24th April 2010 - Saturday
finally my Pulau Ubin post. had been dilly-dally at home. looking the right time, right mood to blog. haha. very tired you know!~
so our 2 days 1 night Pulau Ubin trip organised by Moo. with lots of events piling up for us, the 8 adventurers: Audrey, Edmund, Ginnette, Joshua, Moo, Shun An, Xue Ni and me xD
✖ Cycling Expedition
✖ Quarry dipping (because the place was sealed up =/)
✖ Nigh-walking/Cycling
✖ Trekking + Forest-Bashing (because our dear Edmund wore slippers instead of a proper shoe!!)
✖ Camping ♥
✖ Stargazing with meteors ♥
yeah. so we gathered at Tampines first. i came late and the rest took their first group photo.. without me!! on purpose ='(
but it's okay. nevermind! we shop at the FairPrice for some night supper/snacks. i bought my favourite Calbee Seaweed potato chips as my supper for tonight!! haha.
after that, we took bus 29 to Changi Village. what a long journey. i thought it would be a short one, but no!!!
the 8 adventurers....
inside bus 29...
oh finally we reached Changi Village after a long ride. we made our way to the Changi Point Ferry Terminal to take a bumboat to Pulau Ubin.
heh. maximum only 12 passengers. and it's only $2.50 per ride. but it's only when the boat had a full of 12 passengers. if there's lesser than 12, then we'll have to divide the cost and pay extra loh. haha.
Boarding the bumboat!!!
and we are ready to go!!!
guess whose feet is whose?
and what a lucky day.. we saw rainbow!!!
REACHING SOON!!!
yeah! we have reached Pulau Ubin, the island that i have not been there for 10 over years!!! haha. it's island kind of place, looked so village. small shop houses, bicycle rental shop, etc.
analysing the map.
which route shall we start first?!
and yes, finally we decided to rent a bicycle first, so that we do not need to walk so much =X we rented 6 single bike and 1 couple bike because our dear Xue Ni's cycling skill is not very stable. Edmund will couple bike with Xue Ni, and the rest will stay solo-ed!
the rental fee was $8 each for an overnight bike. quite cheap for it.
our first station was the Secret Garden. half way through, the sky turned quite dark. and so we stopped by one place to get big big plastic bag ready. if it really rain later, we will immediately cover our bag with the plastic bag. yes, the stuffs inside our bag are more important than ourselves xD
the mosquitoes there were very horrible. we only stopped there for less than 10 minutes, but we were attacked by them horribly. shats. i got lots of mosquitoes bite already. quickly applied Audrey's herbal insect repellent, Joshua's moisture type repellent and sprayed Moo's liquid type insect repellent all over our body. super wonder triple layer of protection... woohoooo. and i felt very sticky!!! eww~
the place that we stopped by...
after that, we continued to cycle to the Secret Garden to explore pretty flowers and plants! there's alot of plants, but the horrible mosquitoes spoilt my mood.
damn mosquitoes!!! are u that hungry?! u gave me lots and lots of bum already loh!
End of Secret Garden!
it began to drizzle shortly. and so we cycled back to the jetty to have our early dinner first. we decided to have zi char @ Pulau Ubin Seafood for our dinner. we ordered Sweet & Sour Chicken, Chilli kang Kong and Claypot Toufu. ahhh.. love the food!~
and it's only like $40 for everything! $5 per person for a decent meal! so worth it!!!!
our delicious dinner!
we continued our journey when the rain stopped. we have to get to our campsite fast. it will be harder to cycle when the sky turned dark because there's no street lamp by the walkway at all.
toilet break first!~
the last toilet break we have. also for us to change into long pant as it will be very cold at night. i brought jeans as i do not have any baggy pant or track pant at home. and i felt very uncomfortable with my sticky legs sticking to my jeans. eww!~
but i got no other choice, so i have to bear with it.
yay! all changed to long pant!
and we have to get to our campsite fast. there's no street lamp and we only have 3 torch light with us, plus the sky turned dark extremely fast in Ubin. and our bicyle got no backlight at all. pretty dangerous to cycle in the dark with the uneven rocky pathway.
