Here's what to expect at the new Singapore Oceanarium that's opening at Resorts World Sentosa in July 2025
We've already seen exciting new attractions pop up this year, from Minion Land at Universal Studios Singapore to Rainforest Wild Asia at Mandai. Joining the list this July is the highly anticipated opening of the Singapore Oceanarium – the rebranded version of the former S.E.A. Aquarium at Resorts World Sentosa.
Set to open on July 23, 2025, the refreshed attraction is three times larger than before, with 22 themed zones spotlighting different aspects of marine life. Visitors can explore everything from shallow waters to deep-sea habitats, as well as travel through time from prehistoric oceans to present-day waters.
Highlights include the Ocean Wonders zone, filled with thousands of mesmerising moon jellies, and Singapore's Coast, which recreates our local mangrove ecosystems with interactive displays.
Other features include life-sized models of prehistoric sea creatures, a reconstruction of the whale fall ecosystem, and a massive 36-metre-wide screen projecting reef manta rays and zebra sharks gliding through.
Visitors can swing by the Singapore Oceanarium Store for ocean-themed souvenirs, books and pop-ups by local brands. There's also Explorer's Nook, a themed café serving light bites and pastries.
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Time Out
26-05-2025
- Time Out
Here's what to expect at the new Singapore Oceanarium that's opening at Resorts World Sentosa in July 2025
We've already seen exciting new attractions pop up this year, from Minion Land at Universal Studios Singapore to Rainforest Wild Asia at Mandai. Joining the list this July is the highly anticipated opening of the Singapore Oceanarium – the rebranded version of the former S.E.A. Aquarium at Resorts World Sentosa. Set to open on July 23, 2025, the refreshed attraction is three times larger than before, with 22 themed zones spotlighting different aspects of marine life. Visitors can explore everything from shallow waters to deep-sea habitats, as well as travel through time from prehistoric oceans to present-day waters. Highlights include the Ocean Wonders zone, filled with thousands of mesmerising moon jellies, and Singapore's Coast, which recreates our local mangrove ecosystems with interactive displays. Other features include life-sized models of prehistoric sea creatures, a reconstruction of the whale fall ecosystem, and a massive 36-metre-wide screen projecting reef manta rays and zebra sharks gliding through. Visitors can swing by the Singapore Oceanarium Store for ocean-themed souvenirs, books and pop-ups by local brands. There's also Explorer's Nook, a themed café serving light bites and pastries.
Telegraph
18-05-2025
- Telegraph
Britain still has rainforests – but they need protecting before it's too late
To step into Emsworthy Mire is to be transported into a different world. With the jagged peak of the much more visited Haytor Rocks overhead, the surrounding Dartmoor uplands are relatively bare: grass, sheep and rocky natural Stonehenges. Opposite our vantage point overlooking Emsworthy is a patch of grass so unnaturally green it looks like Wimbledon's Centre Court. Not here in the mire. A path leads through scrub down into a valley where life is untamed and abundant. Birds and insects are everywhere. In March, when trees around the country are still bald and brown, it is a vibrant turquoise. Every branch and trunk is almost completely covered in plants, from lichens and ferns to bryophytes (liverworts and mosses). They live on trees, the floor, even a picnic bench. We are in one of Britain's remaining patches of rainforest. 'The whole of Dartmoor could have tree cover,' says Matt Boydell, land manager at the Devon Wildlife Trust, as he surveys the landscape. Since the charity took over in 2012, sheep grazing has radically reduced (we spot a few offenders among the trees; they always find a way), resulting in rising scrubland, which could eventually turn into rainforest. On a slope opposite, birch are recolonising common land. Boydell reckons 50 per cent of Dartmoor could be rainforest in the future. Wonderfully named organisms proliferate here, including old man's beard, a wispy lichen that looks like wool hanging from branches, and the similar string-of-sausages. Sphagnum moss, heavily harvested during the First World War to dress wounds, carpets the floor. In this valley, from an environmental stance, things are positive, says Boydell. 'When you look closely you realise there's lichens on top of lichens on top of lichens. On a misty day, when everything is dripping wet, it's hard to go anywhere more magical in this country.' A few years back, my first contact with what I now recognise as temperate rainforest was unexpected. Hiking in the Peak District on a scorching day, we descended into Lud's Church, a chasm full of moss-covered trees and rocks, seemingly 10C cooler. I didn't realise it then, but that tiny site was becoming part of what is arguably Britain's most exciting conservational field. These are the remaining fragments of a unique, dense type of forest that once covered an estimated 20 per cent of the country (it is less than one per cent today) and is part of our folklore. From Arthurian legends to medieval Welsh, the Mabinogion stories to Tolkien, Britain's literary history is full of tales centred on these