We wanted to visit a nearby Island, to get away from Singapore for a day. Ideally, we were supposed to have gone to Thailand and visit the Bridge of the River Kwai, but the air fares went too much to enable us to make it cost effective, so I think we will save that trip for another day. Will definitely do that trip though whilst I am here!
So, ticking off the plausible islands, there were only a couple of more that made sense to visit. Bintan and Batam (both Indonesian Islands) were more resort-orientated and I much as well just chill by the pool at my Apartment, so the only one that tickled my fancy was Palau Ubin. This island is 10 minutes bumboat away from Singapore Island, it remains part of Singapore, and most importantly, it has not been that developed, so you see a tranquil unspoilt land that is a stone-throw from the hustle and bustle of Singapore life. Pulau Ubin is meant be take you back to the 1960’s version of Singapore.
The bumboat (ferry) was cheap as chips, S$5 return for each person (S$2.50 for each leg that you pay the boat owner once you are on the boat. The bumboat operates from Changi Jetty, and only departs when 12 people are ready to go, so you could depart straightaway, or you could have to wait for more people to arrive. Luckily for us, we went when 12 people were around. The bumboat was remarkable comfortable and within 10-15 minutes we arrived at the Island Jetty.
The first we noticed is that the Visitor Centre has now closed since August 2010 (shame that the various books and websites still reference it!), so we had to find our own way around, with a map that we ‘borrowed’ from a Bike Hire stall.
We decided to do the Island by foot, and with a National Park’s Walking Trail PDF to hand, we started to walk around the shops and food stalls area of Pulau Ubin, noting the fair number of bike-hire shops around.
We ventured towards the Spice and Herb Garden, towards the right of the old Visitor Centre. We noticed some well-labelled Herb and Fruit plants / trees which were presevered by the National Park, at the end of the Garden, we then continue the trail around the Island.
We noted that apart from the main roads, the site trails were not well-signed posted, so you had to really know your bearings as you walked around parts of the island. To aid our navigation, we used the photograph that we took of the Island Map feature the display board, and used this as a guide to walk around the Island.
At one part of the trail, we noticed a dotted line part of the trail, which we thought was a trail that was off-road, but would enable us to see the roughness of the Island, as it would be off the beaten track. We followed this and after about 30 minutes, we reached a lake which seemed to have some development on the banks, but no sign of a proper path or end-point to reach back onto the main road again, so we had to re-track and amazingly found a sign of life in the midst of the woodland, who signalled us to cross a bridge pass where he seem to live (very primative ‘establishment’), we continued to down what appeared to be a tough trail, and ended up at the gate, which we went through to go back to the main road again. This was quite an interesting experience and luckily we managed to find our way back to civilisation again 🙂
We decided to skip the Chek Jawa wetlands, as we were getting qutie hungry and we knew it was still another hour or so to reach the wetlands and return back to the Jetty. We agreed to grab some lunch and then see whether we would continue after lunch.
We headed back to the area around the Jetty and decided to have lunch at the Seafood Restaurant on the Quay side, luckily we did because the skies opened and a tropical torrential downpour came down – which last a good 40-45 minutes and the diners from the side table had to retreat to other parts of the shelter as the wind and driving rain was dampening their meal. We choice Black Peppered Crab, some Vegetable, and Dough Balls – in total it cost S$60 (£30) – was slightly more than we would have expected, but it was delicious 🙂
We then headed back to the bumboat to head back to Changi back on the main Singapore island.
The only issue I experienced was that even though we had sprayed on the Mosquito Repellent, I was still bitten 7 times on my right leg and right arm, whilst my mother escaped without any bites whatsoever. It must have been the Guinness in my blood that made it a delicious target for those damn creatures, or my mother’s skin was simply too tough for ’em!!!