From waking up to magnificent views of flora and fauna, enjoying al fresco dining on the 57th floor, to swimming in the world’s largest infinity pool, Marina Bay Sands offers the unparalleled views of Singapore like no other hotels.
The most expensive building built at the time of its opening, Marina Bay Sands, designed by world-famous architect, Moshe Safdie, with its grandeur lobby, 55 floors, 2,561 luxury rooms and suites, 1,300,000 square-foot convention center, shops, a museum, two theaters, and the rooftop Skypark elevated at 200 metres above the ground with the world’s largest infinity pool, is no doubt a showstopper iconic in Singapore.
What’s The Hype About Marina Bay Sands?
Is it the glam factor? Or, is it the chock full of carefully-curated timeless infinity pool shots in Instagram that created the hype? Our recent staycation brought us the answer which we never quite understood in our shopping and dining visits there. It is the VIEW! The breathtaking 360 degree skyline of Singapore that Marina Bay Sands presents in every turn and moment throughout our entire staycation is probably what no other hotels in Singapore can offer.
Check-in
For a hotel with views so dreamy and architecture so beautiful, it is quite peculiar yet fascinating that efficiency is the word that we would use to sum up our check-in experience and perhaps our entire stay at Marina Bay Sands.
Tip: With safe distancing measures in placed, check-in is only available in staggered timings. You can only book your check-in time a day prior to your staycation through an SMS link sent to you. With fastest finger first at play here, we would recommend to book your timeslot as soon as you received the SMS; and to select the earliest slot to avoid the queue forming in the afternoon.
We took one of the earlier sessions at 9.00am. Just as you wonder, does selecting an earlier time entities to an early check-in? The answer is YES!
Keeping in with being efficient, punctuality is imperative for the check-in. 5 minutes before your check-in time, you will received a SMS reminder which includes a queue number for your reference.
So what happens if you are 2 minutes late, like us?
We missed our number, and in a lobby bustling with people, we were glad that our check-in was still a breeze. We were lucky that that we do not need to re-queue and were ushered to the Sands Lounge (reserved for Paiza, Club Room and Suites guests) directly for our check-in.
In the lounge, there were free coffee, tea, and drinks to enjoy while waiting for the check-in process to be completed. Besides our early check-in at 9.00am, we also managed to secure a late check-out at 1.00pm.
Note on COVID-19 guest safety: You will be glad to know that Marina Bay Sands is no longer a Stay Home Notice (SHN) hotel!
Premier Room City View
As well-structured as their check-in process, the hygiene standard in the room is sublime. Stepping into the room, we were greeted by a hint pleasant scent of disinfectant that puts us at ease. After all, being on a staycation, hygiene and safety measures should be the last thing on our mind.
And, then, we were greeted by this stunning floor-to-ceiling city view (level 33) of Marina Bay and Singapore's central business district.
The Premier Room City View features a comfortable firm king-sized bed or twins bed with bedroom benches, a sitting and dining area for two, a huge wardrobe, a 42 inch Smart TV with cable channels, mini-fridge, free wifi, a sizable work desk, in-room safe, and power outlets with USB ports.
In the pantry, you can find a complimentary mini-bar (refillable daily) of 2 bottled juices, 2 soft drinks, bottled water and 2 snacks as well as an espresso coffee machine and tea-making facilities which you could make a cuppa, lay back on the spacious sitting and dining area and enjoy!
The bathroom is huge with double vanities, a deep-soaking bathtub that is perfect for a nighttime soak, and an enclosed split shower and lavatory. The amenities are from Roberto Cavalli, an Italian fashion house. What we love most is that the bathrobes and towels were individually packed and sealed for Covid-19 safety purpose.
Tips:
There are 15 room types consisting of Suites, Grand Club Rooms, Club Rooms, Family Room, Premier Rooms, and Deluxe Room and adding on is the confusing selection of Lower Floor View, Garden View, Harbor View, City View, and Sky View.
So, Suites and Family Rooms aside, what are the differences between each room type? Here's what we found out.
