Batam Day 3

Day 3 Batam (4/8/06)

We had our breakfast at 9.30 am and some of us went swimming after that. We then packed our stuff and checked out of our rooms at 12.30 pm.

Jim and I at the balcony of Jieli and Ryan's room

Harris Resort

At the lobby

We booked our return ferry tickets and went to the Japanese Korean restaurant for our lunch.

Delicious appetizers and lunch spread

The food there was quite good despite the fact that we were the only customers in the restaurant. A minibus then brought us to the ferry terminal and we bought some foodstuff there. The ferry terminal is very empty and there wasn't much things to buy as well.

Empty Waterfront Ferry Terminal

We waited for around 1 hour before the customs was open.

Leaving Batam

On the ferry back to Singapore

To wrap up the trip, Batam is quite a laidback island and it is ideal for people who just want to chill out in the resort or hotel. There isn't much of a shopping scene there but it's good for people who want to get cheap Polo Ralph Lauren clothes and Levis jeans. The food there is cheap as well but it's hard to find good food among the rows of shophouses, outlets and roadside stalls. People who are interested in watersports will be disappointed to find that the seasports activities are not vibrant and the prices are not considered cheap also.

Bintan or Bali should be better in comparison with Batam.

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Batam Day 2

Day 2 Batam (3/8/06)

We woke up at 9 am and had our breakfast buffet at 9.30 am.

Breakfast @ Harris Cafe

We went back to our hotel rooms to discuss our activities for the day and Jieli and her bf, Ryan, arrived at Batam shortly. The both of them were here for a 2 day 1 night stay and were staying at Harris Resort too.

The 7 of us played some card games while the hotel staff were preparing their hotel room. While the both of them were unpacking their luggage, the 5 of us headed down to the beach to take a look.

Deserted beach!

Another view of the beach

We walked over to the sea sports centre to take a look of the activities offered.

Sea Sports Centre

Kept monkeys

We decided to go on an hour of speedboat ride around the island. It costs $120 for an hour in the speedboat. Rather expensive but we went for it anyway.

Jim & I

I'm driving the speedboat!

Terence is driving the speedboat!

Speedboating!

The driver or tour guide let each of us drive the speedboat and we were happily speeding and turning the speedboat around the seas while avoiding ships, kelongs, fish catchment areas, etc. It was quite fun and easy to control the speedboat with just the steering and throttle.

Kept parrot at the sea sports centre

I guess we were the first customers at the sea sports centre and there wasn't much people except for the staff there. We headed back to the hotel to rest and relax for a short while before meeting up with Jieli and Ryan for our second session of Go-Kart.

We took the minibus there and i was the photographer for the first round of Go-kart as i did not drive at first.

Gearing up

Go-Kart Centre

I'm with the go-karts

After the race

We were still itching for a second round of racing and we all paid for another race. The race today was much more fun than yesterday's race as there were no wet patches on the road and i was drifting successfully compared to yesterday when we all keep skidding. I only realized that i can drift in the middle of the race as i started to get more daring and accelerated instead of braking at the bends. The positioning of the body played a part as well as the go kart is light and i have to lean right at left turning bends and vice versa.

At the last round of the race, i was overconfident and i skidded while negotiating a sharp bend. Clarence overtook me as a result and was the overall winner. Ha... Gotta beat him next time.

We walked back to the resort and cleaned up before heading to Megamall via cabs.

Taken in the elevator overlooking Batam Ferry Terminal

We had lunch at A&W (no longer existing in Singapore) and went shopping next. All 5 of us got a pair of Levis jeans each as it's quite cheap there. The prices range from S$40 onwards and i got myself a blue-black jeans that costs 299,000 Rupiah ($52.60). I didn't have much money left to buy other stuff and we spent the rest of the time window shopping.

We all then took cabs to Nagoya for seafood dinner. We walked around there for a while and brought Jieli and Ryan to a Polo Ralph Lauren retail shop. PRL clothes there are cheaper compared to other countries as there is a PRL factory in Batam.

We asked the hotel staff at Formosa Hotel for the whereabouts of good seafood and we were walking around the not so populated streets and many idle taxi drivers approached us for rides. Batam is not exactly a very safe place but if you are travelling in a large group, it should be relatively safe.

We found Windsor Food Court by chance and there were a lot of people dining at the open air food centre compared to other eateries with very few people inside.

The moment we stepped into the food centre, at least 2 females approached us and ushered us to a table with the stall's menu. Next, at least 8 females swarmed our tables when we sat down and asked us if we wanted any drinks. We told them to come back 5 mins later as we wanted to order our food first.

A picture of the beverage girls swarming another table

The first time I see so many people in Batam! Windsor Food Centre

We ordered steamed fish, scallops, sambal squids, prawns, vegetables, hot plate tofu, sweet & sour chicken, mixed vege soup, etc and had a very full meal for just around S$10 each. We can never get this sort of price in Singapore i think.

After our full meal

We took cabs back to Harris Resort and we all played card games with Jieli's direction as she had brought Absolut Vodka for the card games. We all drank finished the 300 ml of alcohol in less than an hour and of course no one was drunk. Clarence, Gs and Ryan faces turned reddish though. We turned in at around 2 am.

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Batam Day 1

We arrived at Habourfront at 8.20 am and had breakfast before our ferry at 9.20 am.

Penguin Ferry (Nice cable car backdrop)


We sat on the ferry for about 1 hour before reaching Waterfront City, Batam.

There is free shuttle bus service to Harris Resort which is about 3 mins drive from the ferry terminal. We checked into the resort and dumped our luggage in the 2 rooms we had booked.

Side view from our rooms

Front view from our rooms

As you can see, there isn't much infrastructure in Waterfront City. The beach also looks deserted and we seem to be isolated from the rest of the world. We headed down to Harris Cafe for our free lunch at 11 am and we were the only customers in the cafe. There was only a couple who arrived when we were waiting for our food.

Next, we explored the resort and the facilities include bowling alley, squash court, table soccer, big swimming pool, arcade, gym and spa. Most of them were not utilised at all except for the swimming pool where there were a few couples. Waterfront City is severely underpopulated! Maybe it is because of the lunar 7th month.

Harris Resort

We decided to go for Go-Kart next and it was $20 for two 10 mins rides. The minibus took us to the nearby circuit track and we were ready to race after wearing the helmets.

Go-Karting

We got splashed with mud and water as some portions of the track was wet due to a prior rain. It also affected our driving as we skidded along bends due to poorer grip of the tyres. All of us became quite dirty after the race.

We went swimming in the big pool next as we were all in need of a bath. We played many 'stupid' games in the water and i even taught most of them the correct technique for diving.

After we changed into our clean clothes, we got into a cab and headed to Nagoya for shopping.

Along the way to Nagoya

Buildings along the way to Nagoya

We alighted at Center Point where we grabbed a bite at MacDonalds. We then browsed through some of the shops, walked along the streets and played some games at the arcade. There isn't a lot of shopping that we can do at Nagoya.

Dinner at a local eatery

Bedtime!

We played Blackjack and our bets for each deck is 1000 Rupiah ($0.20). Gs had extremely good luck and he was the overall winner winning 26000 Rupiah.

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