Expat Travel Mom

There's never a "right" day to go do anything outdoors in Singapore, the sun's usually shining and there's always a chance of rain at the same time. So you just go, no matter what. Put down the weather app, bring sunblock, and know you're going to make memories, sweat, rain and all. Sentosa Island alone could eat up an entire week of your trip if you let it, here's how our time on the Resorts World side of the island went, we hadn't yet made it out to Siloso Beach or the cable car side when I wrote this.

Universal Studios Singapore

We'd lived in Singapore seven months before our first trip to Universal Studios, and yes, we finally went on Chinese New Year Day, easily the busiest day of the year to pick. Something about that spinning globe out front with the cooling mist kept calling our name every time we drove past, so on Chinese New Year, we finally answered.

For a family of five, nothing here is cheap. We went in expecting to buy day tickets and walked out with six-month season passes plus Universal Express Unlimited, thanks to a genuinely excellent upsell from the woman at the counter. (And we kept renewing our passes) No regrets, if you're visiting over a holiday break, you'll want the Express option, the standby lines get long fast.

The park itself reminded me of the Hong Kong Disneyland of Universal parks, small but packed with fun. My kids, at 6, 8, and 10 at the time of our first visit, cleared every height requirement, which meant no one had to sit out crying because they were "just a hair too short." From Hollywood Boulevard, the park loops in a circle either direction, with the big rides (Revenge of the Mummy, Transformers, Jurassic Park Rapids) all meeting up near the top.

Here's how my own little expats rated their favorites at the time:

"My favorite ride is Transformers because you feel like you're in the movie, where Transformers are attacking you and you're trying to get away in your own mini bot. It feels so realistic, like it's actually happening."

"My favorite ride is Transformers because it feels like I'm in an adventure. At first I thought it was a little scary, but then the second and third time it was really, really fun."

"My favorite ride is Canopy Flyer because you get to see everywhere in Universal Studios and it's really fun and fast. And also, you can get a good breeze."

I'm sure their answers will be different on future visits as they get older, but I'd say those were pretty good reviews. Catch the weekend parade if you can, Madagascar, Shrek, Jurassic Park, even Marilyn Monroe and Charlie Chaplin make an appearance, and stick around for the Saturday evening fireworks over the lake if the kids can hang. And can we talk about the churros and corn dogs? Genuinely one of my favorite parts of the whole park, and I've happily passed that legacy down to my kids.

Adventure Cove Waterpark

A quick honesty note: our Adventure Cove and Dolphin Island experiences were generously hosted. As always, everything written here reflects our actual experience, the good and the not-so-good.

Adventure Cove took everything we already loved about water parks and added a few things I'd never seen before. The slides were fun, typical for a water park, but they weren't the highlight. Snorkeling was. Rainbow Reef lets you snorkel right alongside over 20,000 fish, and I am someone who does not do open water, ever. Thanks to Rainbow Reef, I finally snorkeled with my husband, saw my favorite puffer fish up close, and did it as a full family, all three kids right there with us, no extra charge beyond regular admission.

Adventure River, the park's lazy river, wasn't anything special on its own, a little worn in places, but floating past the stingray tank and through an underwater tunnel of fish and rays completely changed the experience for the kids.

My favorite moment, though, was Splashworks, what my youngest called "America's Next Ninja Warrior" training camp. Balance beams, tightropes, knotted rope climbs suspended over water, my daughter loved it, and once her brother found it, it turned into an all-out sibling competition.

A tip if you go: rent a cabana. Singapore sun is brutal even compared to Dubai, and we got burned within an hour despite sunscreen.

Dolphin Island

One part of the water park that caused a lot of dismay across the island and beyond, as any dolphin experience does, is Dolphin Island. This is strictly a personal call. Since the experience was offered to our family as part of our day there, we went in and did a mini session at the side of the tank, no in-water experience. My kids surprised the staff with questions they had about the dolphins, and we never really got straight answers back. They compared it to the dolphin experience we'd had at Atlantis Dubai. I honestly don't know if what we were told in Dubai at the time was true either (that it was a rehab facility, etc), we felt it was a great experience there, but this one at Adventure Cove isn't for everyone, and we're just putting that out there so you go in informed. We won't go back.

S.E.A. Aquarium

We also spent time at the S.E.A. Aquarium, one of the largest aquariums in the world at the time, home to tens of thousands of marine animals across hundreds of species. It's an easy add to a Sentosa day if you're already in the area, and a good break from the sun between the theme park and the water park.

Beyond the Parks

We didn't spend much time wandering the rest of Sentosa on visits up to now (except for a few races the kids did), most of our days here were built entirely around Universal, Adventure Cove, and the Aquarium. The island does have a lot more to it though, restaurants, street art, shopping, and beach areas. It's really nice to just walk around some days! 

Between all of it, Sentosa alone could fill days of a Singapore trip, and we never once left disappointed.

Coming back to update: Universal Studios Singapore is still fully open, and gained an entirely new zone since our visits, Minion Land, which opened in February 2025. The S.E.A. Aquarium has since been reimagined and reopened as the Singapore Oceanarium in July 2025. The dolphin program has been rebranded from "Dolphin Island" to the "Marine Mammal Habitat," but dolphin encounter experiences are still offered there today under the new name, so the same personal-choice consideration raised above still applies.