ethereal, verdant landscapes, inspired by the gnarled, plant-covered oaks like Dartmoor's Wistman's Wood. There has been a surge of interest in our domestic rainforests. Earlier this year, the Soil exhibition at Somerset House in London featured a film focused on them. In March, it was announced that an unnamed donor is spending almost £18 million to purchase an estate near Ullapool, Scotland, partly to create new rainforest. In 2024, England's biggest temperate rainforest, Borrowdale in the Lake District, became a National Nature Reserve in a bid to improve restoration. A year prior, Aviva announced a landmark £38 million fund to restore temperate rainforests with The Wildlife Trusts. This month the Chelsea Flower Show will feature a garden celebrating mosses, ferns and lichens. Its designer, Zoe Claymore, grew up visiting Devon's rainforests. 'Lichen and moss are definitely odd for Chelsea,' she says. 'The whole point is to shout about our wild wet woodland and give them a voice. It won't be your average Chelsea garden, some won't like what I'm doing. But it will be a lot less controversial than a few years ago.' Why are rainforests in vogue? Partly because so little remains – just an estimated 18,000 hectares in England. Last year a University of Leeds study revealed that up to two thirds of the world's temperate rainforest could fall victim to climate change by 2100. Found in Atlantic Europe, the Pacific north-west of the US and Canada, southern Chile, Japan, Korea, Tasmania and New Zealand, temperate rainforest is much rarer than its tropical counterpart. In the UK, it stretches from the tip of Cornwall to Scotland through the entire west. Described as 'green on green on green', there are lichens, liverworts, mosses and ferns covering trees. They require an oceanic climate: wet, humid, without extreme hot or cold, and year-round moisture. You'll find rare plants and fungi, such as hazel gloves, which campaigner Guy Shrubsole describes as 'looking like Donald Trump's tiny orange hands'. These forests are home to important threatened bird species, including wood warblers, pied flycatchers and redstarts. Many environmentalists point to Shrubsole as a key figure in the movement. In March 2021, he launched a call to action, asking the public to help map Britain's lost rainforests. Hundreds sent submissions, buoyed by a wave of interest in nature during the pandemic, and Shrubsole's subsequent 2022 book, The Lost Rainforests of Britain, showcased their ecological importance. Boydell says that though he has worked in these woodlands for decades, he only became aware of the term 'temperate rainforest' five years ago. Known previously as Atlantic oak woodland, wet woodland and native broadleaf oak forest among other monikers, a recent rebranding is helping their cause. Some of the biggest environmental campaigns have involved saving tropical rainforests – a word that immediately conjures images of both beautifully dense and biodiverse habitat but also deforestation for beef and soy. 'We've been doing brilliant work since the 1980s,' says Luke Barley, tree and woodland adviser at the National Trust. 'They've been rebranded more recently, and it's been a brilliant thing, it's hugely raised their profile.' Barley argues that Aviva's £38 million fund 'probably wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for that increased focus'. For Shrubsole, 'We have the best opportunity in Britain of anywhere on Earth for restoring temperate rainforest, because so much has gone, and because we have the ideal climate for it in that 20 per cent of the country that we have is an oceanic rainforest climate.' Devon sits firmly within Britain's temperate rainforest zone. Yet its tree cover is below the national average. Rainforest sites such as Wistman's Wood and Emsworthy Mire are rare, and small. Boydell is part of the movement to change that. At Bowden Pillars, on a hill overlooking the hippy enclave of Totnes, he shows me the Devon Wildlife Trust's new forest, purchased with funds from the Aviva grant. Other new locations enabled by the insurer include Trellwyn Fach in Pembrokeshire, Bryn Ifan in North Wales, Skiddaw in Cumbria and, most recently, its largest rainforest recovery project to date, at Glen Auldyn on the Isle of Man. It is an ambitious 100-year journey to restore this precious habitat across Britain, hoping to create 1,755 hectares of rainforest and sequester 220,000 tonnes of carbon by 2050. 'Our temperate rainforests have this incredible lower plant flora, the lichens, ferns and mosses – you have hundreds and hundreds,' says Rob Stoneman, director of landscape recovery at The Wildlife Trusts. 'Some of the richest diversity in northern Europe is in our temperate rainforest, and there's hardly any left. We chopped the vast majority down, we've been chopping it for thousands of years.' The Devon Wildlife Trust purchased a 105-year leasehold on Bowden Pillars, taking on 75 acres that will become a new rainforest. Through a mix of planting and natural regeneration, it hopes to create a vast new woodland, expanding the remaining fragments. When I visit in late March, the last of 7,000 trees – a mix of 21 native species including oak, elm, hazel and blackthorn – have been planted, mostly by local volunteers; 10,000 will be planted next year. The sloping fields are covered in biodegradable tree tubes – some might consider them an eyesore – which protect the saplings, currently no taller than a foot, from deer. Grazing has been removed for similar reasons. The project has involved plenty of bureaucracy, from public consultations to being on the public register for six weeks. There was almost no opposition, says Boydell, although some queried the thousands of tree tubes overlooking Totnes. How long until it resembles woodland? Around 20 years. 