Singapore & Malaysia travel guide

Travel to Singapore & Malaysia between Feb – Jul. Those are the months the weather, the crowds and the airfare line up — outside them you trade one of the three.

Currency

Singapore Dollar and Malaysian Ringgit (SGD / MYR)

Language

English throughout; also Malay, Mandarin and Tamil.

Time zone

SGT / MYT (UTC+8) — 2½ hours ahead of India

Plug type

Type G (UK 3-pin), 230V — same plug in both countries

Flight time from India

5.5 hrs

Flying from

Mumbai · Ahmedabad · Delhi · Chennai

• 

  Gardens by the Bay — Cloud Forest before the Supertrees

  Do the two conservatories in the afternoon heat, when a 23°C indoor mountain with a 35-metre waterfall is exactly what you want. Then stay outside for the 7.45pm Garden Rhapsody, which is free, and watch it lying on the grass rather than from the skyway.

• 

  Universal Studios and Sentosa, in one day if you must

  Seven zones, four serious rides. Book the first entry slot, run to Transformers and Battlestar Galactica before ten, and do the rest at leisure. Sentosa also carries the SEA Aquarium and the Skyline luge, which is the thing children ask to repeat.

• 

  Night Safari, and why it beats the day zoo

  Most large mammals sleep through the tropical afternoon. The Night Safari runs a tram through open moated enclosures under low warm light, and the animals are awake and hunting. Take the 7.15 tram, then walk the three trails afterwards — the tram alone misses half the park.

• Batu Caves and the KL twin towers

  Two hundred and seventy-two rainbow steps to a Murugan temple inside a limestone cave, thirty minutes from central KL and free. Cover knees and shoulders. In the evening, the Petronas Towers skybridge needs a timed ticket, but the fountain park below is the better photograph and costs nothing.

• Genting Highlands by cable car

  The Awana SkyWay climbs 3.4 km through cloud forest to a hill town at 1,800 metres where the temperature drops to 18°C. Chin Swee Caves Temple is a mid-station stop worth the extra ticket. Lightning closes the cable car without warning, so keep a spare half-day.

• Melaka, or Legoland, on the road between

  The KL to Singapore drive passes both. Melaka is Dutch and Peranakan shophouses, Jonker Street and a river walk, and suits an adult group. Legoland Johor is forty minutes from the Second Link and suits children between four and twelve better than Universal does.

• Roti canai with dhalVegetarian

  The default breakfast of Malaysia and the safest vegetarian street food in either country — flaky flatbread, lentil curry, a glass of teh tarik. Ask for it without the egg version (roti telur) and check the dhal has no anchovy stock, which the cheaper mamak stalls sometimes add.

• Hainanese chicken rice and its vegetarian problemVegetarian

  Singapore national dish, and worth knowing about even if you will not eat it: the rice itself is cooked in chicken stock and pandan, so at a hawker centre the plain rice on a vegetarian plate may not be vegetarian. At a mixed stall, ask specifically about the rice, not just the topping.

• Nasi lemak and sambalVegetarian

  Coconut rice with sambal, peanuts, cucumber and a boiled egg. The sambal almost always contains dried anchovy or belacan shrimp paste — a vegetarian version exists and is common, but you have to name it. Belacan is the single ingredient a vegetarian traveller should learn to say aloud in Malaysia.

• Little India and BrickfieldsJain friendly

  Serangoon Road in Singapore and Brickfields in KL are full Indian quarters — banana-leaf thali, Gujarati kitchens, Jain menus on request with a day notice, and Komala Vilas or Annalakshmi for a pure-veg meal that a grandparent will recognise. This is why the circuit suits multi-generation families.

• Chendol and ice kacangVegetarian

  Shaved ice, palm sugar, coconut milk, green pandan jelly and red beans — the local answer to a 33°C afternoon and entirely vegetarian. Ice at established hawker centres in both countries is factory-made and safe, unlike much of Southeast Asia.

Set a meal preference — vegetarian, Jain or halal — when you book and we brief every hotel and restaurant on your itinerary.

• Mustafa Centre, Serangoon Road — open 24 hours, the cheapest electronics and gold in Singapore
• Orchard Road for the brands, Bugis Street for the market prices two stations away
• Royal Selangor pewter and Malaysian tin-cast souvenirs, KL
• Petaling Street and Central Market, KL — batik, pewter and hard bargaining
• Beryl and Harriston Malaysian chocolate, and white coffee from Ipoh
• Duty free at Changi is genuinely competitive on liquor, cosmetics and chocolate — leave room in the bag

Singapore MRT is the best metro in Asia and takes a contactless Indian card directly at the gate — no ticket needed. Grab works in both countries and is the default at night. Between KL and Singapore, the KTM ETS train to Johor plus a Causeway crossing is cheap but the immigration queue can run to two hours on a Friday evening; a morning flight is often the calmer buy. Inside KL, the LRT and monorail do not always interconnect — check before you plan a tight transfer.

• Singapore fines are immediate and unarguable: no eating or drinking on the MRT, no durian on public transport, no smoking outside the marked yellow boxes, and jaywalking is enforced. Vaping is outright illegal — possession alone is fined and devices are confiscated at the airport.
• Both countries carry the death penalty for drug trafficking and the threshold quantities are low. Never carry a package or a bag for anyone else, including at the airport, and pack your own luggage.
• Snatch theft from a passing motorcycle is the common street crime in Kuala Lumpur. Walk with the bag on the side away from the road, and use Grab rather than a street taxi after dark.
• The Malaysia Digital Arrival Card is free and filed on the official immigration site. Dozens of lookalike sites charge for it and some harvest passport data — a fee is the tell that you are on the wrong page.
• Chinese New Year and the Hari Raya week fill hotels in both countries and shut a surprising number of family-run restaurants for several days. Check the dates before fixing a February or April departure.
• Genting and the Cameron Highlands are cool and wet; a family arriving in Singapore summer clothing with no jacket is the most common avoidable discomfort on this circuit.

Per person, per day, on the ground — meals, local transport and entry tickets. Flights and hotels sit in the package price, not here.