Orchard Rd (Singapore) > Reviews > The Smart Street

Author's product rating:   

Value for Money
Shopping
Nightlife
Ease of getting around
Family Friendly

Advantages:	Smart .  Good Western food .  Good hotels .  Bright .
Disadvantages:	Pricey .  Full of tourists .  Difficult to find bargains

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Orchard Road in Singapore is the smart shopping and dining street par excellence. It is the main tourist drag in the Island Republic and houses a lot of the ultra smart but increasingly expensive one stop shopping centres,a number of top rate hotels, designer boutiques and a veritable plethora of mostly Western-style fast food joints and sophisticated restaurants.These are fairly pricey and not good value.

If you want to sample authentic local food get out of Orchard Road and
head to Newton Circus for hawker food, Chinatown for great Chinese food and Little India,the area around the Serangoon Road,for fiery South Indian and Vegetarian food.You will be amazed at the quality of the food and the very affordable prices.

If you like shopping in comfort in air conditioned finery then it would be churlish to deny that Orchard Road will go a long way to meet your requirements, If you are after the latest designer labels and are not too concerned about price then again Orchard road is fine. If you want to visit smart,up market,jewellers or drug stores (chemists) then again
Orchard Road is OK. If,however,you want to find bargains,unusual goods like crocodile skin handbags, and local arts and crafts,steer clear of Orchard Road. For Indian items go to the streets of Little India and for real bargains go to areas like Woodlands. Chinatown is another place where you can come across bargains.Arab Strret is another exotic enclave well worth exploring.

Like Blackpool, Orchard Road,always has brilliant lighting especially around Christmas and New Year and is worth a visit just to see the spectacular lighting. You will also find a goodly number of travel agents,tour companies,banks and foreign exchange dealers in this elegant,street-the main tourist belt of Singapore.