The larger Premier Room (42 sqm) has a bathtub and different furnishing from the Deluxe Room (30 sqm). Both the Premier Room and Deluxe Room offer the lower floor room (2nd to 9th floors, facing the highway or The Shoppes), Garden View with a balcony (10th to 39th floors, facing Gardens by the Bay), Harbour View with a balcony (40th floor and above, facing sea overlooking Gardens by the Bay), City View without balcony (19th to 39th floors, facing city) and Sky View without balcony (40th floor and above, facing city). Rooms without balcony typically feature a seating and dining area for two, whereas rooms with balcony feature a comfortable lounge chair and side table.
Featuring similar furnishing as the Premier Room, the slightly larger Club Room (44sqm) comes with complimentary breakfast, afternoon tea, and evening drinks and canapés at Club55 as well as complimentary laundry, dry cleaning or pressing. Do note that King bed is the only bed size available in the Club Room. As it's name, the larger Grand Club Rooms (62sqm) are corner rooms which features a gorgeous floor-to-ceiling window view in the bathroom and a spacious separate sofa seating area.
Hotel Amenities: Iconic Infinity Pool and SkyPark Observation Deck
Infinity Pool
The highlight of our stay, the Infinity Pool located 57 storeys up from the heart of the Marina Bay area, definitely lives up to its name.
As to why, we cannot really pin-point. Perhaps, it is that nice outdoor breeze on a tall building? Or, the relaxing vibes of lying on a pool chair surrounded by palm trees with a coconut mocktail on hand, our feet soaked in the pool, and our eyes gazing the beautiful skyline?
Maybe, it is the delicious humongous club sandwich?
Or, the complimentary fruit punch that the friendly staff offered us each time?
Or the fact that we can find a little piece of heavenly vacation in this period? We have no doubt fall in love with this place.
Tips: With safe distancing measures in place, pool access is limited to 1 hour 15 minutes/day and pre-booking is required. If you’re staying for 2D 1N, you can book the pool for 2 days. You can only book the slots a day before check-in and evening slots fill up fast. The pool is now divided into 3 sectors. One can only choose and stick to 1 sector. The plus side is the pool would not be crowded. For the best view, choose the middle sector or the sector at Tower 3.
If you cannot get enough of that alluring view, you will be glad that room guests are entitled unlimited free entry to the SkyPark Observation Deck (usual adult ticket price is S$26).
SkyPark Observation Deck
Also on the 57th floor, the SkyPark Observation Deck similarly boosts a scenic panoramic view of Marina Bay and Singapore’s cityscape.
Here, you can also catch a bird’s-eye view of Singapore's iconic modern landmarks such as Gardens by the Bay and Singapore Flyer, heritage buildings, and our iconic HDB flats.
Banyan Tree Spa Fitness Club
If you feel that a gorgeous vantage will motivate you to push harder in your workouts, do check out the state-of-the-art Banyan Tree Fitness Club located at the 55th floor.
Besides a good range of training equipment, you can also find hot pool, sauna, and steam facilities there (time limit 15 minutes each). Pre-booking is required, do ask for the number for the SMS booking team during your check-in.
Dinner at Rise Restaurant
The things about traditional self-service buffet (which is a relic in the past now) is that if you want quantity, the varied cuisines and variety of dishes are amazing, but on quality wise, we always find buffet's food not hot enough and the reformat table service style buffet we had in several other hotels concurred this further.
However, Rise proved us wrong. Besides the huge selection of food choices, we are impressed that the Chilled Seafood were served iced cold and the mains were served piping hot 👍. The dinner was wonderful!
Tip: Sands Rewards member enjoy up to 30% off for daily buffet lunch and dinner
Check Out
As we bagged out bags and took a last Instagram shot of the beautiful view overlooking our room, our call for the front desk went through and we learned that check-out is literally effortlessly where we just need to simply drop our keycards into the express check out boxes and we were done.
Operational efficiency certainly runs the core of this hotel - while we got to maximised our time here with their amazingly on-time processes from check-in, amenities reservations, dinning reservations, to check-out, the only comment we have perhaps is we kind of miss the human interaction in a staycation where everything is so well-structured.
Getting There:
10 Bayfront Avenue, Singapore 018956
Directly link to Bayfront Station
My Travel Kakis Singapore Travel Blog - Singapore Staycation, Marina Bay Sands