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Sun 25 Jun 2006

MacRitchie - Bukit Timah Briskwalks 2006: 2nd walk on 18th June

Category : events

For two Sundays in June (4th & 18th), a group of people turned up in the early morning to experience the two hour briskwalk MacRitchie to Bukit TImah with Raffles Museum volunteers. I posted the summit photo of the 4th June 2006 here. Below is an account of the second and final public walk on 18th June 2006.

With the promise of sunrise in MacRitchie and breakfast in Bukit Timah, we met at 6.45am to register and move to the briefing point. Against a backdrop of the reservoir, participants were introduced to briskwalk objectives and trail etiquette explained, and some forest issues are discussed - all in a very short time.

And then we're off! Crossing the bridge is slow but soon we are in the forest with little human traffic (congested old route avoided). It's still quite dark at 7am in the forest but there is enough light to walk without torches.

The ambience of the forest, the company and the morning air and sounds makes this Sunday morning walk really rewarding. Everyone must feel that struggling out of bed at 5.30am was worthwhile right now. The groups scatter themselves into the sub-groups that form naturally based on walking speed and thankfully there are enough guides to oversee this.

The Bukit Timah leg of the route couldn't have been better designed - its climb, climb, climb to the summit! But watch out for that left-hand turn into Catchment Path; miss that and you're headed to Bukit Panjang; overcome that and you face a long flight of seemingly never-ending steps to the summit!

The climb to the summit is sweet and most clear the laast step past the sign post in less than two hours. Then its time for group photos; we took two this session as some were slower due to a shoe that needed fixing, and a need to apply some 'organic fertiliser' to the vegetation along the way! After congratulations are exchanged, its a slow walk down to the Visitor Centre teeming with Singaporeans in for a Sunday stroll. Then breakfast beckons!

Project Manager Ng Kai Scene, who was assisted by Anand Balan, had this to say to the guides:

"Thanks for all the sweat, efforts, photos, orange towels, name tags, spreadsheet sample, great conversation, smiles, ideas, encouragement, all of which made my coordination job so easy. *Phew!*"

Six albums of photos from this year's event are lodged at the MR-BT Briskwalkers page.

A heartfelt thanks to NParks for backing up our safety ad evacuation plans. It was a lovely feeling both weeks to be able to send that sms confirmation that everyone was out, safe and sound and off to enjoy the rest of their Sunday!

Posted at 11:38AM SGT by N. Sivasothi | permalink | , .