Bintan Day 01 I

A couple more hours and I'll have to make my way to the doghouse, so I'll have to rush this entry. I did try to take the dog to the vet but the vet only gave it a day's MC. Anyway, I hate the fact that I take so long to choose, edit and put the photos together, that I don't have as much time to write properly on the trip. I believe in good writing as much as I believe in good photography, although I know that the photos are probably the things that people are going to look at, be it due to laziness, or my bad writing.

The trip sort of started with dinner the previous day at Terence's house. This is the reason why I'm starting to get fat. Really.



The food was bloody good. Honestly. I think Terence's mom makes half the chefs in Singapore bow their head in shame. Although it was us cooking, she was the one who prepared the food. The marinating, the slicing and dicing... It was ready for us the moment we got there (which was at a very late time of 830PM due to our last minute shopping trip), and all that was left to do is to cook them ourselves. It's unbelievably delicious. I can't wait to go back to have another round! Just that maybe this time we'll try to get it done on our own! We owe the Chua family a bit much - including the transportation to the ferry terminal the next morning!



It's possible that almost everyone has visited the airport before, but certainly not the ferry terminal! I haven't been there before in my life! The place was less glamorous than its air-travel counterpart, and the walk to the jetty reminded me of the trips to Tekong. That was how nasty the place was. And the haze situation was bad. Atrocious, more like it. It really didn't give me the feeling that I was going on a holiday.



And we boarded the ferry that completely reminded me of the fastcraft rides to Tekong. Is it me, or has being in NS left a scar in my life forever? Oops. The trip was a long and boring one. I didn't do much there except stone. The hour-long trip felt like half a day!



It was when we reached that things started to feel exciting. The first pic is the view of Bintan's terminal, which was much more welcoming. We got through the usual procedures of getting our passports stamped and luggage X-Rayed before boarding the bus which would bring us to the hotal where we would be staying - Nirwana Gardens Resort. They welcomed us with the banging of the gong and some drink with a logan in it. It was refreshing. By right we could only check in at 3PM but the receptionist was nice enough to inform us when one of the two rooms became available, and we went to dump our things almost immediately. We decided to take a walk round the place.



It seems that the compund was humungous. There were smaller adjoining facilities which all belonged to Nirwana, and you could enjoy it as long as you were staying there. It stretched across 2-3 bays. That was how cool it was. The weather continued to stay gloomy, but we were more interested in exploring the place and planning our itinery for the day. We went to Mana Mana, which provided equipment for sea sports walked down further to this other reception for chalets. We asked what was interesting and where to go for dinner. Amazingly enough, we were recommended the Kelong restaurant, which one of our Sergeants also told us was a good place to go for dinner. We took a bus back to our hotel and for the sake of saving money, we ate the cup noodles we brought along.



On our way to the beach after lunch, we came across this giant chess set as well as a snakes-and-ladders game. We had an entertaining showdown (which I won). It reminded me of the humungous moving chess pieces in Harry Potter, and it was indeed difficult to visualise the big pictures when the biggest of pieces were about 2/3s my height!



Our first stop was the beach where we played frisbee. We didn't manage to play with the ball, other than carrying it around for show! It was too hard to play volleyball with. Anyway, there was also the compulsory bury-me-in-sand session...



Except that this time, Sern Hong was the only one to be buried! Despite the lack of sun, as you can probably discern from the photos, all of us got a little burnt at the end of the day. Ooh yeah, and we also encountered a small jellyfish, which we caught with the frisbee before releasing it to the open ocean. After that we went back to the hotel's swimming pool for a swim. There was a poolside bar where you could order and drink while in the pool. That was a bloody cool concept! I loved it, but didn't manage to try it. I saw my favourite Irish Cream being served there though, and thought of giving it a go. There was also this seperate pool where we played something like water polo. That was really cool, other than the fact that Team Jason-Daniel lost in the end!

More to come in part II.