Weekend Golfing at Bintan Lagoon Resort
After 3.5 years in Singapore, I was yet to play a full round of golf here. The heat, no clubs and the crazy prices kind of always spoilt that avenue of fun. After a sweltering 9 holes at Champions, smack in the centre of the island a few months ago, and another practice session at the driving range a couple of weeks ago, with some borrowed clubs, I was ready!
I had little to do with the whole package process (thanks Gary!) but it ended up including return ferry right to the resort, 2 rounds of 18 holes, 1 nights accommodation, 2 lunches, 1 buffet dinner, 2 buffet breakfasts at just over S$250pp. The only real exclusions were alcoholic drinks, as always and dinners.
Day 1 - Saturday Morning 7am - The Jack Nicklaus Sea View Golf course
Oh, I hate early mornings! But we were up at the crack of dawn (well, my crack of dawn) and quickly threw a few changes of clothes in a backpack, a scramble to find some respectable collared shirts (unfortunately the same ones I wear to work almost everyday) and a few heat wave essentials. Living in the east of Singapore has its perks when it comes to going to National Stadium, Changi Airport or Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal. Conveniently today was the ferry terminal. 20 minutes and a S$15 GoJek to the ferry terminal later we arrived into a sea of people. I had never seen it like this, our previous 8 journeys to Bintan had always left on Friday night, which always seemed busy, but not like this, so note to self, if you want it a bit less mental and a slightly longer break away, leave on Friday night. A quick check of 7-Eleven revealed nothing enticing. The ticket collection process was painless, as was bag-drop and customs. I was whisked through a new eye-retina scanner and into the waiting area. Some jostled boarding encounters later and our team of 6 (3 couples) posited ourselves slightly towards the back on the side, ready for a quick getaway at the other end. The 1hr 15min crossing was easy as. I love staring out the window at all the container ships (apparently 2000 at any one time) and watching the comings and goings of the crew and fuel bunkers.
It was our first time arriving into Bintan Lagoon Resorts own private ferry terminal, what a difference! It is super easy going to the other ferry terminals and being collected by their coaches, but the aura around the passengers on arrival was so different, everyone had already arrived in 'paradise' and was in a relaxed state. There was no hustle and bustle to get to the end of the jetty first.
As part of our golf package (thanks again Gary!) we were escorted in a fast transit zone, our passports were collected from us, and that was that. Nothing further, no checks, no scans, nothing. I feel they treat the resort like a bubble and we were in a secure bubble with no way out (not really true, but practically, yes). We made our own way on foot to reception to see about our rooms, said goodbye to our loved ones and headed to the pro shop about 200m from reception.
Golf check-in was also painless, we missed a large group ahead of us which probably helped, grabbed our golf carts, met our female caddies (yes, each cart gets a caddy) and drove to the driving range for a quick warm up session. I had rented standard golf clubs for about S$20 a day and hit 25 of the worst balls of my life. Consistently every shot was atrocious. I was miserable, destroyed, gutted...this was going to be a slow, painful day. Our first round would be at The Jack Nicklaus Sea View Golf course, starting on the back 9. This was in an effort to avoid the previously mentioned group ahead of us. Our flight of 4 progressed around, seemingly improving as we moved on. We stopped for lunch at the club house and met our significant others for a refuel and rehydrate session, did I mention it was absolutely sweltering hot. The course was expansive and the signature holes with Sea View were heaps of fun. As we approached the final few holes, we were exhausted, battered and bruised. A good day out.
Post-golfing involved a quick pool session with some celebratory beers...someone won, doesn't need to be named and who is counting anyway! A frantic shower and then it was time for the Rugby World Cup. A heart breaking typhoon meant we would miss out on our signature game of the weekend, France v England, but luckily as we were with our Irish friends, the Ireland v Samoa game was still on. It was expectedly a white wash, 47 - 5 to Ireland, but a good game to watch in the resorts small pub. On to our all inclusive, underwhelming buffet dinner that doesn't need to be mentioned and ending up in the games room for a bit of darts, where after a few beers, we were all performing fantastically.
Back in the room, I crashed hard. I was done for the day.
Day 2 - Sunday Morning 8am - Ian Baker-Finch Woodlands Golf course
We woke to the joyous sound of our neighbourly guests yelling (maybe communicating normally), right outside our door. The hallways are like echo chambers and their piercing screeches reverberated back and forth, I'm sure spoiling a relaxing Sunday morning for all. Luckily they were receptive to our hints that it was a bit much for this time of the day and they took it elsewhere.
Breakfast was on! I was so excited to scour the spread and find bread and butter pudding. It had been on my mind all weekend, something tripped it off in my mind and I was hooked. I remember having it on a Royal Carribean Cruise buffet and it blew me away and I had similar expectations. Unfortunately after several trips around the stations, it was nowhere to be seen. I was 💔! Never mind, I stocked up on hashbrowns, scrambled eggs and some other delicious desert and was ready for Day 2 of the golfing weekend.
Today we played the resorts other course, the Ian Baker-Finch Woodlands Golf course. This one is more inland and a bit more remote from the resort, as in once you start, you don't really come near the resort till you are on the 18th fairway. This meant that we skipped lunch and went straight through. It was a wonderful challenging course as well, with twists and turns on every hole. I lost a lot of balls on that one, in fact, 3 off one tee, which is a record for me and there was no opportunity to fill up water bottles along the way. Our caddies had brought along with us an esky with some small bottles of water, without that, we would have been really stuck. 5 hours later we made it back to the club house for our usual 1 of 2 choice lunch, fried rice or fried noodles (both were yummy) and sooner or later we were on our way to the resort ferry terminal for our trip back home.
The journey back was uneventful. Getting on was a bit of a different story. As usual, someone spooked the entire crowd and everyone lurched forward to gain prime position in front of the terminal doors. Upon opening, the flood of people running down the jetty was almost comical, if you can't beat them, join them I say, so with elbows out I jumped in and tried to secure the best spot on the boat I could. All of this is pointless and reminds me of the days on low cost carriers with no assigned seating.
All in all a great weekend.