A view from the Lantern Bar – Singapore
Luxurious surrounds, good food and great view
When your great love, aside from gluttonous husband, is food, Greedy Girl’s other perfect marriage is a lovely tipple – made all the better at a bar with a view.
So what constitutes a great bar? When Greedy Girl was a mere avaricious whelp it was one she didn’t require ID to get into. These days, she prefers to go to bed.
There’s always a moment of hesitation before revealing a favourite haunt – what if everyone decides to go there? The Lantern Bar at the Fullerton Bay Hotel sits on the top floor of a low-rise five-star hotel overlooking the new Marina Bay Sands arts/shopping/dining/gambling precinct. Walk past a beautifully landscaped pool area down to the main bar, kick off your shoes and jump into bed.
Perfect for two, the Lantern Bar offers day beds on which to loll, drink, nibble and contemplate a truly weird-looking display of architecture. Greedy girl reserved her spot by e-mail for 7.30pm – the sun had gone down, a tiny breeze stirred the canopy and just enough time to order a bottle of bubbles and snacks before the nightly light show.
Each evening at 8pm, Marina Bay Sands – the building that looks like an oil tanker plonked on top of three wishbones – puts on a ‘Heinz’ display. It’s 57 varieties of lights, lasers, flame throwers and fountains that, from a pure design perspective, is a bit over the top but for sheer fun while you’re holding a cold glass of champagne, laying back propped on pillows, makes for a spectacular backdrop.
After the 10-minute extravaganza, the lights revert to their usual night-time twinkling, while thrown in for good measure in the background is the gaily-lit Singapore Flyer giant Ferris wheel.
Lantern Bar is an exceedingly comfortable spot. Being a Monday night, a DJ was on deck but other nights also feature a ‘lounge band’ which can be a bit cheesy. Being open air, you are at the mercy of the elements. The heat would be murderous on a sunny day and the area can be closed down reasonably quickly when a particularly nasty thunderstorm rolls through. Be warned though – even at night it can still be fearsomely hot.
It’s every wine waiter’s instinct to fill glasses – this is something you need to be extremely wary about at Lantern Bar. No ‘glass’ is allowed, presumably because of the proximity to the pool and the open structure. All drinks are served in chilled plastic but – apart from the patrons – nothing stays chilled for long. Frozen cocktails need to be drunk extremely quickly or, in our case, tiny amounts of champagne need to be decanted from the bottle nestled in an ice bucket. Hot champagne is not good champagne – you have the choice to sip small glasses often or large glasses quickly. As much as the latter is in keeping with Greedy Girl’s nature, it wreaks a terrible toll. Asking the waiters to not fill the glass to the brim when they come by becomes a mantra.
The snack menu offers typical bar food – a nod to the location with satay sticks, truffled french fries, mini Wagyu beef burgers, calamari. It’s all perfectly edible and served promptly and piping hot.
Singapore isn’t the cheapest place in the world to drink but the cost of a bottle of champagne, the burgers and fries came in around A$160 – including the dreaded Singapore ++ (service and tax). It’s comparable to what you’d pay in any major city.
One final tip – if travelling by taxi, some drivers can be confused between the Fullerton Hotel – a majestic colonnaded building near the Merlion fountain and the Fullerton Bay. Save yourself a 10 minute walk in the heat and make sure they take you to the right place.
With thanks to the Fullerton Bay Hotel Singapore for the use of the photographs in this post.
Lantern Bar
Fullerton Bay Hotel, Singapore
fullertonbayhotel.com
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