Recce Trip to Mandai Orchid Garden and Gardenasia

Finally some updates on our second recce trip on Vesak Day, 9th May 2009. We spent the Saturday afternoon recceing MOG and Gardenasia. On our way there, Jeff told me: “Dear, don’t expect that we will reach MOG very fast ok? The journey will take a while.” Well, the reason why he said this is because I often complain that the roads he chooses are often the longest. And my reply to him? “Yes, I know, Dear. Thanks for managing my expectations.:p”

About 10 mins into the ride, Jeff exclaimed “The road sign! See, Mandai Orchid Garden!” We were both too surprised as we didn’t expect the car ride to be a short one.

As we stepped into MOG, we were greeted with beautiful orchids. The feeling about the place was good.



We tried to find Gazebo and the water garden based on the photos we saw on the website. Here’s some photos of the solemnization venues:

We were in favor of both Gazebo and the water garden, both bearing their own merits.
Gazebo has a beautiful setting, surrounded by colourful orchids. Nice background for photography. The water garden gives an exclusive feel and can accommodate a bigger capacity.

We approached the Vanilla Pod restaurant next. The restaurant owner, Mr Wilson Yew, was helpful and answered some of our enquiries. The owner gave us assurance of the high quality western food his chef provides and it seems to us, at reasonable prices too. Accommodating 60 pax in the restaurant would be a tad too crowded, as we were told. Hence, difficult to include a screen as well. Other than this, we think this place will suit our garden theme wedding perfectly. Too bad.

We moved on to our next destination, Gardenasia, which is near Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve. Dear wasn’t sure of the direction, after all we seldom wander to the northern part of Singapore. In the car ride, Dear asked me if we would be so lucky to again see the road sign “SBWR” in no time. “Got so near meh?” was my reply. You know what? Within the next few minutes, tada, we saw the SBWR sign. We couldn’t believe our eyes, we got the direction right! Today indeed was our lucky day.

The drive after seeing the sign, was deep in though. Inaccessible. Subconsciously, we started giving Gardenasia a low rating even before we reached there.

In a word, Gardenasia was disappointing. The frangipani venue, which looked so good in the website photos, has a huge tree entrenched in the middle where the guests sit. Quite out of place, isn’t it? Jeff felt that the place would be almost ideal had the tree not been there. I second that. And so, this venue for our solemnization is definitely out.