yay! finally we reached our campsite. it's like a big piece of empty land, so spacious. next to the quarry with trees surrounding us. and when we raised up our head, we can see the entire sky clearly without trees blocking our view! a plus point for stargazing latre on xD.
and now, we have to start working hard on pitching the tent. we laid out the groundsheets that Joshua and Moo brought, and then placed all our bags on top of it. then off we go to help pitching the tent. it's not easy to pitch a tent in the dark, especially with just 3 torch light to survive on.the hardworking people in the process of pitching the tents.
working hard on Audrey's big tent.
yeah! we're finally done with the tent pitching part. so tired. we gathered around the groundsheets and relaxed. but looked like it's a very humid night.
and also to play with lightsticks. haha. sponsored by Moo. yeh, i love to break lightsticks.
anyway, Moo had planned a task for us to complete. earlier on, when we were cycling our way here to our campsite, Moo secretly hid some "stuff" somewhere from where we came from. our job was to walk back the route and find the "stuff" back for him.
Moo stayed behind to look after our bags, and so the 7 of us started our Night Walking at 9pm. the journey back there was extremely dark and we were only allowed to bring 1 torchlight along.
there's this path that was pretty eerie, surrounded by big trees. it's totally pitch dark if we switched off the torchlight. so creepy!~ we increased our walking speed, wanting to get out of that path. and we saw red light coming from the bushes at the bridge. finally, we found it!
we opened up the plastic bag, and found one piece of paper and a red lightstick inside. Moo placed a lightstick inside so it can be easily spotted!~
the piece of paper: some Astronomy star reading thingy.
quickly made our way back to our campsite. and we have to walk past the eerie path again =/ and also to walk past the dark route, rocky way and muddy ground =S
back finally. we used 30 minutes to complete the task xD
we played Uno to pass the time. the entire place was so dark, and we have limited light, only 3 torchlight. too dark that we couldn't differentiate blue from green. haha. we have to keep passing the torchlight around. Audrey the best, she was wearing that headlight all along. haha
i'm the unlucky one who kept on losing the game. i lost thrice loh. i'm not the only one since Shun An also lost 3 times, but then at least he won the game before. i'm the ultimate loser T_T!!!
and yeh, those who win the game will get to wear Audrey's headlight. and we called it the "light of glory!" no one really likes to wear that. and this is the first time that everybody did not aim to win at all. we must wait until when finally one person win the game, then the rest can quickly finish the game. lol.
playing UNO!~
LIGHT OF GLORY!~
we played until 11.30pm, then we decided to play sparklers, sponsored by Moo again lol!! it's the best thing to play in the dark.
Sparklers!!!!
drawing out shapes and words!!
can you all managed to get what we were actually drawing?
Heart Shape. Star shape. Lyrids and P.Ubin
we stopped playing when it was around 1am. it was said that the meteor shower timing was around 1am plus. so everyone lied down on the groundsheet and stargazed. i saw a few horoscopes as well. i think Scorpio was the nicest. it's so big, with the shape of a Scorpion!! haha.
i waited for so long and i finally get to see my Sagittarius. i was anticipating that it will looked like an arrow or what, but it turned out to look like a teapot!! haha. so cute!~ but it looked so small beside Scorpio =/
we waited for quite some time but never see any meteors yet. and some of us wanted to use the toilet urgently. and so all of us decided to cycle out to the toilet at 2am. it was quite a distance away, we started hanging lightstick at the back of our bike, so that the people behind knew where's the bike infront and won't bang towards it.
and yah, there's only 3 torchlight to brighten our route, so the first, the middle and the last person will be holding the torclight. and it's really not easy to cycle in the dark especially with rocky, bumpy slopes!! the path was so dark there i don't even know whether i should cycle straight or turned left =S
reached the toilet, like finally!!
forever SSG!~
and now, we have to make our way back. half way through, all of us decided to get off and push the bike back. it was too dark and the remaining route was mostly up slope.
