Guys, it is about time to leave your laptop at home and move your buck out of your comfortable armchair! Let’s spare a moment to immerse yourself in the beautiful nature ecosystem. But, You guys must be wondering where to find such place in the highly-urbanised Singapore.
Last Sunday, my girlfriend brought me for a trip down to HSBC TreeTop Walk, the first of its kind in Singapore that offers a bird’s eye view of the community of plants and animals that live in the forest canopy.
I have resisted myself for bringing any gadgets to this place but I just couldn’t bear to keep my HTC phone at home. GPS and Google map are actually helpful in terms of getting us to Venus Drive’s car park (though most of the time, the phones are actually not much use except for adding loads during the trail) Morale of the story, if you have 2 phones like I do, just bring one for the trip.
The Free-standing suspension bridge connects the two highest points (Bukit Peirce and Bukit Kalang) in MacRitchie and the total length The total length of the walkway is about 250m and its height from the forest floor varies, with the highest point at 25m.
I didn’t expect to see such a beautiful scenery in our forest. I guess the location of the bridge has been carefully selected so as to see different segments of the tropical forest. I can imagine how magnificent the area will be during sunrise or sunset. But you won’t get the chance to see it as the bridge will only be opened between timings 9am – 5pm (Tue-Fri) and 8.30am – 5pm (weekends and public holidays). Monday will be closed. So disappointing!!
(Picture) Central Catchment Nature Reserve
This is my first trip to the TreeTop Walk so I didn’t know that dogs are not allowed in the nature reserve. I don’t exactly know the rationale of such rule set by National Park but apparently, the monkeys got pretty agitated when they saw my dog which was why I hand-carried my dog almost throughout the trip.(Man, don’t think that carrying a small dog is easy! it can be a tiring task!!) I am not going to bring my dog again if I happen to come for a second visit.
PLease be mentally prepared before you go. The distance to the entrance of the TreeTop Walk is approximately 4.5 km (it is about 1.5 – 2 hour of walking) from the MacRitchie Reservoir Park and 2.5 km (45 mins – 1 hr walk) from the carpark at Venus Drive. A round trip including the TreeTop Walk is about 7 to 10 km (3-5 hours depending on your walking pace)
Note: Getting to Venus Drive By Bus: Take bus nos. 132, 163, 165, 166, 167, 640, 855 or 980
For more information, you may wish to visit National Park website
p.s. I have uploaded some more photos. You may wish to view it in my facebook here.