life / 365 / 2022 : Day 6 - 8: The first 500, Singapore and back.

Day 6 - 8: The first 500, Singapore and back.

Day 6: 38km to Singapore from Skudai
Weeks before, the idea of cycling into Singapore after all that kilometers from UPM would feel like the victorious scene from Shrek where the Donkey confronts the dragon on the drawbridge, except this time I was literally the donkey on a bridge but an ass for misplacing my wallet until I had to pause the trip to fix my missing stuff.

Early morning ride crossing the Causeway and the weather was cold, short drizzle after exiting Johor. Also thanks you loads to Mr. Sk for letting me stay over his place right before a big storm. He fed me delicious herbal soup, nice coffee peng gao and let me hang out with his awesome chatty kids where we had a philosophical debate through a platform of rational argument and questions via a systematic logical approach, on Ultraman. I.e- Does he poop? Does he do laundry? Where does ultraman buy groceries? etc

Day 7: 73km merayap Singapore. 532km so far
If you've been to the Merlion statue before, this picture is an impossibility because there's nobody there to ruin your shot! Hahaha That's because this picture was taken in the rain!

Singapore you rock but you're expensive lah.

The last time I was here on a bike was for the 400km, 27hours, Kuala Lumpur to Singapore ultraride.

Cycling through the many beautiful intertwined park connectors crisscrossing across Singapore - interconnecting dedicated routes that connects different housing areas together. Cyclist will have to ride at a medium speed as its a shared path with pedestrians.

Hiding from the rain.

Orchard Road.

Accompanied Mr. Sk and his wonderful kids to school. We traversed the many park connectors, bike lanes, hidden shortcuts - cycling in Singapore is safe and super fun!

Beautiful kids and a monster.

Day 8: 60km + 66km Singapore - Sungai Renggi
Today I will be going back to Malaysia but instead of crossing the Causeway again, we will be using a far less trodden way - taking the bumboat!

Rode for about 60km to the Changi Point Ferry Terminal and took the bum boat exit to Tanjung Pengelih. Sk and I rode via the scenic Punggol Promenade park connector and although arrived early at 11ish at the jetty, I had to wait till 4.30pm because there were only 2 passengers. Lenguh gak buntut tunggu. The bum boats can accommodate 12 passengers and departs once at 9am and another at 4pm.

We stopped for breakfast here. Looking at the big cargo ships, clanks of cranes and gentle poo pooo of ships gliding on the water macam sangat enthralling.

Hi hello Pasir Gudang and a very good morning to Ayam Brand perfect baked beans breakfast with roti paun yang empuk.

I can do this forever lah. Riding the smooth park connectors was a great departure from the gedegang gedegung banyak lubang Malaysian roads.

The Punggol Promenade route ni memang eye candy siot.

Oh hi Changi Point Ferry Terminal. Here we go!

The 4.30pm bum boat. Tototototototot..

From Tanjung Pengelih its only a 66km ride to Kampung Sungai Rengit.

The road was very quiet.

There's barely any cars here and to my right are just never ending stretches of beautiful beach. I wished I coudda just camp here but I didn't packed any supplies prior to leaving Singapore and there's no shops or food stalls place along the way.

For an out of the way and quite literally - end of the peninsular town, it was quite extraordinary that there's just so many cars here. And there were 6-7 guesthouses where all of them were fully booked. It's like, who comes here? What's going on?

Eventually lepas penat carik bilik, I found a market - contemplating to back pedal outta town and pitch a tent at the beach. But before I bought supplies, a restaurant taukeh offered me to stay a night at his worker's room. Its air conditioned and Rm15.

Come nightfall, loadsa abang in full boiler suits and 4WD appeared. Turns out Batam and it's surrounding area including parts of Tanjung Pengelih is turning into a massive shipyard, specifically to build oil and gas tankers. The abang having dinner a table away confirmed what I was thinking that at least in the future Batam has more than just seedy nightlife and ayams.

By 10pm all the stalls and restaurants were closing up and since there's nothing else to do so I turned in early.