The Southern Ridges!

We have finally gone to the Southern Ridges after so long! Weather and other activities thwarted us whenever we wanted to do this. Our cast of adventurers feature: Mintea and Dude, Joelyn, Max and Raven.

Our trail:  From Kent Ridge Park to Marang Trail

Which we had planned to go via: Canopy Walk > Floral Walk > Alexandra Arch > Forest Walk > Hilltop Walk > Henderson Waves > Faber Walk > Marang Trail

You can check out the trails from the NParks website here too. If you want to try out the trails, really check the website out first so you know which path to take.

We started our actual walk around 8am and just went on from there. It started to rain and we stopped under a shelter. Eventually we hecked it cause it was 9am and we needed to go to places after that. HUZZAH that the rain did stop and we shook our umbrellas off and shoved them into our bags. There are historical places and notes along the trail which you can also check on s1942.

Somehow we ended up at Look Out Point. There’s a picture on what is supposed to be what when you look out. Obviously expectation is different from reality. You can’t see it from Look Out Point any more since the trees grew taller, blocking your view.You could see said view while you went up though, at an angle instead.

After stone steps, our paths turned to wood as we got onto one of the tree top walks.

The trail goes somewhat of a loop since it would be too steep if you just went DOWN like that. Mind you, the weather was turning hot once more as the rain stopped drizzling.

Then picnic time! We were halfway through our journey. Brownies were doing their plant activities in the back and they were really fascinated by the automated paper towel dispenser at the washing area since it was motion activated.

Walk some more and we ended up at Hort Park. The actual visitor’s centre. It has a cafe and restaurant too! Pretty fancy and a lovely place to go to if you wanted coffee or one of those places where you write stories/poetry amongst nature while looking hipsterish.

Ok. Let’s get on with it. The metal walk ways if you look down, you’ll realize…THAT YOU ARE FREAKING HIGH UP. Don’t look down if you want to freak out. This area is lighted with LEDs at night. Not all of it but some of the pathways are all fancy closest to Hort Park for pictures.

Don’t be silly and carve on the bamboos as you walk along the pathway.

Meanwhile, I’m not sure how NParks did it but they stopped a landslide by putting concrete on it. It really is a severe landslide, frozen in time as you stand on the metal walkway. It would have been utterly dramatic if they did not do this.

Pit stop before we go up to the Henderson Waves. This cat just continued sleeping as we sat next to it. With a cameo of Max’s butt, I guess.

I asked them all, “So, how s this the ridges? Is this whole thing a ridge or something?” and Dude replied that if you looked from the top, the place was made up of ridges, hence our twisty trails.

FINALLY! The Henderson Waves. No skate boarding or cycling on it. You might just fall off the waves and plunge into the forest or traffic below.

This totally looked like some scene from a movie as a silver tower or some alien ship lands in the middle of the forest. It was so out of nowhere.

We ended up at Faber Park and it all went downhill from there. TOWARDS, Harbourfront MRT! Huzzah! We made it out! AND WHAT WAS THAT NOTE? From Slenderman?

In total, nearly 10 kilometres. We brought long a lot of water which was really important for this hike. Wear comfy running shoes and also, we were lucky not to see any monkeys around. They would snatch at people’s food and you’re not supposed to disturb them anyway.

Perhaps the rain helped with this since only people were found on the trail itself. Other bits in the trail, we passed by the Bukit Chandu museum. We’ll probably go back again just for the museum when we have time.