Jurong Hill

Another climbing route tonight. This time it's Jurong Hill. Ben seems keen to get me up every hill in Singapore. In no time, I think I should would be going up mountains if this keeps up. The route was simple, we headed to towards Jurong East then Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim before going all the way straight down towards Pioneer North Road. Wrong choice of road. It connects to part of the expressway. We should have taken the road to Boon Lay then go past the industrial estate and make a left towards Pioneer North Road. Lucky for us, it was very late at night and there were no cars on the road. We did meet many patrol cars though. We even saw a group of punk riders get stopped by a patrol car early in the morning.

Anyway, this seems like the season for hill climbs and short rides, but hell do I feel more tired after these rides. I have done 120km a night but hill climbing seems more tiring than long distance riding. Jurong Hill, just beside Jurong Bird Park starts with a long low gradient slope that gets steeper as you progress upwards. Hitting the car park midway, you will face another climb almost twice the gradient of the first part of the climb. Happy climbing!

Finishing the climb, we were aimless and headed to a Mac at Jurong West for coffee to replan our next destination. After much discussion, we decided to head for our regular Jurong West Nasi Lemak. At $4 a plate, consisting of ikan bilis, fish cake, chicken wing and egg, I felt that it was very expensive as the Nasi Lemak at Changi only cost $3 for the same stuff. The interesting this about this malay guy who sells nasi lemak is that he can speak almost perfect mandarin!!! Try talking to him. The stall is located at the market at Jurong West. After that, we headed back to Bt Batok for more food. We had eggs and toast and coffee. The funny thing was, we could still eat! I wonder if it was the hills we climbed. I don't eat as much even on long rides. This is like a makan ride disguised as a hill climbing ride...


Ride Details:
Distance : 28.2km
Avg Spd. : 18km/h
Ride Time : 1hr 39mins

Short ride with new discoveries

Supposed to ride at 2am but had trouble adjusting my brake pads at home and was late. My road wheel's spoke snapped on the previous ride so I had to change to my original semi-slick wheels but I forgot that I had to change the alignment of my brake pads. According to Murphy's law, everything went wrong that night. I had forgotten to change the spare tube in my saddle bag to the semi-slick version before riding out. This made me have to go back home to change it as I did not want to be stranded due to a flat tire.

Finally everything was set and it was already 3.30am. Ben had an appointment in the afternoon and wanted to be back by 7am to avoid the traffic so our trip was planned to be a short one. The 1st part of the route was simple enough. We went through BT towards Cavanenagh Road and made a right at Suntec towards the Esplanade and all the way to Keppel Road. Going to our favourite Murtabak place along Pasir Panjang Road, we stopped there for a bite. The strange thing was I felt hungry at that point but I just could not finish the Murtabak??? Must have been a psychological scar the last Kent Ridge ride left me.

After the food, the ride became more interesting. We hit Pepys Road up towards Kent Ridge Park and found a very nice treetop broad walk that connects to Kent Ridge Park. (Cyclist please dismount! Don't make them ban all cyclist from using it!) There are benches and rest stops you can sit at and enjoy the sunset from the broad walk. Getting into Kent Ridge Park, we headed to the exit towards Science Park and made our way towards Bouna Vista, Old Holland Road and towards Senapang Trial where we would emerge from the entrance of BT hill. At this point, Ben decided to explore the road that supposedly runs behind the fire station. No luck, it does not run through. We backtracked and headed back home. Being IBS, I decided to do another hill before heading home so I went up Hume Ave. for another climb.

Conclusion, I had to get used to semi-slicks again, found a nice broadwalk and an alternate route to Kent Ridge Park instead of murtabak puking Vigilante Road, went through Senapang Road and explored a new route behind the fire station.

Short and sweet!

Ride Details:
Distance : 46.60km
Avg Spd : 18.7km/h
Ride Time : 2hrs 28min

Discovery Route

It's back to Changi for Nasi Lemak again but this time using a different route and having many new discoveries along the way. We set of as usual and used Mandai toward Bondary Road vai AMK ave 6. Making a left on Boundary Road, you hit Tampines Road then Old Tampines Road, in my opinion was one of the more interesting roads that night. It spans 6.17km and is mostly flat, runs behind a runway and you can see the Tampines skyline from the uphill climb at the end of Old Tampines Road. After that, as we proceeded right to Bedok Reservoir Road we saw a very bad accident where a taxi crashed into the middle of the road divider destroying the steel barricade. Wonder how was the driver? As typical Singaporeans, I overheard a man on the phone at the crash screen telling his friend about the crash and to buy 4D of the car no. plate! BTW, it 4549. Further up, where you will find a 7-11 that sells MARS ice-cream!!! Best Energy Bar in the world!!! Instead of turning right to Simei Road, we should have just continued on Tampines Ave 2 and would have hit Loyang Ave. instead of doing the extra mileage. Following Loyang Ave, we used the usual route towards Changi Village for our breakfast!

