Wednesday, 7 August 2013

Punggol Park

It's been a long time...lazy, lazy. So what have I been up to the last 8 months or so? Well many things but no need to tell grandmother stories here. Suffice to say that I'm now shuttling between SG and HCMC. Have been exploring our local parks and walks (a paradise compared to HCMC) and this morning, it was a stroll in the park ... Punggol Park to be exact. I've lived near there, witnessed the building of the park but never really explored it ... the shame of it all.

It's a nice and peaceful place, underused as most parks are in Singapore and a great place for me to perfect my skating falls in the future. Yes, I know not what I was doing when I took up inline skating. But no choice. Cannot run as knees are out of order, walking is a tad slow for me so blading is the next course of action.

Some photos here that I took while on my walk today (click for bigger pix).

Panaromic view of Punggol Park






Reflections

Hardworking Ant!

Hardworking Bee!

Was very thrilled with this little bird. Many of his bros were around but they were all shy except for him. So I followed him around for about 20 min.

Later found that he was a Striated Heron (aka Little Heron, Little Mangrove Heron, Little Green Heron, Green-backed Heron) and probably the most common heron in our area (according to singaporebirds.net). Really? How come I've seen so few of it around?

Close-up of the Striated Heron

Snack is served

Poor Ant or something...

This I think is an Egret of some kind.
See tidechaser.blogspot.sg 

Another bro of the Striated Heron species
I found along the canal

Saturday, 3 August 2013

A Walk in the Park ... Southern Ridges (Part I)

We decided to explore the Southern Ridges today starting at the foot of Mount Faber. It's a steep walk for two unfit persons but we managed to "conquer" the hill a tiring huffing-n-puffing 15 minutes later. Haven't been to Mount Faber for a couple of years. Nothing much has changed, which is indeed a comfort given that Singapore is changing so rapidly that I am now a tourist in my own country. Along the way after the Henderson Wave, we were so thrilled to come across a family of White-crested Laughing Thrush. A rare sight for city-dwellers like us. It turned dark and we managed to reach Alkaff Mansion. Decide to head for the nearest bus-stop before the sky gave way. So end of walk for us, and back to VivoCity.

The start of our adventure

Just a few steps to climb!

And another few steps...

What on earth is this?
Stairway to heaven?

Finally ... civilisation

View from Mount Faber

The way to continue our walk along the Southern Ridges

Going down this time


Step-by-step

Start of the Henderson Wave





View from Henderson Wave
+67.22m above sea level


Nice benches for tired bodies






White-Crested Laughing Thrush