Weekend at Bukit Timah Nature Reserve

Its Saturday morning. We woke up early by 8AM and got ready for the day trip to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve (BTNR). It was a fairly sunny morning with occasional light breezes. We reached BTNR by 10.30AM. My first impression of the place was "WOW!". There was a Visitor Center's Exhibition Hall, which we skipped. I heard that there are some interesting glass displays of products that could be made of plants found in the reserves and specimens of different types of leaves and flowers. As none of us were interested in these details we straight away took the map of the place and started exploring.

There was a steep road ahead and lot of tall trees right from the entrance. When we saw the map we could see Blue, Yellow, Red an Green lines. Each line has some distance and the longest was around 1.8KM. We were a bit disappointed with such a short distance of trekking. So decided to go through the longest way possible by crossing these lines here and there. The highest point of Singapore is here at BTNR and the height is just a meager 164mts.

At around 11AM we started off the trek through a mud road through tall trees on either side and steps going down. We were a little worried about the rain. The temperature was warm and climate was humid. As soon as we started the walk everybody was sweating because of the humidity. We started on the path- South View Path. The first thing I saw was, of course, lots and lots of trees which looked almost the same to me. I had absolutely no clue to the different species of the trees. All I noticed were that they come in all different heights and colors and thickness.


After a while the air was refreshing and I could feel light breezes every now and then but the sweating did not stop. The feel of the tropical rain forest has been very much provided here. I had the serene feeling and felt at ease away from all the busy world. As we trekked further using the steps that have been carved out for hikers, guys wanted to stop every now and then as they were feeling tired because of the trek. I was feeling at ease because of the 5KM walk that I am doing everyday.

We saw different kinds of trees and the leaves. There were also plants that grew on other trees or structures such as railings and hedges something like creepers. We could also see the leaf litter on the ground near those majestic trees. We could also see some small waterfalls during the trek. Besides observing the trees around us, the ground I could also see that the ground was in different colors. I could see soil dark color and yellow in color which might have its own reasons for that coloring.

We also saw some fallen tree trunks which we thought might have been kept artificially by BTNR to have the look of the forest. We were also hearing the continuous buzz in the back ground which we were not sure whether it was natural or a tape going on. The walk through the forest took around 2 hours in total. There were some tough routes in the reserve which had many steps to climb. As usual we took so many pictures in this trek also.

At last as we came down and had some water and posed for some pics. We took some pics of the monkeys that were around. At around 2.30 we took a taxi back home. The hike certainly reinvigorated me and though the paths are rocky, I found the trip an interesting and enriching experience that I could share with my friends. However, I feel that the trip was too rushed as my friends were very much tired. May be some other time I shall go for a longer route.