'For it to be really temperate rainforest, we're probably talking great-grandchildren,' Boydell adds. A 50-mile drive west, another patch of rainforest is being resurrected. As I exit the A30 towards Bodmin Moor I see the telltale signs: stone walls along the single-lane roads are green with moss. I'm heading towards Cabilla, a 250-acre upland farm in Cornwall with a hidden secret: 100 acres of some of Britain's most magical temperate rainforest. Bought in 1960 by the explorer Robin Hanbury-Tenison, the woodland has persevered, despite the advice of countless agricultural consultants. A recent soil sample revealed there has been continuous forest here for at least 3,664 years, remaining because the valley is too steep and rocky to be farmed effectively. It is a sanctuary. Deep into the woods one hears the trance-like flow of a river. Boulders are covered in moss, plants hang from trees – you half expect Tarzan to swing past. A fallen oak forms a bridge over the river, and is covered in a fungus reminiscent of oyster shells. When I arrive it is misty and drizzling; ideal weather for a rainforest visit, says Robin's son Merlin, who now runs the farm. Merlin Hanbury-Tenison hopes to bring back 100,000 trees, 40,000 through planting, the rest via natural regeneration. On the edges of the existing woods are newly planted celtic oak, hazel, rowan, alder and more. 'All rainforest varieties,' says Hanbury- Tenison. A pioneering planting project by the Woodland Trust has scattered seeds by drone. Livestock have been temporarily removed to allow regeneration. Hanbury-Tenison hopes to one day pioneer 'agro-rainforestry', rearing high-quality cattle within the forest, and to show farmers how upland farms can both restore nature and provide high-quality food. Something even more ambitious is at foot, too. Cabilla is not merely reforesting. It is home to a new charity, the Thousand Year Trust, which will become Britain's first dedicated temperate rainforest research centre. A recent Crowdfunder aims to raise £50,000 to facilitate the project. The name, inspired by the sessile oak's lengthy life cycle, hints at Hanbury-Tenison's long-term vision: 'Can we fix climate change by 2030? Probably not. But we can fix it by 3025.' Everyone knows about tropical rainforests: how the Amazon is the planet's lungs, a major carbon sink, creating weather patterns. Countless university courses focus on them; there are many research institutes and field stations in the tropics. For temperate rainforests? Barely anything, at least in Britain. Hanbury-Tenison wants 'a place where scientists, academics, students and volunteers can come together'. The location is also symbolic. Europe's temperate rainforest zone stretches roughly from Bergen in Norway to Braga in Portugal; Cabilla is almost slap-bang in the middle. Yet there is more to a rainforest than its environmental benefit. A former soldier, Hanbury-Tenison's tank hit a landmine in Afghanistan in 2007. A decade later, working as a management consultant in London, he was diagnosed with PTSD. Returning to the family farm and spending time in its rainforest helped. At the same time, his wife had suffered multiple miscarriages. 'We healed here,' says Hanbury-Tenison (who stresses he'd never suggest anyone shun conventional medication and treatment). Since 2020, Cabilla has also become a well-being retreat, not only for the typical wellness crowd who can afford it, but helping those who might not normally attend such spaces, including army veterans and burnt-out NHS nurses. Scattered in the woods are cabins for attendees, which look like hobbit huts, if they were designed in Sweden. So far, 3,000 people have benefitted. The Western world has long lectured tropical countries, where more than half of the rainforest has been destroyed. But 3,000 years ago, Britain was a rainforest island; an area the size of Birmingham was felled in the 20th century alone. 'We need to realise how much we have denuded and destroyed our own habitats,' says Shrubsole. 'You've got politicians going to the Amazon later this year to Cop30, and the West is expecting countries like Brazil to stop cutting down the Amazon. Obviously it's vital that this happens, but we really need to be going one better, to restore some of our lost rainforest.' Hanbury-Tenison hopes the Thousand Year Trust will help to triple Britain's rainforest coverage. What happens to the traditional farming that dominates areas such as Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor? For Boydell, the areas being restored are 'small in the grand scheme of things'. Does removing land from farming threaten food security? 