Tour de Bintan year two

Joel is just finishing up the final stage of the Tour de Bintan which has been running for the past two days. We have been staying at the host resort, Nirawana Gardens this year. Not as clean or as comfortable as the Bintan Lagoon Resort we stayed at last year but much easier to deal with all the race stuff staying right at the location of registration etc.

Joel has been riding with his team here and despite the incredible heat, everyone is holding up ok! He was ecstatic about nearly getting the KOM this morning... If only he hadn't dropped his chain at the last second. Ah the lament of cyclists. Anyway, final short race is starting around now. Then we are racing back to Singapore to see how Kopi-o is managing. He didn't spend the whole weekend alone, our helper went over yesterday to feed him but he's sure to put on a good show of displeasure when we get back.

Prunus Trail at the MacRitchie Boardwalks

 

Today we did the walk around the lower boardwalks at the MacRitchie Reservoir Park. It's quite a beautiful and tranquil if you can get there when it's not full of people. I grew up around lakes and miss the sound of water lapping up against a dock and fish breaking the surface of the water in feeding frenzies. 

The most remarkable thing in this area of the park today was the huge group of monkeys hanging out on the shore. They were playing and somersaulting across the grass. Occasionally stopping and watching all the humans but mostly just carrying on their games oblivious.

Jungle Trail Run

We just did a trail run around Bukit Timah park in the pouring rain. It was beautiful and quiet. Joel's shoe landed an inch from a little ribbon of green I could see as I ran behind him. When it came into focus I realized he'd just missed stepping on a Wagler's Pit Viper. It looked like an adolescent male who had been washed out of his daytime nap spot. Pit Vipers are nocturnal and usually hang out sleeping on tree branches during the day. The park naturalist was quite interested in our find, though I'd be fine with not seeing another one.

Our other discovery was dozens of monkeys with tiny babies hanging around their necks. It's really probably the cutest thing you could ever see... and we had no cameras this time.

-Stacey