More Singaporeans are going on staycations now, especially now that it’s not yet safe to travel.
As the pandemic lingers on and the year-end school holidays approach, demand looks set to skyrocket.
In a bid to offer greater diversity and appeal to more targeted demographics, some hotels are positioning their staycations as novel experiences.
Millennium Hotels and Resorts, for example, has launched a Yacht-cation Escape package. Bookings at Orchard Hotel and M Social include a sailing expedition to the Southern Islands of Singapore.
In need of a quiet place to work because the house next door is undergoing renovation? Long-suffering neighbours can seek respite from the drilling and hacking by taking a Reno-Vacation at Frasers Hospitality’s serviced residences. Even pets are welcome at Fraser Suites Singapore, Fraser Place Robertson Walk and Fraser Residence Orchard.
For anyone who has ever looked at a shipping container and felt it looked cosy, Shipping Container Hotel may be calling your name. The pop-up hotel claims you can be an off-the-grid pioneer, yet still live the luxe hotel life – in a metal oblong.
Meanwhile, if you are a mum fed up with home-based learning and working from home, Fairmont Hotel has a relaxing Mumcation package for you.
Three journalists from The Sunday Times check out hotel life with a difference. It’s hard work but someone’s got to do it.
Some things you only realise when you are a mum.
I didn’t know, for instance, that going swimming would for years entail moving in water in a family pod like porpoises.
At first, it was because the kids were too young so it was one parent watching one child each in the baby pools.
WHERE: 80 Bras Basah Road
INFO: https://www.fairmont-singapore.com/offer/mumcation/
RATES: The Mumcation, valid till Dec 30, is priced at $385++ for a single guest and $495++ for two guests. The package includes a 90-minute Aromatherapy Relaxation Massage at Willow Stream Spa; breakfast in bed or at Prego restaurant; high tea in Anti:dote tea lounge, a bath set from Lush Singapore and Uniqlo loungewear.
There are two kinds of people in this world: Those who get excited at the idea of living in recycled packaging and those who don’t.
As I step into the blue box that will be my home for the next 20 hours, I think about the voyages it has taken around the planet and what it has carried. And if I might be able to smell it.
But even if my unit – wrenched from its oceanic travels and plonked here on a grassy patch in Ayer Rajah Crescent like a beached whale – had smelled of cooking oil and automotive parts, I would not have minded, because I find the idea of a shipping container hotel cool.
WHERE: Blocks 77 and 81, Ayer Rajah Crescent
INFO: shippingcontainerhotel.com
RATES: Basic rates before service tax and GST are $160 (Sundays to Thursdays) and $180 (Fridays and Saturdays)
The promotional photos and videos for Orchard Hotel’s suite-and-yacht staycation show young adults sipping bubbly, living the carefree, Instagram-worthy luxe life on a yacht.
Not the usual hotel stay, for sure.
But I wondered if all this opulence would be lost on two frazzled parents with a pair of bouncy, always-on-the-move daughters, aged seven and a little under two.
My doubts were unfounded. There was plenty to satiate both parents and kids, from a yacht trip and an island jaunt to water sports and customised culinary experiences. We even had a butler, Raymond, at our beck and call.
INFO: Bookings at Orchard Hotel and M Social
This article was first published in The Straits Times.