'We use an estimated 22 per cent of the UK for sheep farming to provide just one per cent of our calories,' says Hanbury-Tenison, who believes we should eat more wild venison instead, helping to control deer populations that blight new woodland. For Stoneman, 'We need to encourage landowners and farmers to transition from loss-making sheep farming to profitable agroforestry.' In Shrubsole's book, he points to hill farmers who've replaced sheep with less destructive native cattle at far lower densities, and received greater income for a premium product as a result. One such site is Rhemore Wild Croft on Scotland's Morvern peninsula, home to some of Britain's largest rainforests. Sam Firth took over the site with her partner, Alasdair, a woodland ecologist, in 2020. More than half is temperate rainforest, predominantly hazel, and it runs as both woodland and farm, with 200 sheep removed and replaced by about 12 cattle at any one time. Firth was 'keen not to have livestock, but it became clear in the first year that some areas need grazing', to protect meadows and push back bracken, which can inhibit regeneration. The meat, 'conservation beef', as Firth calls it, has proven 'incredibly popular' and is sold locally, including to a renowned restaurant in nearby Lochaline. Already there are signs that new hazels and willows are emerging, the rainforest expanding. The couple receive grants and funding for natural regeneration, woodland management and farming, proving they're not mutually exclusive. In late 2023, the government, under Rishi Sunak, published a temperate rainforest strategy, to 'protect' and 'enhance' them. It was the first dedicated government policy on temperate rainforest, and a key pillar of Shrubsole's campaigning. 'It's only a start, but it was recognition of the national importance of this habitat.' For Boydell, meanwhile, 'they are as special as tropical rainforest, they're rarer'. Barley points out they're still threatened, by conifer planting, invasive species such as deer and rhododendron, development, climate change, overgrazing, and neglect and poor management. 'Britain doesn't have that many unique responsibilities to global conservation, but this is one.' The word 'rainforest' captures our imaginations, but few realise we have it on our doorstep. Ecologists have long described important British habitats like chalk streams and peat bogs as 'Britain's tropical rainforest'. Actually, says Shrubsole, the truth is less metaphorical: 'Britain's rainforests are 'our rainforests'.'
The Independent
19-11-2024
- The Independent
Ministers hope for tourism boost with Bedfordshire Universal Studios resort
Ministers hope they will achieve the 'dramatic' change to UK tourism which a new Universal Studios theme park would bring, Sir Chris Bryant has said. The creative industries minister said he wanted to see fewer foreign tourists stick to London when they visit the UK, holidaying elsewhere instead. Blake Stephenson, the Conservative MP for Mid Bedfordshire, told MPs that the planned 476-acre resort south of Bedford 'could be the key to unlock the Government's growth mission' in his region. Speaking in Westminster Hall, Sir Chris declined to 'enter into the specifics' of ongoing discussions about the site, adding: 'That would be unhelpful to everybody. 'But I am very hopeful that we will be able to get to the very significant and dramatic change that this would make not only to visitor numbers in Bedfordshire but for the whole of the United Kingdom.' The minister continued: 'Of course, we should be ambitious for the whole of the United Kingdom when it comes to our tourism strategy but it would be counterproductive if every single person who came from overseas to this country – and we've still not got up to the numbers that we had reached before Covid – it would be counterproductive if every single person who came to the United Kingdom decided that they were only going to visit London, and didn't even get to Bedfordshire.' Universal has five entertainment and resort complexes around the world – Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood in the USA, Universal Studios Japan (Osaka), Universal Beijing Resort in China and Universal Studios Singapore. Its proposed UK venue would lie along the East West Rail route, a proposed Oxford to Cambridge railway which the Government has backed as part of Chancellor Rachel Reeves' October Budget. Sir Chris said the railway could unlock 'tens of thousands of new homes and jobs', which in turn could bolster the region's tourism sector. He said: 'You could also say in relation to tourism, if you're going to have a very significant expansion of the tourism industry or the visitor economy industry in Bedfordshire, you're actually going to need houses where people are able to live who are going to work in that industry as well.' Mr Stepheson, who tabled Tuesday's debate about tourism in Bedfordshire, had earlier said: 'Where what used to be the world's largest brickworks site at Stewartby in my constituency – once fired the bricks that built our nation – now it has the potential to power our local economy again as the home of the Universal UK theme park project. 'Backed by 92% of local people and local leaders from all parties, a £50 billion boost for our local economy, bringing around 20,000 jobs for local people but also crucially offering us an opportunity to turbocharge our local tourism, hospitality and leisure sectors, with potentially 12 million more visitors in our area every year. 'That's a gamechanger, bringing millions more visitors to Bedfordshire to stay in our communities and see all that we have to offer. 'Universal could be the key to unlock the Government's growth mission in Bedfordshire.'