Coming back from Changi Village, we discovered a new road that leads to an Aviation Hub with a 1.6 mile runway and huge hanger. Excellent cycling road; long and straight but has strong headwind at times. Riding along the Changi-East Coast Park Connector, we saw the remnants of a lorry accident along Coastal Road. The driver was dead when we saw him. The lorry crashed into a tree on the oncoming side of the road and swerved 180 degrees, shattering the windscreen and throwing its carriage onto the middle of the road. That driver must have been going very very fast for something like that to happen. Would have posted a pic if I had a camera with me. Talk about road kill! 2 accidents, 2 rats, 1 toad, 1 bloated dog and 1 man(if the taxi driver wasok). Bad night...

Well, that only goes to remind us that road safety is just so important. Doesn't mean that at night, there are less cars it is safer. In fact, it is just as dangerous if not more as people drive faster/race and are already sleepy and don't see you as well.

We also found a way of coming back from East Coast without hitting much traffic during peak hours that we thought was well appropriate for the morning as we were tired and were late in a sense that the peak hour traffic had started. We took the usual route to Orchard and made our way along the pavements towards Botanic Gardens and entered Tyersall Avenue. It leads to Cluny Park Road where you emerge from Bukit Timah Road. Making a right at 6th Avenue, we went up Swiss Club Road, Swiss Club Link then Binjai Park where Ben tried to Sabo me by ordering a $4 plate of wanton mee for lunch just before a major climb at Hua Guan Avenue. There is a back road that leads to BT nature reserve's Senapang Trail where you come out from the main entrance of BT hill. Beware, if you are going there after a rain and you have slick tyres.

From there it was all the way back home before I started work at 5pm. I reached home at 2pm, cleaned up my bike and discovered that one of the spokes of the drive-side of the rear wheel was broken. Damn!!! I just had it repaired not long ago. Now I have to go to Peter Chew's place to get it fixed again. And since I'm riding 120km again tonight, I guess it's back to my semi-slicks again. I think I'm going to smell smoke from Ben tonight... :~(

We'll see.....



Ride Details:
Distance : 116.26km
Avg Spd : 20.1
Ride Time : 5hrs 45min

The Great Murtabak Hunt!

After the crash at Jalan Kampong Chantek, I decided I had to re-visit the site and document the crash site. I headed out to Ben's late at night about 2am and we made our way there the reverse direction to take pictures of the damaged kerb and steep slope. You can see the video in my previous post on the full story. I shall not go into details here and will focus on something of greater importance... my hunger...

I was famished by the time I finished taking the pictures and was craving for a good murtabak thinking back on the one at Telok Blangah, thus began the quest for murtabak. Since we were at BT, I thought that the coffee shop at 6th avenue would be open. We rode there only to find that it was closed...it should have been opened if I remembered correctly..... anyway, further up was Adam Road food centre, I thought,"This time sure got one....". We reached, parked our bikes and I approached the indian prata shop in the food centre only to discover to my demise, "Solly boss, vee are crozing...". I could not believe it! It was as though it was a conspiracy. Ben even suggested a network of indian prata houses that would phone ahead to tell the other stalls to beware of a murtabak monster riding towards them.... 2nd last resort, Mr Prata just along the road by the old SMU, current NUS.

Typical of Ben when he said, "Ay, Hon Shin, later you reach there they say closed for cleaning". Now this was something that was highly possible as we ride past there quite often and we always observe that they are usually cleaning the place... Mr Prata was kind to me; they were open. I went in there and ordered a mutton cheese murtabak and a teh tarik, Ben being afraid that he would end up Jolly like a mutual friend of ours, decided to just have a teh tarik. The murtabak came very quickly and disappeared very quickly too... For second helpings, Ben ordered a cheese roti tissue and another round or drinks. That disappeared pretty fast too and we were on our way again.

Heading back this time along BT was the best ride of all nights as we were so early that there was no traffic to beat. Brilliant, till Ben suggested we take a right up the hill towards upp BT road from the main junction at BT plaza. After having a full murtabak and half a roti tissue climbing up a long long climb as like trying to squeeze out all that I had stomached. Now, South Bouna Vista doesn't sound that bad after all...

I was tired by then and decided to head back home to sleep and that concludes our short documenting, recovery and makan ride for the night.


Ride details:
Distance : 28.79km
Avg Spd : 16.9km/h
Ride Time : 1hr 42min

New toys and more crazy riding

So its back to Viki's or some new toys. Bought a Garmin GPS 60 to better plot my cycling routes for future references. Got too tired of visually plotting the route using Google Earth . Now, I just upload it via USB directly into Google Earth PLUS after paying the US$20/- yearly subscription. In my opinion, it's worth it! Saves you a lot of eye-strain hunting blurred, clouded, not updated satellite images of google maps. You can also use MotionedBased to do the job. Haven't tried though but I'll do a full write-up once I have tested it out with the unit thoroughly, but in the meantime, here are some comments I have for the unit.

Quite bulky but it is very visible while travelling as it sports a larger than average display as compared to other handheld GPSs. The waypoint recording is highly accurate as referenced with the picture on google maps and physical location, subjected to full 3D capturing of waypoints. Try not to stand just outside the shop to take waypoint as you are usually partially sheltered by the building. This has resulted in one of my waypoints being 500m off-course which I later traced to it being that I did not have a full 3D lock on the location.

