Saterday, February 21st, 2005 Well, the big weekend we had both been waiting for finally happened! Since we joined the Singapore Bike Hash we have been waiting for the Bintan weekend to arrive. The Singapore Bike Hashers coordinated efforts and took 28 hashers to Bintan, Indonesia one of the small islands of Indonesia just an hour ferry ride away! The all inclusive weekend was staged from Mana-Mana, a resort beach club! For a mere S $200/person, we got our ferry ride over, our own bungalow, a Saturday ride (25km), BEER, a BBQ dinner, (more BEER), breakfast and lunch on Sunday and the option of a long (50km) or short ride on Sunday and the bus transfers from the ferry to Mana-Mana each way, including transport for our bikes. As well, we had motor support provided by the locals for our rides. We thought this to be an excellent deal, and so we signed right up! We chose the 9am Ferry, leaving from the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal out in the South East coast. We called our new "whenever we need a van" porter, David, and he picked us up and got us there on time, early enough for us to check in and get thru customs. Since we had our bikes, we needed something a bit larger than a cab, as they would likely have made us remove our tires, which with the POS's that we have, is much more difficult. So, for S $35 anywhere you wanna go on the island, David took us from our condo, to the Ferry Terminal.
We arrived at Mana-Mana 3 hrs before the next group of hashers were due to arrive. We checked into our room and headed to the beach to check out our surroundings.
This was our half of the bungalow, #27. We went inside saw there was an airconditioner and decided to use that instead of opening the windows. Then, we headed to the beach to check out the water.
The first thing we did was ditch our shoes and head for that awesome blue water. It was so warm and wonderful, that we decided to go back to our bungalow, and put on bathing suits and 30 block. I immediatly found a small sand dollar! I think the water was even warmer than the water from when Pam and I went to Jamaica! Ahhh, the waters of the South China Sea!
Beach view to the right. The tide is fairly high at this point, but beginning to receed.
Jeremy checking for snorkling opportunities.
When the second wave of hashers arrived, we were instructed to all meet at 1pm ready to ride. Now, 'ready to ride' was not really completely possible for Jeremy and I. Our mtn bikes, and biking attire was still on the boat to Singapore, not due to arrive until Thurs Feb 24th. So, in the same fashion as our last bike hash, we had crappy commutuers, here on out known as POS's. (Piece of ...you get the pix) and not the proper biking attire. At least they would all remember us, it had as you know, been 3 weeks since we've seen them all. We had talked to Barbarian ealier in the week and procured helmets, mtn bike tires for Jeremy's bike, and 3 L Camelbak's. We were on our own for the rest.
We all met at 1pm and loaded up the bikes and bodies for transport. Some of the locals help out Andrew, the guy who coordinated our transports, so we had motor support.
Just like refugees in the back of the truck! Everyone has smiles on their faces ...for now. We headed off for about an hours long bumpy ride to the start of the hash.
Which brought us out into the middle of nowhere! At least there was some single track for us to follow. As in all hashes, we are looking for white toilet paper and/or chalk on the ground to find our way...
Not long into the ride, Jeremy's basket fell off making riding difficult at best. We had to stop and began utilizing Zip Ties. We were fortunate enough to have some onlookers who all but one fled when we drew the camera. See one little head in the window? This is a typical backwoods house on Bintan. The single track you saw previously, was the only way in!
And from the shade of those folks house, it opened up into a sunny, clay baked hill. Even with our basket mishap, we are still with the pack for the most part...for now....
And then, a dreaded flat! Luckily it happened near shade, and yet another family to watch us do our repair. They were all quite enthralled with these crazy dressed bikers cruising past their house, especially ours with baskets on the back. They didn't speak too much English, but when we showed them the camera and gestured if we could take their pix, we got a positive response.
Except for the one man who arrived on motorbike, he ran into the house while the rest of the family posed for the shot. Since we had the digital, we showed them the picture and the man came back out and had a look. Most of those we encountered, mostly children, knew "hello" and "bye bye".
We were on our way again. After leaving the still very hot shade of our new friends houses, the trail opened up to a hardpacked clay rutted opening. Uphill! It was probably about 3pm by now, the worst possible time to be in the blazing sun. And now, we were also at the back of the pack, having had to stop for the flat tire, and Jeremy's basket must have fallen off about 4 more times. Thank God for zip ties! We would have been immobilized without them, with our POS's!
But, we caught up to Andrew Young. He's the guy who coordinated all of our transports and motor support for the trail and he was the sweep, waiting for us to catch up. We are officially at the back of the pack now. Andrew speaks fluent Bahasa Indonesia and runs a side business like Eco-tourism, so he comes to Bintan quite a lot.
