Saturday, January 17, 2009

East coast park

Hi all,

Ting has pleased us with many posts recently, and I hope you enjoyed reading them as much as I did. But I'd like to tell you about our afternoon at east coast park.

Amongst the numerous things to do on week-ends in Singapore, you can cycle, run, roller-blade, swim, or just have a slow stroll in East Coast Park. It's a stretch of road reserved to pedestrians and bicycles in the... east! And this is where we went this afternoon.

We go there quite often but today, for the first time, a couple of friends, Yihmay and Jimme, joined us and made it quite an adventure... Our meeting was scheduled at 12h30... We were the first to reschedule and 12.30 turned to 1pm. At 12.30 a call... Our friends had just woken up, meeting is set for 2.30pm. Ting and I being usually late had to warn that we'd be there only at 3pm and when we finally showed up at 3 our friends were still in the cab. That gave Ting and I time to choose good bikes in the rental shop... The rental guy was getting frustrated at running after me around the shop as I was trying the bikes... In the end I settled for the one with huge wheels and disk breaks... very useful for a stroll along the beach. And we waited for our friends to arrive.
We managed to depart for our trip at 3.30 and one goal was set: Changi Beach. Only 9Km away from where we were:


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Shortly after we left, I received a call, our friends had turned back to change one bike... he told us after he tried two more in the shop. I wish I had been there to see the face of the rental guy. Meanwhile Ting posed for a nice picture:



Finally we started cycling and nothing much noticeable happened. I think we were all busy talking and avoiding the crazy kids zooming past us and the adults stopped in the middle of the road (why do Singaporeans like to stop in the most annoying places and have long chats there ignoring the scolding of the passers by?!). We had to face the wind and the whole while I was just hoping it wouldn't turn around when we did.

For our first brake we sat on a nice green spot not far from the beach... On this picture Yihmay and Jimme are not crying after hearing one of my jokes, they just happened to rub their eyes at the same time. We were all actually quite joyful...



And again we left. We covered the 9Km distance in about an hour and a half, that gave us time to rest at Changi Beach and watch the kite surfers do their stunts. We also did our own of course.



I also find it funny how 9Km of cycling can turn two young girls into old ladies... Or maybe they're always like that?



And we had a laugh at this couple coming there for their wedding pictures... The beach is pretty dirty and the wind was blowing really hard... Look at the bride's sorrow face...



It's on the way back that the most important thing happened: I saw the A380! In real, with it's wings and engines... Okay, it was about 1000 metres away, but still... I was running across the road like a little boy to take better pictures, and I realised how childish I was when I heard this little boy next to us jumping and running just like I had done seconds before. As I was looking at it I was thinking that I'm not sure how I would like to fly one of these... Quite huge and heavy for a flying object I feel. Unless I get to stay in my private room.



We managed to get back, after waiting for our friends while they took pictures and we waited while they took money, and waited again while they had a drink...

After the effort the comfort, as the French would say. So we went for a good old pint in the Irish pub not far from there. We ended up ordering a lot of food




and left with our bellies fatter than when we arrived that afternoon... 3 hours of sports wasted in one meal! At least we enjoyed ourselves.

Next week-end is Chinese new year! I'm going family visiting with Ting, the occasion to meet most people who will be present at the wedding. Hope it's fun!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I wish you and your family and friends a happy Chinese new year! We are currently preparing our summer clothes, in view of our trip to Singapore in February; it is strange since the weather in France is cold, rainy and windy! All the best.