Singapore! Singapore! Sing-a-pore!!!: The end of the Eurasian road

March 25, 2015

Thanks to the causeway that now tethers the island to the Malaysian mainland it is actually possible to travel entirely overland from Paris to Singapore. Despite the incredible distance it really is connected by land the whole way, and so I could theoretically have cycled all the way from the Eiffel Tower to here. Which I suppose might beg the question as to why, by the time I rocked up on the Singapore causeway, I had already taken about 27 boat rides during the journey, although the answer to that question can be summed up quite simply in three words – poor route planning. But no matter about that, here I was now about to enter the small city-state that marked the end of the land and from here I felt I could legitimately justify boating it the rest of the way to Australia. The vast islands of Indonesia also stood in the way of course, and would make a worthwhile stopping off point and probably a more likely launch-pad for the difficult final leap to the land down under, but it was Singapore that truly marked the end of the long continuous road through Eurasia. I had made it.

Well I had made it to the causeway. There was still the small matter of whether a country renowned for its strict cleanliness would be kind enough to allow a filthy urchin such as myself to enter its territory. I was most concerned about the appearance of my panniers, which were by now so covered in grime as to be on the verge of sprouting legs and walking off. And then there was the matter of Singapore’s infamous rules and regulations. I was trying to enter a country that dishes out thousand dollar fines for littering and where chewing gum is illegal. What other strict rules did they have? Would my bald tyres be against the law? What about my beard? I was getting myself all worked up by the time I approached the Singapore customs man. ‘Oh sh!t!’ I suddenly remembered the chewing gum I’d attempted, unsuccessfully, to use to fix my inner tube in place back in Thailand. The rest of the pack was still lying in my bag and it was too late to ditch it. ‘Oh sh!t!’

The neatly uniformed customs man was old. Very old. He surveyed my bicycle carefully through his aged eyes as I pulled up next to him. “I’m getting new bags in Singapore” I blurted out before he had a chance to say anything, as if the fact that these ghastly old ones would soon be in the trash somehow justified my bringing them into the country. My statement was at least true, Ortlieb having kindly agreed to honour their five-year warranty and replace these dilapidated panniers free of charge via a Singapore distributor. The old fellow smiled and nodded and said he thought I’d probably be able to find some bags here. “And I’m getting new tyres too!” I continued, still trying to conjure an image in the man’s mind of me as the clean and respectful member of society I soon intended to become. He smiled some more and asked me where I’d cycled from and seemed impressed when I told him, and other than that he said nothing other than that I should get some glucosamine for my knees and, with no suspicion having been raised regarding my inadvertent chewing gum smuggling, I was allowed in.

Yes, they let this thing in! Come to think of it, maybe the old guy's eyesight wasn't so good

I had arranged to stay with a warmshowers host and fellow member of the popular bicycle touring community ‘crazy guy on a bike’ by the name of Andy Peat. In his emails he had mentioned to me a walking/cycling trail called the ‘green corridor’ which started near to the causeway and continued almost directly to his house 25 kilometres away. It was an old railway line that had not really been developed other than having the tracks removed, and Andy said that there would be a few bridges out and it might be rough going, but I was so overjoyed with the idea of being able to cycle away from roads that I simply had to give it a try. It turned out to be an excellent decision.

The green corridor lived up to its name, being both very green and somewhat like a corridor, with thick foliage initially hemming me in on both sides. It was wonderful. I could hear the city noises of Singapore going on around me, and the occasional tall building would poke up above the trees, but the overall feeling was of being in a special little pocket of nature. Birds sang as they hopped from branch to branch and lizards scuttled across my path. And it was my path - it seemed that the rest of Singapore was too busy doing important other things to be worrying about this secret little trail. I was the only one on it.

The green corridor - a bit different from the Malaysian highways

For me, it was a little piece of cycling heaven

As Andy had warned me I did come to a couple of missing bridges and had to backtrack until I could gain access to the roads and figure out detours. But these were minor inconveniences that also provided me a first insight into Singapore. Well laid out roads, people obeying traffic lights, no horn beeping – was I really still in Asia? It felt so good to be here. The difficult part of Asia was behind me now and I was back to a more ‘western’ way of living. Of course I was pleased about that, but I had to quickly adjust to the fact that with it came things like a ‘no cycling’ sign on a pedestrian overpass that I needed to use to cross the street. I’d become so accustomed to the liberal way of doing things in Asia that I went to cycle straight past it. Then I saw the tagline. ‘Fine $1000’. Yeah, okay, I suppose I could get off and push.

No way across here and time for a detour

Over a couple of other bridges the old railway track remained

Andy turned out to be a very nice man indeed and an excellent host. Having made long bike trips himself across Eurasia, Australia, and the Americas, he was very well in tune with the needs of a long-distance cyclist and offered me (in the correct order) a drink, a shower, some dinner and a bed. For the dinner we went out to the local hawker centre. I would soon discover that these food establishments are popular all over Singapore, and essentially consist of a canteen style dining hall surrounded by small food stalls. It is a very social place, and it appeared a great many locals would convene to eat here, perhaps all choosing food from different hawkers and bringing their trays of food together at one of the plastic tables. The food on offer was an interesting mixture of the influences that have shaped Singapore, primarily Chinese and Indian. The people also, an intriguing racial blend mostly descended from immigrants of those two countries, provided a most interesting backdrop. This was not the clean-cut, straight-laced image of Singapore that I had in my mind. This was a noisy place, an alive place, and a place where litter could blow from the tables and end up scattered on the floor with no fines being administered. “That stuff is not so bad now” Andy assured me on the way back, as I stood on the sidewalk, afraid to cross the road until the little man turned green in case I should be slapped with a $500 punishment for jaywalking. “They used to fine people for things like that, but not anymore,” he said, trying to coax me across the road. But I didn’t want to take any chances, I had very little money left available to me, and I couldn’t afford to blow the last of it crossing the road.

After all, I might well need it for a boat.

Inside Andy's apartment. I resisted asking the obvious question for as long as I could

25/03/15 - 54km (23km in Singapore)

Today's ride: 23 km (14 miles)
Total: 39,956 km (24,813 miles)

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