Green space odyssey - Part 3

The sun rises on our last day in Singapore and I admire the golden sun-kissed facades from our secret window.

The golden city

We hit the breakfast buffet for the last time although we're so full from all our big meals that we both have quite a modest breakfast. Just after 8am we're on our way. It is Sunday morning and the streets and shopping centres are still slumbering. There are a few people waiting at the MRT station and the Bugis interchange is busy, but our 45 minute train journey past Jurong East is very quiet. The train emerges overground and our window seats give us a great view of uniform apartment blocks, roads, and shopping centres. We also see lots of trains heading in the opposite direction... loaded up with domestic workers and daytrippers on their day off, and all heading into the city.   

It is only a short walk from the railway platform to the Jurong Lake Gardens where we're immediately welcomed by a large pagoda.

Seven-storey Pagoda at the Chinese Garden

The Chinese Garden opened in 1975. The garden features teahouses and pagodas in the Chinese Imperial style dotted around lakes and linked by paths and bridges. A major bridge leads to the adjacent Japanese Garden, altogether making up a national park that covers 90 hectares.

Statue of Confucius - one of many eminent personages in the Chinese Garden.
Others include Mulan, and General Guan Yu.

We visit what must be the most beautiful part of the Chinese Garden. A collection of buildings around a traditional Suzhou-style courtyard with an exquisite collection of bonsai. The combination of outdoor rooms, round and rectilinear forms, water and of course soft and lush greenness, combine to create a very aesthetic and pleasant environment. 

Bonsai garden

Ross emerges from the foliage having made a discovery...

The beautifully manicured little trees all have something in common. As Ross discovers, the vast majority have been cultivated since 1977. That makes them exactly the same vintage as me! Nice to see that they are being lovingly cared for. 

The bonsai collection at the Chinese Garden

Treat this old lady with kindness!

Although a 'manufactured' green space, it feels right

An outdoor room

We walk around much of the Chinese Garden, and take in many of the landmark sights, sometimes more than once as we mistakenly backtrack on some of the more confusing paths. 

A pavilion set around a koi filled pond

Twin pagodas along the waterfront

Ross is most disappointed to discover that the 'teahouse' refers only to the structure and not the function of the lakeside building. He asks a passerby... hopefully... if there is coffee to be had, but alas. The sun is climbing higher into the sky and the day is heating up so we press on to the Japanese Garden.

The 'teahouse' by the lake

Crossing over the Double Beauty Bridge, we find ourselves in the less structured, and slightly 'wilder' Japanese Garden. There weren't many people in the Chinese Garden but there are even fewer here. As we don't have much time, we only do a quick circuit of the water lily pond and head back over the bridge towards the train station.

Spirit house in the Japanese Garden 

Water lily pond

Jurong Lake Gardens is known for its bird life

Ross crossing the Double Beauty Bridge

The sun and rising humidity is quite punishing as we walk back towards the MRT station. More people are starting to pour into the Chinese Garden now - mostly groups carting their picnic gear. We are hot and sweaty as we wait on the station platform so it is quite a relief to get inside the air conditioned carriage. The train is packed however. Everyone is heading into the city so we stand for the 45 minute journey back, the lush lakeside gardens rapidly receding into the distance as the train gets swallowed up by buildings and then the featureless blackness of underground tunnels.