, and are on a strict budget, then there are many hostels that cost as low as INR650 per night. If you are traveling with friends or family and want to have a private space, then go for one of the many service apartment options. They range from economy to luxury. Similarly, there are many hotel options, ranging from economy (starting at INR 2500 per night) and going to luxury and super luxury. But you must book your accommodation in advance for the mid-range options, since get filled up the fastest. 

If possible book something which is close to the attractions that are on your must visit list. And also close to a public transport like a MRT station.

Our hotel in Singapore

We booked our Singapore hotel, Hotel Parc Sovereign, through agoda.com. For our trip to Singapore in the year 2018. The reason we booked this accommodation was:

1. There was free cancellation till 4 days before our travel, with total refund.
2. We needed to make the payment only 4 days before our travel, although we had booked the rooms 2 months in advance.
3. Most of the airbnb options and service apartments were not cancellable.
4. The hotel is located quite near to Kitchener Road, where there are many Indian Food Restaurants. So, we thought it would be convenient for our  elderly parents taking the trip with us, to walk and have Indian food, as they accompanied us on this trip
5. The hotel was also near to most of the attractions that we wanted to visit like Sentosa Island, Merlion, Gardens by the Bay etc.
6. There is a MRT at around 600m from the hotel, again, walkable.

What to pack for a trip to Singapore from India

Singapore has hot and humid climate all through the year. As such, you need to pack really light cloths. Checkout our comprehensive travel packing checklist to help you pack the right travel accessories , your camera for the travel and travel essentials that you must have. Also, if you are traveling with baby, toddler or kids like we us, you should definitely checkout our travel packing essentials that are made for kids! We don’t go anywhere without them. Last, but not the least, don’t forget to pack your essential medicines for travel when traveling to Singapore. It is not easy to procure a medicine there if required. My father forgot his insulin and he couldn’t get any in Singapore without first visiting a doctor, going through a thorough assessment and then obtaining a prescription !

Deciding the things to do and places to see

There are many things to do and places to see in Singapore. Of course, not all can be done on a 5 days trip to Singapore. So, you need to choose. If you are traveling with a group of friends or doing a solo trip to Singapore, you might have a different kind of interest area than when you are traveling with family and kids. Also, whether you are interested in shopping or food, adventure or calm trip, it all would determine what you would want to add to your 5 days trip to Singapore from India.

We visited Singapore with our parents and our kid. Thus, we added things to our own 5 days trip to Singapore from India, so that they balance the interest of everyone. Accordingly, I am categorizing the things, and you can choose one or more of them. The one in Italics are the ones we were able to cover on our trip:

1. Kids friendly attractions : Singapore Zoo, River Safari, Night Safari, Jurong Bird Park, Universal Studio Singapore, SEA Aquarium, Dolphin Island, Butterfly park & Insect Kingdom
2. Other attractions : Gardens by the bay, Merlion, Marina Bay, Botanical Gardens, Singapore Flyer
3. Shopping options: Orchard Road and the numerous malls there, Mustafa Center on Kitchener Road, Bugis Street Market, Little India

Booking tickets to the attractions

For most of the attractions that require an entry ticket, you can book the ticket online. The prices are fixed. So, you can book them anytime before your trip. This will save you time waiting in the queue at the entrance to the attractions to book your ticket. However, the queues here are not too long, like the ones for attractions in Europe that we visited last year like the Vatican in Rome, Engelberg and Mount Titlis or the entrance ticket to Keukenhof Tulip Gardens.

For Singapore, we had booked online the combo tickets to the Singapore Zoo, night safari, river safari and jurong bird park, which was discounted compared to the individual tickets. We had also booked the tickets to Universal Studio online. Rest all, we had thought we will book on the fly as and when we decide to visit somewhere.

Day 1 of your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Always keep the first day light. As you need some time to give yourself after your flight, check-in and landing into a new place, before you can start full fledged exploration. Also Singapore timezone is 2.5 hrs ahead of India, which means, there might be a slight jet lag on the first day. Particularly with kids.

On the first day of our 5 days trip to Singapore from India, we arrived in Singapore at 8:30am in the morning. However, clearing immigration took around an hours time as there was a long queue. From the airport, we then went straight to Kitchener Road and had breakfast/lunch there in Shravana Bhavan, a South Indian Food Joint. Also, we bought some fruits from nearby grocery store. From here, we walked to our hotel and reached there by around 12:00 pm. Although the hotel check-in time was 3:00 pm. But luckily, our rooms got ready by 1:00 pm and then we shifted to our room and took rest for couple of hours.

