Island in the sun

Mar distance: 219 km

St John's Island, 64 km. Who would've thought that:

• A tiny island could be so pretty?
• This island, previously used to hold those with cholera and then political dissidents, is now a holiday camp?
• Another island nearby could become a country, and when its first prime minister, Lee Kuan Yew (LKY), died, the world's largest democracy, India, declares a day of mourning? And Australia and New Zealand pay homage to him in their parliament?
• While LKY was alive, British Prime Minister Tony Blair visited the former to learn how to govern.  A British Prime Minister learning from an ex-colony, five decades after independence?  

Twists and turns

Photo courtesy of Ah Tak

Seletar, 57 km. There are about 20 golf courses in this small country. That's a lot for an island which has only three official mountain bike trails*.

Tonight, the two become one. Sort of. For the first time in my life, I get to cycle in a golf course. What a treat!

Five km per loop. The first is with a volunteer guide, a club member, who takes us where the buggies go. Only it's at night. It's kind of dark, but not quite. There's a lot of light pollution that hinders night sight. It doesn't help when a girl wants to avoid sprinklers, turns her bicycle around and shines her light right in my face. Then the sprinker hits me, it feels like someone turned a hose on me.

The path twists and turns, just like at work, and goes up and down. Lights from cyclists behind and in front of me light up my way, but the way the light twists and turns on their handlebars is distracting: sometimes the road is bright, sometimes dark, and there are drains, kerbs and water hazards.

I let everyone close behind me get ahead. By the time I'm on round 5, I'm alone. The golf course is all mine. I start sprinting as if I'm racing. Just like old times, on my Little Red Tank.

*After Tampines trail got bulldozed. The number varies, depending on source. National Parks lists three, Razor TV mentions five.

Nightfall

Admiralty Road West, 37 km. Dark clouds gather. I wait for the rain to fall as dusk draws near. The clouds hold back, but the light inexorably fades. So out I go. As I head back from the ride, lightning flashes. I speed up to beat the rain. As I near home, I see that the rain has fallen, but not on me.

The dark clouds didn't blanket the entire sky, and I had options where to cycle. I'd headed where the dark clouds faded. I escaped.

Beauty and the bleak

Sengkang 36 km. I feel tired, but I cycle anyway. On the road, the tired feeling slips away. With traffic around me, I have to keep my wits about me, or I might end up in permanent sleep.

I look for a beautiful place and find it. No matter how bleak things look, there's beauty to be found somewhere.

High horse

Matt Black amidst the greenery

Upper Thomson Road, 25 km. I'm tired but take Matt Black through its paces: the slopes I trained on Inner Mongolia race and a bit of off road. With its 100 mm suspension fork, my new ride has a higher centre of gravity and feels less steady. But bouncing downhill is so plush. Instead of a jarring experience bouncing about, I glide downhill and just need a feather light touch to feather the brakes downhill. Going up slope, I use all 30 speeds.

I follow a single track along a stream and see a guy in his birthday suit, all lathered up, bathing in the stream. There's also a family with a girl on a high horse. She gestures me to pass but I don't want to rattle by and startle it.