The trail took us through woods and grasslands, and the trail was sandy.
You can see how dry everything is, and there must have been a fire throughout different areas of our ride as the ground was black and the grass dead.
I decided to wait for Jeremy and Andrew to catch up. At this point we picked up a couple of other riders who lost the pack, and weren't quite sure which way to go. So we all stayed together.
Sandy trail through the grasslands.
Through part of the grasslands we hit a section of trail that was quite muddy off to our left. Our new biking pal Melanie, she works at TWA (Two Wheeled Action- a high end bike shop in the Holland Area) happened to take a spill thus earning her a down down for a hash crash of the day. She seemed to have stirred up some insects in that area as when we came upon her, we were getting stung from all directions, Jeremy on his forehead and me on my ass!
After the hottest part of the ride, being in the grasslands, with little breeze and big time heat, the trail opened up to a beautiful sandy, deserted beach!
We were told at the beginning of the ride that we would end up on a beach, and this was it! Jeremy had to get a shot with the blue waters behind him.
This beach was just as beautiful as our beach at Mana-Mana. The sand was fine and soft and white, and the ocean water just as warm and the breeze refreshing. For an image of about where we are click on this map. We aren't at Banyan Tree, but you can see the reference to Singapore and the South China Sea. We are a bit further to the East and North of what you can see on the map, after the horn.
And we cannot believe that our POS's actually made it! The ride was 25km long, took about 4 hrs to complete for us with single speeds. It was probably in the upper 90's F in the shade and I've counted, my bike now has 19 Zip Ties holding it together! We lost quite a few bolts and screws on that trail, and the rack that holds the baskets have also broken off of both of our bikes. For S $80 I guess we can't complain! Our good bikes arrive tomorrw! This group of hashers aren't even going to recognize us when we have our own gear and bikes! And they won't have any more reasons to give us down-downs. Our nicknames as a team, are 'The basket twins'.
It was just an easy ride along the beach to where the rest of the hashers awaited our arrival.
Quite beautiful! And tranquil.
C'mon Fergus!
Ahh, and folks were still smiling!
Maybe we were a little more burnt, overheated and sweaty, but smiling at the prospects of a cold beer or 3 awaiting us!
A great beach!
And a shipwrecked boat!
Those who arrived and were waiting for us, went for a cool off and rinse off swim!
See that red cooler! It holds the nectar we all worked so hard for! Thank You MOTOR SUPPORT!
Barbarian in action, circling us up, and giving out the charges!
And of course the motor support crew HAD to drink too!
Needless to say, after many quick drinks and a raucus circle, we had to once again mount our steeds and get back to the trucks...which were not parked that far away, but made for the most crashes of the day by Jeremy, who was by now, quite intoxicated.
I can't believe Jeremy didn't fall off this bridge!
Awesome design eh? This thing was rickety!
Once we reached the trucks, the bikes we reloaded, and everyone got into our refugee trucks and we began our bumpy loud trip home, filled with hash songs, and laughter. We just beat the sun going down as we loaded the trucks, and arrived at Mana-Mana an hour later, stinky, sticky and starving! In the truck I was in, I had a bat end up on my foot. I managed to get my foot out the window of the truck and someone else flicked it off. That was interesting. Not sure how long it was there.
Once at Mana-Mana, we unloaded our bikes and everyone hit the showers and dressed for our BBQ dinner at the bar. Great food and fun conversation followed. We had options of Chicken, Lamb, Prawns, Lobster, Salmon, or Steak, 2 choices with either rice or mashed potatos, and steamed veggies and corn on the cob. The beer was Bintan. But you could choose others if you wanted, or wine or mixed drinks. Soon after the food hit the bottom of our bellies, the efforts of the day mixed with a little food coma began to set in. Jeremy was drunk, and exhausted, and myself tired, so we cut out early and went back to our bungalow where we promptly passed out.
Jeremy never woke until the next morning, but I woke up at 2am, hearing the pounding beat of the drums and hearing the laughter of folks dancing the night away at the bar, which was a good distance away. The night life here (Bintan) doesn't really start until midnight, and from what we learned, some of our hasher buddies may have taken a nap after dinner, but hit the dance floor and rocked out till 4am! We were either too tired, or too sensible although I have to admit, I almost got up to go and check it out. Supposadly, other folks from other resorts come to Mana-Mana for the Saturday night beach party as this was the place to be on Bintan on a Saturday night. Maybe next time???