Evening, we had planned to visit Marina Bay, Gardens by the Bay and Merlion. Later, while returning from there, we again had dinner at the same road, in a restaurant next to Shravana Bhavan. In fact, for the rest of the trip we visited this area for breakfast and dinner since we could easily get many Indian Restaurants here which was really convenient for our parents.

Day 2 of your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

On the second day of our 5 days trip to Singapore from India, we visited Universal Studio. We had kept the previous day light. So, we had a good night’s sleep to wake up fresh today. Post breakfast, we headed to Universal Studio on the Sentosa Island. Inside Universal Studio, we tried to mix the activities so that both we and our kid would enjoy. So, we did some kid friendly rides, some adventure rides for adults and enjoyed the Shrek 4 D Adventure movie as well. There are plenty of food options inside Universal Studio but most of them are fast food options, and there are very limited options for vegetarians. You could carry packaged and sealed snacks from outside as well. Open food containers are not allowed as per the information on the internet, but, we didn’t have any of our bags checked.

Read: Universal Studio Singapore in a day

Day 3 of your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

After a day full of fun at Universal Studio Singapore, today, we headed to Sentosa Island to visit rest of the attractions here. Our day started with a visit to SEA Aquarium, which is considered one of the best aquarium parks in the world. It look us much more than the anticipated amount of time to complete our trip of SEA Aquarium, Singapore since our little one spent time appreciating each and every variety of fish that she could see. When we came out of there by noon, we had lunch near the Malaysian Food Court between the SEA Aquarium and Universal Studio entrances. Thereafter we roamed around the Sentosa Island before heading back to the main city of Singapore. We intended to cover the Butterfly park and Insect Kingdom as well. But we couldn’t as the kid was very sleepy. If you can, do add them next to your itinerary. In fact, you could add the Sentosa Island Attractions in the following order on this day of your trip:

1. SEA Aquarium
2. Butterfly park and Insect Kingdom
3. Dolphin Show
4. Cable Car ride back to the main island of Singapore

Day 4 of your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Today, start the day with visiting the Singapore Zoo as we did. Either reach early and have breakfast at one of the restaurants at the entrance of the zoo. Or, you can book a “breakfast with Orangutans” which your kids will definitely love. There are a couple of vegetarian Indian food options on almost all the restaurants either outside or inside the Singapore zoo. If you explore the zoo properly, it will take you around 5-6 hours easily. Arrive a little late in the zoo in case you want to combine the zoo trip with river safari and night safari otherwise you will get exhausted by evening.

Read: Visiting Singapore Zoo with kids

Once done visiting the Singapore zoo, you could get out of the zoo and get into the river safari zone which has entrance just besides the zoo. We headed for the river safari by 5:00 pm. It can be done in around 2 hours. After the river safari is over, you can have dinner at one of the cafes or restaurants in front of the zoo / river safari area. And then proceed for the night safari. The night safari starts post 7:00 pm. It will take you along the trails in the Singapore Zoo at night, where you can see the active nocturnal animals.

Day 5 of your 5 days trip to Singapore from India

Today, being the last day of our trip to Singapore, we again kept it light. Our hotel check-out was around 12:00 pm. And our flight was in the evening. So, we visited the Jurong Bird park in the morning and had breakfast near there. Then we checked-out from our hotel by around 12:00 pm. We left our luggage at the hotel reception and ventured out for some food and shopping. Upon returning, we collected our luggage and proceeded to the Changi Airport. The Changi Airport is nothing less than a grand visiting place in itself. So, we explored the Airport before saying goodbye to Singapore. 

PS: As always, ourselves being travellers with full time day jobs, we could spend only 5 days on our Singapore trip. If you have more time at hand, you can try other attractions in Singapore including Comic Con Singapore, Adventure Cove Waterpark, Changai Airport Attractions, Singapore river cruise, skyline, cable car sky pass, The Maritime Experiential Museum, Snow City Singapore, Sightseeing Bus Tour , Pororo Park and Trick eye museum. We have saved these to try on our next trip to Singapore 🙂 . In case you are exploring many attractions, it’s a good idea to go for an uber pass like an Unlimited attractions pass which will include the entry to many of the attractions. It will give flexibility and will be economical too.

Summary of 5 days trip to Singapore from India

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