I just left Singapore and I wanted to let you all know how the riding was. For those of you that don't know me, I'm in the US Navy and last month we left home in Bremerton, WA on our 6 month cruise. I brought both my mtb's in hopes to do some serious riding with friends wherever we may go.
Before I reached Singapore I spoke via e-mail to Monique Cordeiro and Mike Bailey, the owner of Two Wheel Action Pte. Ltd. in Singapore. They said that they could draw up some maps and show us where to ride when we arrived. We met them at their shop and they made us maps to a couple local places; Boys Brigade cycle track and Bukat Timah Nature Reserve. The first day we decided since it was rather late, we'd hit the BB cycle track.
BBct is a large triangle shaped plot of undeveloped land right in the middle of the city. It used to be the site of mtb races a few years ago but now it's just used by the local scene. We encountered mostly flat narrow trails through thick jungle, underbrush and a little mud since it had rained the previous couple of days. Ahh, mud is GOOD. Fairly non-technical but a lot of fun. I did manage to "taste" the trail once when I endo'd in a small rut. I'll just blame that on not riding in 2 months ;-) We spent about 1.5 hours there exploring the maze if trails and then we headed back for the night since we didn't have lights and were thoroughly lost ;-) When we got back, we made plans to head out to Bukat Timah the following morning.
The next morning, Al Madison, Brian Robinson and yours truly loaded our bikes in a taxi (a fairly humorous sight for sure) and we were off. When we arrived, the taxi practically exploded as we opened the doors since one of the three bikes rode inside with us! Anyway, the basic trail is about 8k of rolling terrain that is full of short ups and downs. It's well marked and even has little signs that warn of steep downhills. I especially liked the line on the rule board that said, "hikers use at your own risk"!! The trail works it's way through dense jungle around a quarry filled with water and through some tall cliffs that are used by climbers for scaling. The temps were in the 90's with high humidity so when we reached the cliffs, we took a short break (this ain't a race after all). There were even some chairs sitting out in the grass, how convenient. After a short break, we continued on in to the jungle. The trail is well traveled but not rutted out like some heavy use trails so that was good. They use everything from pieces if asphalt & concrete to gravel to protect against wear in soft areas and it works. It does however, make for a very bumpy ride in places. When we got to the Belukar trail we took a right and followed it up to the hwy where there were signs leading to the Central Catchment trail. This trail is a bit more remote and less traveled as it weaved through jungle, tall grass and open fields. There were some steep hills that in the mid-day heat seemed pretty long but actually weren't that bad. The downhill sections were very fast with speeds reaching 29.5 on the computer and several were pretty hairy since the surface was slick, red clay dirt with sandy sections thrown in. On one downhill section I was scared half out of my wits by a *BIG* 6 foot Monitor lizard that darted about 2 feet out of the jungle and then made a hasty retreat. All day we were hearing "things" just off the trail but we never expected (read: hoped) to actually be confronted by any of the "locals". Needless to say, that was a new experience for this Washington St. native!!
We worked our way back to the Bukat Timah trail and finished off the loop; well not really. We took a wrong turn and went down a long downhill trail to Rifle Range Road. Upon discovering that we made the mistake, we all agreed that destiny had brought us there and we called it a day as that was a looooong hill after all. We were all out of water at that point (1 full blatter + 1 large bottle) so we made out way back to the downtown area for some fried noodles and a few Tiger/Carlsberg beers. We made it back to the ship by 9:00 pm still covered with mud but sportin' big smiles and a few stories from all the riding. All in all, we racked up 17 miles of trail riding and about 5.5 on the roads getting back to town.
All this riding wouldn't have been possible without the great maps that Mike and Monique made for us. A great big THANKS go out to them for making us "Yanks" feel so welcome here. If you ever go out to Singapore, go out to their shop, Two Wheel Action Pte. Ltd. (36 Holland Grove Rd.) and they'll do you right or join up on one of their "bike-hash" adventures (www.home.pacific.net.sg/~twa/sbh.htm). I look forward to returning here and doing some more exploring.
Sorry this is so long, but it was really that good. Till next time.
Nathan Morse
Bremerton, WA
Last updated 22 January 1999