And now for something completely different...

Hi there. Guest blogger here again. Guess what!? I worked so hard lately that I was awarded an all expenses paid trip to Singapore. Cool or what? Actually, I’ve “won” about 25 of these now so it’s not quite so exciting anymore. Also notice that I said “trip” and not “vacation.” EXCEPT…

… occasionally I get to spend the weekend in Singapore, which gives me a chance to get out and do something besides work for a bit. So now I’m proud to present my amazing journey along the South Ridges of Singapore. This is a hike that I wanted to take with the family when we all came in August, but we didn’t get to it.

The journey began (as most journeys in Singapore do) with a walk to the MRT station (subway). Singapore is a night town, so Saturday morning is usually pretty dead. Unlike the USA, where we send out the Jehovah’s Witnesses to pester you, Singapore sends out its school kids in uniforms asking you to put coins in cans. I don’t know what they’re saving money for but it must be really expensive because they’ve been out every Saturday morning for at least 11 years now. These nice girls were kind enough to let me capture the moment.

So I got into one subway, then switched to another and wound up in the very back car. Did you know subways have rear windows? This one does. Previously I’ve only looked out the side windows up subways, so I decided to seize the moment and looked out the back window. And I gotta say, it’s pretty black back there. Occasionally a blueish light would show up and fade into the distance, but that was about it. You’ll notice there’s no picture of this part of the journey. In fact, right then I decided to coin a new phrase: 

“That was more exciting than looking out the rear window of a subway.”

I’ll let you decide when would be an appropriate time to use it.

OK, so I didn’t know a lot about the South Ridges hike other than I was supposed to go to the Harborfront Station and go out exit “D.” And sure enough, there’s a sign pointing you towards something that sounds very refreshing on a hot day on the equator: “Henderson Waves.”

The first part of the trail is called the Marang Trail, which basically goes up a hill using a lot of steps.

When I got to the top, I discovered that I’d been here before. This is Mount Faber, which has a cable car that goes to Sentosa Island. I bought some water, dodged a lot of senior citizens in a tour group, and discovered the “magical yellow feet” that are supposed to guide you along the Southern Ridges hike. As you can see in the picture, I was faced with a daunting choice—300 meters or 700 meters? Hmm, let’s see, lots of time, no kids… what the heck. 700 it is.

And thus I went up, up, to the top. I think Dr. Seuss must not have visited Singapore after he went to Yangshuo or Mount Faber would have made it into one of his books. It’s just rife with possibilities:

“Up, up, up to the top of Mount Faber,
Where he blew his bloo-gloobler to annoy every neighbor.”

Anyway, at the top I found--what else?--a Merlion. This is Singapore after all. I got this shot of the Mt. Faber merlion in the front and the giant Sentosa merlion off in the distance.

Coming down from Mt. Faber, I noticed a side path with benches that dove down below the road I was on. Now, the view from where I was standing was just barely high enough to see over the trees down to the ocean, so I wondered what else you could see from down there.

Yup, trees.

I’d been hiking for an hour now, and look! The Henderson Waves!

But any hopes of a cool, refreshing stroll through the surf were quickly dashed. Apparently the Henderson Waves is just a wave-shaped footbridge. Oh well. It looked neat anyway.

Along the way you can cool off in the shade of the “waves.”

After the waves, the next stop was called Telok Blangah Hill Park with the “hilltop walk.” It was here that I noticed one of Singapore’s most famous qualities began to shine through—warning signs. You may have heard about the standard ones—no spitting, no chewing gum, no littering, etc., but these were starting to get even more entertaining.

Isn’t it refreshing to just come out and say what you mean? With pictures too! Note that this isn’t even a poor translation with Chinese above it—this is English only, the official language of Singapore.

At this point the magical yellow feet failed me and let me off the correct path and down a hill to a “fish pond.” I use that phrase loosely—I saw two little bitty fish in thing that is smaller than the neighbor’s swimming pool and only about 18 inches deep.

Nevertheless, someone decided it was still necessary to warn you…

After I hiked back up the hill to the main path, I found another very interesting sign:

Fair enough. But now look where it’s located:

“Hey dear, look! It’s a narrow road in the middle of a park, with a pedestrian crosswalk and no hoses in sight! Let’s stop and wash the car!”

This park had a nice garden area to climb.

I went to the top, checked out the view, and then on the way down the back side I almost stepped on a neon green piece of plastic cord, but it suddenly flipped around and slithered into the bushes. I had no idea real animals could be that brightly colored. This isn’t my picture but this is what it looked like:

Now I came to my favorite part of the hike: the “Forest Walk.” It’s basically a ½ mile long, clean, flat metal sky path through the tops of the trees. Now THIS is what I call tax dollars well spent (Singaporean’s tax dollars, anyway). Well done, Singapore National Parks.  

However, the path is not quite as safe as I was led to believe, as evidenced by the series of warnings for this section.

Now, I’m not 100% positive where one’s volume knob is, and I did encounter a few people on the path who needed to be turned down a bit, but in the interest of misunderstandings and staying out of jail, I decided to not take any chances. “Really, officer, I was just trying to turn her volume down.”

The forest walk also had a couple of banana trees with more than a couple of bananas growing on it.

Sadly, the Forest Walk had to come to an end, at the Alexandra Arch. Apparently it is lit up at night with multicolored LED’s, but for me it just marked the end of the cool metal skyway and the last swallow of my first water bottle.

And as I left the bridge I was reminded of a few more things not to do.

Here’s a map of my walk so far. I’ve come from the top left corner, all the way to the “you are here” bubble. It’s 11:00 on the equator and time to go find a new water bottle.

But first, a quick stroll through the very short “Floral Walk” before reaching Hort Park.

Success!!  They sell water here!  Hort Park is kind of like a public botanical garden, but sponsored by commercial landscaping firms who manage a small section of the park and proudly display their contact information if you like what you see. Nice idea, but unfortunately 90% of people in Singapore don’t have a yard. I was amazed how many landscaping companies there were. Hort Park also has a nice grassy area and a really cool geometric monkey bar toy thing.

I finally found some cool looking flowers I’d never seen before.

These are an interesting concept—“anti-greenhouses.” Basically they suck moisture and energy from the tropical climate in order to create a cool climate inside, so that temperate foliage can grow.

Now exiting Hort Park, and entering the aptly named “Kent Ridge Park.” I don’t know who Kent is, but you definitely have to start hiking up a ridge as soon as you enter. And look—I think I see another walk through the trees!

It’s called the “Canopy Walk,” which you are free to enjoy… with yet another volley of warnings.

The Canopy Walk wasn’t quite as long or nifty as the Forest Walk, but I still liked it a lot. I was almost halfway through my second water bottle by this time.

Upon exiting the Canopy Walk, I was greeted by the beauty of the central area of Kent Ridge Park. And what says “peaceful harmony with nature in the park” better than the turret of a Singapore Army tank pointed straight at your head?

And the “Do not feed the monkeys” sign is now an entire comic strip.

Almost at the end of my journey, I went down some jungle stairs to an area with a REAL pond. There were quite a few butterflies in the area, but since my oldest daughter Meagan was not with me, they resisted their natural urges to attack and kill, and I was quite safe.

Oh yeah. No swimming either.

At the end of Kent Ridge Park, I arrived at something called “Science Park,” but things suddenly weren’t looking very park-y anymore, so I hopped on the nearest bus, then the MRT, and went back to the hotel.

Four hours, 5 miles, and two bottles of water since the start of my journey, I was ready for a shower and some rest. But all in all, it was definitely more exciting than looking out the rear window of a subway.