14th - 15th March 2006
We arrived at the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal before 9am, hoping to catch the first ferry at 9.30am to Tanjung Pinang. However, when we arrived there, the lady at the counter told us that the ferry had been delayed. The next available ferry was at 10.50am and we bought the tickets for that. Well, basically there were only six ferries a day to Tanjung Pinang and because of some code-sharing agreement among the various ferry companies, there really wasn't any other way that you could get to Tanjung Pinang. Even the prices were standardised. A two-way ticket came up to $44.
The 2.5 hour journey there was pretty uneventful. There wasn't much that we could see through the windows and so we whiled time away watching a Hong Kong movie that was shown on the television screen. Soon, we arrived in Tanjung Pinang. After passing through immigration, we passed through a carpark which was swarming with touts, all clabbering to take us to some hotel or resort. It was almost impossible to shake them off. Some just wouldn't take no for an answer. We were trailed by three touts who went with us all the way out of the jetty complex. We had decided to stay at the Hotel Laguna, but these guys kept wanting to recommend hotels to us. Eventually we relented.
They led us to a hotel that's just a couple of minutes walk away from the jetty. It was a dark and faded old place, and it looked like it was uninhabited, so of course we rejected it. After seeing what recommendations the three touts came up with, we decided to put our foot down and tell them that we wanted to stay at Hotel Laguna. Naturally, they tried to lead the way, but it really wasn't necessary. It's very easy to spot the hotel as it's one of the tallest buildings in town. Well, we failed to shake them off and they followed us all the way to Hotel Laguna.
Once there, the guys started asking us for money for their 'service'. They actually had the cheek to ask for S$10 for the short ten minute walk. Well, we didn't want to give them any money, but the receptionist told us that they might actually follow us all the way up to our rooms if we do not do so. Eventually, we decided to pay them S$4. It was either take it or leave it, and of course they took it. Once that was settled and they got out of the picture, we got down to the business of getting our room. According to the Lonely Planet, Hotel Laguna is a swish-looking place with slick service and has surprisingly good-value rooms. I would say that description is spot-on. We got a room for about S$40.
After checking-in, we decided to head out for lunch. Our hotel adjoins a shopping mall, Bestari Mall on the third storey. The mall is a rather lifeless-looking place with a smattering of clothing and CD shops, but fortunately, it has a decent supermarket. That was where we stocked up on Indonesian snacks and water. The water that you get from the taps is not drinkable.
From Bestari Mall, we decided to head towards the volleyball stadium to look for food. Along the way, we passed by a school, a mosque and a KFC outlet. Around the corner, we found a shop that sold nasi padang. The food looked fine so we decided to settle our meal there. Our verdict? Well, only the jackfruit curry was decent. As for the other dishes, it was quite obvious that the ingredients weren't too fresh.
View from the piers near Jalan Plantar II
Anyway, after lunch, we decided to walk around town a bit before we headed to Pulau Penyenget. From where we were, we walked down Jalan Ketapang, and we eventually ended up at the area around Jalan Plantar II. Well, basically that's the older part of town and we saw stilted houses that jut out to sea. It looks quaint and charming from afar, but when we walked closer, we saw that the area below the houses were filled with rubbish. That's definitely not a very charming sight. Fortunately, there was no stench. But on the other hand, the view from the pier is great. There are nice views of the vessels in the harbour, from tiny human-powered sampans to large freighters.
Walking on, we soon arrived at the Pasar Baru, a two-storey market where stalls sell fresh produce and meat on the first level, and clothes and other household products on the second level. Around the market are tiny alleyways lined with shops and stalls selling food, clothes, religious artifacts and so on. Given that I'm writing this travelogue after I went to Jakarta, I would say that the area around Pasar Baru actually reminds me of Pasar Ikan (fish market) in Jakarta. It's as chaotic, and as colourful.
From Pasar Baru, we decided to walk over to the pier to take a boat over to Pulau Penyenget, which is just a short hop across the harbour from Tanjung Pinang. We went over to Pulau Penyenget on a small wooden motorboat with a covering overhead and small benches to sit on. Even from Tanjung Pinang, we can make out the minarets of the sulphur-coloured mosque on Pulau Penyenget. Tiny Pulau Penyenget was once the capital of the Riau rajahs (kings). As such, the island is littered with relics such as old palace ruins and tombs and graveyards of the various rajahs. It's also the birthplace of the man who created Malay grammar and wrote the dictionary. However, its heyday is long over and today, most of the historical sights are crumbling from neglect.
Pulau Penyenget
We arrived on Pulau Penyenget within minutes. The road from the pier leads straight up to the mosque, which is called Masjid Raya Sultan Riau Penyengat. The sign board in front of the mosque says 1832, so I guess that's when the mosque was built. However, we didn't go in just yet. Instead, we decided to walk around the island first. Walking on, we soon arrived at one of the tomb complexes on the island, a yellow-green complex housing the grave of Raja Jakfar (Jaafar?), who's the 6th prince of the Riau Kingdom. But besides Raja Jakfar's grave, there were many other graves both within and outside the complex.
