Besides the tree top walk, the other thing I was excited to do in Singapore was kayak through the mangroves. I was originally leery about booking the tour because the ferry port was an hour and a half bus ride away from our hotel and the ferry won’t leave until there are 12 people. In other words, it’s a bit of a challenge to arrive promptly for a tour.
We booked it anyway and took a cab to the ferry (30 minutes instead of an hour+) and arrived an hour ish early so we had plenty of time to wait for the ferry. We didn’t end up having to wait that long for the ferry (in fact our future tour guide sat next to me!) and we got to the island way early so we got to explore. I found cats to pet. Win!
We couldn’t get started until everyone arrived and, because of the ferry, we started about 20 minutes late. No biggie! We had time to chat. In our group were a couple from South Korea and 5 young women from Australia, newly graduated from high school and celebrating before going to college. While the Australians were on a trip to the bathroom, our guide joked that USA was going to be in the lead. I said heck no, we’re the oldest of the group! The young people will easily take the lead. He laughed at me and offered a bet. I declined the bet because he does this for a living and, while I thought he was wrong, I’m also not a gambler. Spoilers, the man knows his craft.
We sat down for a brief overview of the game plan for the 2 different groups: the shorter tour was going to go around this solo tree and then up into the canal with calm waters and mangroves on both sides. They’d kayak up to this bridge and then make their way back. The longer tour (ours) was going to go to the same solo tree but instead of going into the super cool-sounding canal, we were going to sea kayak between 2 islands. We got our boats and headed out!
That’s all Past Devin wrote for this story. Spoilers: I got really sunburned on this particular adventure and that put a bit of a damper on my ambition to write blog posts for several days. That of course meant that I was really backlogged on posts and never caught up. I wrote this one as well as the next few you’ll hopefully see wrapping up this particular trip while on the plane ride home. But then I was home and distracted by cats and life so let’s see what my memory is like 8 months later.
We headed out from the dock after doing our float test. I wish I had a picture of this! The water is absolutely disgusting and smelly but we had to get in and verify that our life jackets worked. For some reason, we all had to hold hands in a circle and then kick our feet up into the middle. A bit like the hokey pokey.
We paddled slowly around the area heading to the lonely tree and passing by the garbage dock for the island. Chris and I were having a blast. Chris doing all the work while I documented all the things.
Unfortunately, the Australian team was struggling. One of the women suffers from back problems and thought there would be backs on these kayaks. She wasn’t able to really paddle and was paired with a weaker friend. Our guide had them switch out to create better balance but it didn’t really work. I offered that Chris and I could help which meant that Chris was paired with the woman with the back problems and I was paired with her friend. This meant I actually had to work!
I kept apologizing to my new friend (who’s name I can’t remember) because I am photo happy. I’d stop paddling so I could take a million photos of XYZ silly thing. It didn’t really matter tho because we were still faster than her friends that weren’t paired with Americans.
The South Korea peeps did all right. They weren’t the fastest nor the slowest. In fact, they weren’t terribly memorable other than being late.
I know we saw some cool shit. I remember learning (ha!) all sorts of cool things. I know we saw fisheries and a dry dock and lots of mangroves. But yeah. I didn’t retain much 8 months later. Sorry Past Devin.
I always write these things and then go back to add pictures so one last thing. Shout out to my super smart husband for wearing long sleeves and a hood plus reapplying sunscreen. Man is way smarter than me!
