Green Corridor

My enthusiastic Danish friend suggested another walk - last Saturday - along the Green Corridor.

Singapore's Green Corridor is a walk along 24 km of the old railway that connected downtown Singapore to Malaysia.  The last trains travelled on the line in 2011, and it was subsequently developed into a north/south walking route lined for most of its length by a narrow corridor of tropical greenery.

Saturday was overcast so not as hot as it might have been, but even so there was a noticeable temperature drop each time we walked from the open into an area of green canopy; clear evidence, if ever any was needed, of the cooling effect of greenery.

We walked from North to South.  Once again the pace was blistering* and this time there were no breaks, pauses, stops for contemplation (or food) and I took no photos except a blurry rushed job on a small rooster and a couple of hens.

Chooks (as they are known by me) appear to be feral here - free to find their own place in the scheme of things.  When you see them (and they are relatively common in parks and green spaces with trees) there always seems to be a rooster and a couple of hens.  The crowing of roosters, unseen in the 'jungle', was a fairly constant sound track in the northern half of the track where the built up suburbs have not encroached on the green corridor to quite the same extent as in the south, and the greenery is more like very tall swamp grasses than jungle.

It is in the south however that that the trees really close over the track and give it green feel for which it is named.  Despite feeling embraced by the greenery, the corridor is in reality only a 20-30 metres or so wide for most of its length and the rushing of heavy traffic on expressways is a constant companion sound .  In places it passes right through high-rise enclaves and the architects have designed it into the carefully curated landscape of their developments.

Dotted about the green were colourful flowers, most of which I couldn't name but did include vibrant red hibiscus.   Some birds made exotic noises but with the exception of a black and white crow sized bird I saw none of the makers of these noises.

This crow was snapped on the Orchard Road

Walkers were comparatively few.  There were many cyclists, some joggers and few families out with pushchairs or tots on three-wheeled scooters. The evidence that it is not a hugely popular park (albeit a very long narrow one) probably lies in the lack of businesses that offer distraction to its users.  In 24km I saw only one cafe/tearoom/seller of ice-creams.  I guess it wouldn't be such a restfully green place if it was wall to wall escapees of the city and an ice-cream seller was set up at every bend or mile marker.

I mean where would the chickens go if the humans really invaded this vestige....

(*I had bought new walking shoes in preparation this time - feet unblistered thankfully)