Bakau lining and mallet
A short 1 hour walk and survey.
Primary objective is to cut through the Bakau steps, mallet them out for the wheelbarrow to go through the next day.
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trail armoring starts now
The granite chips are finally here.
With the granites chips being poured on the trailhead in big cubic metres,
Max, Nik, Alvin, Chew take the chance to route the trail from ‘yellow space‘ to ‘triple junction‘.
I pop by just in time to see the section and ride through the proposed route first hand. Indeed a total different kind of ride compared to the rhythm section of the earlier sections.
Love the underlining ‘bog’, the soft yet ridable surface simply give the trail a new flavour.
15 manhour – yellow space to triple junction routing
trail armoring starts now Read More »
meeting and race procedures
Just like any other meetings, things get tied down and some new question raised.
The race and adoption plans are made ready, with various National Parks people coming for the meeting with a few of us from SACA, so to come up with a plan.
Indeed some papers and clarifications are needed here and there. Everyone got to know the status of affair, and how Kent Ridge Park be featured as one of the official trail in the future.
Stay tune.
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bridge completion
With the roadies’s bridge incomplete, Chew, KeeMeng, Justin and Nik pop by for a full days work to get it completed.
Timberman KeeMeng and Knotting Justin get the work done with Chew putting in his bit on sitting and securing the bridge.
the completed Roadie’s bridge is one nice piece of work, totally blending into the surrounding.
Nik took the chance to recce the exit of the trail, finding the line that eventually link the ‘yellow space‘ to ‘triple junction‘.
12 manhours – roadies’s bridge
4 manhour – recce and routing
the first bridge
the day started late
We are toying with GPS to map the area, ran into technical, ran into battery problem, not your usual double A battery stuff.
Justin pop by to help out. We work our way to the first crossing, objective is to build a bridge from existing material around the trail, fallen logs, small branches etc
armed with a 200m long Manila rope. and Nik’s parang. We cut out blocks of fallen trunks and branches, tie them up with Manila ropes cut into 4metres length, secure the footing of the bridge and form the bridge out of the material around us.
The bridge is left half done when the daylight gone out on us.
At the same time, while Justin taking up the width of the bridge to tie down pieces of crossbraces, I buried one of the log so to make the soon to be called ‘log slope 1‘ a ridable and manageable slope.
The whole work is done without much equipment, rocks to pound down branches to secure it, leg power to brake the broken branches further. Total make do.
6 manhour on bridge 1 (soon to be called roadie’s bridge)
1 manhour on log slope 1
Moss hill
A full recce day.
Jaymes (Sporting Spectrum), Max, Liyana (National Parks Board) and me join 3 of the park workforce in a recce trip up the ‘Moss Hill’.
This is certainly the highest place this trail will ever reach.
we got to the ‘summit’, and I went all the way down to the drain, walk myself out of the trail, hike along South B. Vista road to the bottom of the area we were, so to mark an exit from the ‘summit’.
We managed to pathfind ourselves around gulleys, and some trails possibilities. tracked a nice route back to the drains, and then to yellow space, down along the bakau footpath wooded area, all the way to the Kent Ridge Park entrance!
We get a loop at last.
15 manhour – recce and marking
Park around
One of the first touchbase meeting with Nparks officials.
Max, Ling and me represent the cycling end of the deal and we go through the plans, a surprising think 30pages proposal to Nparks.
We got to thanks those who work that document in 2 days.
Trail Recce
another recce day. The second one to check on how feasible a MTB trail can be made.
Alvin, Max, Moneru and me take a hike and trek around, checking the area for trail lining, erosion, flora and water bogs.
Is interesting to walk in this very part of Singapore, unreal.
Kent Ridge Park being a secondary forest get a tall canopy. The low lying area is totally bare of plants. An occasional bush here, lots of fallen trunk here and there, thick mossy bottom layer, thick pile of leaves and vines.
A 4 hours hike we had.
Kent Ridge walk about
Deep inside the rarely walk area of Kent Ridge Park, is the whole North Shore like wooded area, with widely planted trees, certainly a secondary jungle.
Max and me took the chance to walk the park with Alvin from Nparks, for a site recce on possibility of getting a riding trail up.
The place is hilly, gulley filled, very open under the tall 6-8metres tree canopy. A perfect place to run a trail weaving around the trees, allowing riders and people to witness the nature close up with minimal distruption.
A certainly thrilling walk, and indeed a long one.
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