Just beside that is the House of Engku Bilik. Well, I don't know how it was like in its heyday, but what's left of the two-storey building is just a shell so it wasn't too interesting. Outside the house of Engku Bilik, a becak (bicycle rickshaw) rider told us in his broken English that he could bring us around the island, for a fee of course. Well, since the price he quoted was reasonable, we decided to hire him to bring us around the island.
The first place he brought us to is the old palace of Raja Ali, or what's left of it anyway. If you're expecting grand majestic ruins, then you'll be sorely disappointed. All that's left of the palace are a few crumbling walls amid lush vegetation. (see picture below) And if you want to know more about the palace, you'll do better googling it online because there are no signboards describing the history of the place.
Ruins of an old palace at Pulau Penyenget
Moving on, our becak rider brought us to the cultural centre which has a general air of desolation around it. It stands next to a couple of dilapidated buildings and in front of it, an abandoned jetty juts out to sea. Walking into the cultural centre, we were greeted by its caretaker who showed us around the place. There wasn't much in there, just a couple of tools for weaving and some other stuff which I can't remember. Right at the back of the hall is a colourful throne-like sitting area (I don't know what you call it) which is used for ceremonies and weddings.
We didn't stay long. After bidding farewell to the friendly caretaker, our guide brought us to a few more buildings and tombs which are all in a similar state of neglect before we arrived at Bukit Kursi, which is actually a small hill or hillock. There's a nice view of the sea and the surrounding areas on top of it, which is not surprising, because this area used to be a fort. You can see traces of the rock fortification built around it, and at the top, there are a couple of rusty cannons gazing out to sea.
Moving on, we headed back to the main mosque on Pulau Penyengat. It was a small mosque, and not particularly pretty. So after taking a quick look inside, we headed back to the jetty to take the boat back to Tanjung Pinang. Just as we were reaching Tanjung Pinang, the engine stalled, giving us a small fright. But luckily, our boatsman was able to revive the engine.
Back at Tanjung Pinang, we decided to head back to our hotel for a short rest before heading out for dinner. As the hotel is one of the tallest buildings in town, we headed up to the rooftop to take in a bird's eye view of the city. Well, it's not a particularly nice view as much of the city's made up of ugly shacks with corrugated aluminum rooftops, but at least you can see the sun setting in the distance.
After resting a while, we decided to head out for dinner. Based on my Lonely Planet guidebook's recommendations, we headed to Hanly Cafe along Jl Ketapang. The book says that the restaurant has a good range of Indonesian and Chinese dishes at reasonable prices. Notice that it didn't mention anything about whether the food was good or not. Well, it's not half-bad. In fact, it serves the nicest food in our two days there (if you exclude KFC or course), but if you don't fancy eating fried chicken skin, then don't touch the snack that's given to you before the meal. We had been munching happily on the fried chicken skins, thinking that they were some form of crispy, crunchy keropoks, until we asked the waitress. Well, it's not too bad, but we probably wouldn't have been munching so happily if we had known what it was beforehand.
Anyway, after dinner, we decided to walk around town, but alas, everything was closed. It was only seven plus in the evening and we thought that there would be some night markets somewhere. Well, seeing that everything was closed, we decided to have ice-cream at KFC. There, we asked a staff whether there were any shopping malls that were opened at night and after thinking for a while, he told us there was one, the Ramayana Shopping Mall, which was a good 15 to 20 minutes drive into the interior of Bintan.
Outside KFC, the staff helped us to hire an opelet (small van) that would bring us to the mall. Surprisingly, the two-storey mall was almost deserted. Makes me wonder where all the residents are at night. After walking around the mall a while, we decided to head back to our hotel to watch TV.
The next morning, we got up early and took a boat to Senggarang, a fishing village of wooden and congregated aluminum sheets on stilts. Our boat dropped us off at a pier just outside the Vihara Dharma Sasana, a complex of three temples, all said to be over a century old, and occupying a large courtyard facing the sea. Within the complex are many sculptures similar to the one you see above, all painted in garishly loud colours.
From Vihara Dharma Sasana, we walked on for about half a kilometre to the village where the star attraction is an old Chinese temple. What's so special about this temple you might ask? Well, it's a rather small temple built into the gigantic roots of a banyan tree that's said to be more than a hundred years old. After taking a couple of pictures, we decided to head back to the pier where our boatsman was waiting to ferry us back to Tanjung Pinang.
Back on Tanjung Pinang, we walked around a bit looking for souvenirs (not easy to find), and after lunch, we decided to head back to Singapore. After checking out of the hotel and lugging our stuff over to the ferry terminal just before a ferry is due to depart, we were told that we had to validate our return ticket at one of the travel agents around town. How come no one told us about that earlier? Well, they wouldn't let us board the ferry and we had no choice but to find a travel agent to validate our tickets. Since we missed our ferry, we had to wait two hours for the next one and we decided to head over to KFC to while away the time.
Half an hour before the next ferry was due to depart, we arrived back at the ferry terminal. This time round, we managed to get into the terminal because our tickets have been validated. However, they told us that we had to pay some departure taxes. Well, back in Singapore, the lady who sold us the tickets told us that all taxes have been included in the ticket price. Clearly, it's not the case and clearly she's not been a very helpful ticket agent. Fortunately, there were no more hiccups after we paid the taxes, and in two hour's time, we arrived back in Singapore.