went back safe and sound. haha. and we continued our stargazing. i waited for so long but did not get to see a single meteor =(. so at around 3am Audrey, Xue Ni and me went to sleep inside the big tent, while Edmund and Shun An sleep inside the smaller tent, the rest stayed outside continued to stargaze.
it was so uncomfortable as the ground was so hard, with small small rocks poking me. and my whole body was so sticky. and the humidity level was quite high, our hair looked very wet and damp =/ewwww~
i was sleeping and suddenly i heard Ginnette shouting that she saw one meteor. haha it was around 4am loh. too bad, i missed it D=
anyway, we woke up at around 7am like that. damn, i missed the sunrise!! ahhhhhhh!!! and we finally get to see clearly how the place actually looked like. last night, in the dark we couldn't even see the surrounding well loh.
well, it was quite a nice place to camp, just that it rained last night, that's why the place was so wet and muddy.
plants & flowers!
nice and beautiful scenery!
the wet area!
our camping place.
we managed to find a dry spot to lay our groundsheets and tents!
we took out our biscuit for breakfast and started packing our stuffs. we changed back to short pant as well xD luckily we were fast enough, just right after we cleared finish almost everything, it rained all of a sudden. all of us dumped everything inside the tent and we stayed inside for shelter.
the 6 of us inside Audrey's tent.
while Edmund and Shun An inside the other smaller tent.
it looked like it was just a passing-by rain. it stopped pretty fast and so we continued the packing up job. the most difficult part was to fold and keep back the tent.
and lastly, before we left our campsite, a group picture with the beautiful quarry behind!!
group photo xD
left the place and cycle to further explore the place. Moo wanted to bring us to somewhere but the place turned out to be blocked. no trespassing allowed. disappointed, but to U-turn back.
stopped by for a drinks!
finally saw one lady selling drinks. stopped by to buy drinks to quench our thirst and also to rest for awhile. after 20 minutes or so, we cycled back to the jetty to return our bike.
and we had our lunch at Cheong Lian Yuen. we ordered zi char again. haha. this time round with Fu-yung egg, Chicken Wings and non-chilli Kang Kong. lol. we waited very long for the food to be served loh. and it's also $5 per person. haha. very worth it. so if you have big group of friends, it's best to order zi char xD.
our lunch.
it started to pour again when we finished our lunch. have to delay our plan and went to seek shelter near the information area there.
the umbrella people!
i couldn't stand soaking feet and so i changed back to my slipper. haha. went to wash my legs in the toilet and i felt so good! haha. no more sticky leg xD
next stop was the Mini Zoo. we started our journey when the rain stopped. no more bicycle, we have to made the rest of the journey by walking =X. with the damn mosquitoes keep attacking us!!! we don't know sprayed how many times of insect repellent!!
group picture again!
this place have alot of big big flying insect. but they were not as horrible mosquitoes. at least they didn't even bother to fly near us! haha.
yay! reached Mini Zoo finally. as said, mini zoo! really have very limited animals!!
wild boar and rabbits!!
trekkingggg!
Have a nice day, and Good Bye Ubin!!!!
and lastly, that's the end of our Pulau Ubin trip. so thrilling, exciting and fun, although with lots and lots of irritating mosquitoes bite. what an unforgettable experience i had! camping was fun ♥
we took a bumboat back. the person splitted us up as if we have to wait quite long for us 8 people to be in the same boat together. and so we agreed to split into 4:4. there's a boat still short of 4 people, so Audrey, Edmund, Shun An and me went ahead first, while the rest wait for the next boat.
waving goodbye to them. bye bye!
3 2 and 1!!
and lastly, picture in the boat!!
we waited for the rest at the terminal, and then took bus 29 back to Tampines, train back to Tiong Bahru and then bus back home!!!
now i wanted most was to WASH MY HAIR and scrub myself clean clean!! hahaha. GOOD BYE!!!!
Labels: astronomy, camping, Cosca, Epsilon, HSS friends, night cycling, overnight, stargazing