[Tip! That extra 2mins you spend acquiring a full signal would save you miles later on the way back. More, if you are elevated/climbing!]

Sexy design sporting user friendly water-proof buttons for easy single-handed use and rubber studded side-grips for those slippery and wet moments... hee :p


Route taken was half-manually plotted. As you can see from the pic, the light green line was plotted by me and the cyan one by the GPS.

Highlight of the day happened just as we started riding. I went tree-hugging just 20 mins into the ride... I was very lucky to only sustain minor abrasions and bruises on my left shoulder and thigh considering that I was going very very fast. Flipping my stem over really made a difference to the profile of my riding, not to mention the handling of the bike too. Check out the vid.

All in all, this ride was an interesting one as we located new bike shops and makan places. Had chunky grass jelly and soya bean curd along Upp Serangoon Road, also managed to find 1 of the 3 Scott distributors in Singapore called Swiss Valley along River Valley Road and we found a little bikers haven for cool drinks and chillin out. Go check out Ambrosia. It's a Mediterranean restaurant that has the coolest slushes and refreshing drinks. Didn't have a camera then so will write more and post more pics there when we visit again.

Till then....


Trip Details:
Distance : 103.51km
Avg Spd : 20.3km/h
Ride Time : 5hrs 5min
Crash speed : 60.7km/h

The moment of truth

Took me Scottie out for a ride this morning in the witching hours of the night to test out the results of my work. Enjoyed the ride with the smooth transmissions and superb braking. The ride goes as follows.

Started at 1:00am 25th Oct 2007

Route

I started at Bukit Batok and proceeded to meet Ben at Dairy Farm Road before turning to Petir Road connecting to Jelebu Road and Bukit Panjang Road before turning into Woodlands Road for the long ride to Mandai Road.

Upp thomson Road was the next turning that takes you to Lornie Road before passing through a chinese cemetery atKheam Hock Road. Can be pretty eerie at night as the road is not well lit and there are humps along the way and the chance of dogs appearing out of nowhere. We emerged from Bukit Timah Road to proceed on to Evans Road then Nassim Road.

Stopped at Treknology and Tay Junction at Tudor Court along Tanglin Road and rode all the way to Alexandra Road. Turning right at Lower Delta Road we enter Kampong Bahru Road. At this point, it started to drizzle and we decided to make a dash for the prata house along Telok Blangah Road. We were going at 40km/h for about 10 mins before we realised that the 3 weeks that we did not ride was starting to take an effect on the performance of our muscles. 10 mins in my opinion was all the sprinting we could do before we felt like cramping in the legs. The murtabak at the prata house was awesome. Huge crispy murtabak with lots of egg and filling as compared to the lousy murtabak at Railmall. We had a great stuffing before we set off for what seemed like the killer of the whole ride.

Taking Pasir Panjang Road and turning into South Bouna Vista Road and up Vigilante Drive to Kent Ridge Park. The bloody hill was more than 20 degrees gradient and was even more daunting as we were full of murtabak. Ben wanted to make it more challenging by only using the middle crank and not the granny. Halfway up the first part of the hill, we were both wheezing like broken whistles and our legs were feeling like they were slowly melting away on the slope. Finally we emerged at the top of Kent Ridge PArk after what seemed like an eternity of climbing.

Going through Kent Ridge Park and emerging from the other side from Science Park Drive while witnessing a liquid nitrogen tanker refilling the Science Park facility. There was fog all over the place as the super cold liquid was pumped into the facility. At first I thought the tanker was on fire or something seeing smoke all around the vehicle. Ben in his usual prankster mind was thinking, "Hon Shin, go buy a pail of that stuff and refill your insulated water bottle."

We exited by North Bouna Vista Road into Lower Kent Ridge Road then Kent Ridge Cresent, finally into the all too familiar Clementi Road for the final journey back home. The last leg was through Jalan Anak Bukit, Upp Bukit Timah Road then Diary Farm Road for Ben. I had a little more to go through Hillview Avenue to Bukit Batok.

An incident happened at Hillview Avenue just outside The Petals Condo. I was returning home along the road when this mother drivine here 2 kids in her car was stopped at the entrance of the condo waiting for the oncoming traffic to clear before making a left turn. I was riding at 35km/h and approaching. We made eye contact but as I approached her car about 5m away, this reckless mother darted out making the left turn! Damn it. What was she thinking? I shouted, was scared shit out of my pants, and e-braked till my tires skidded. It was a good thing I was using good brake pads from Kool-stop or I would have collided into that purple car with number plate 6612. What's more, this lady didn't even turn back and and just drove off. Talk about reckless almost hit and run accidents. She should have her license revoked and banned from driving for life.


Ride ended at 5.30am

Total Distance: 67.94 Km
Riding Time: 3hr 12 min
Average Speed: 21.2km/h

Given the idea of a test ride to be an easy ride, we never expected that the ride would turn out to be a torture as we were climbing hills more than 20 degrees gradient, dodging rain at 40km/h and finally riding on a full stomach of "Murtabak".