3 months in Singapore and an opportunity improve my climbing

I’ve found myself in a very fortunate position. Regular readers of RCUK will know that last December I left my job as MD of a web agency to become a freelance online marketing consultant. This means that I now have very flexible working hours and I have been able to commit to climbing a lot more. At about the same time as I left my job, my girlfriend was offered the opportunity by her employer to run their Singapore office for 3 months. The conversation between us went something like this… Emma: “How would you like to go out to Singapore for 3 months, all expenses paid?” Me: “Erm, let me think… Hell yes!”. So here we are. We arrived in Singapore last Saturday.

Research

Before coming out, I naturally did some research about the climbing and kite-surfing scene. There are quite a few climbing gyms out here, and more are opening. The government here has made climbing a curricular activity at school (lucky kids). However there is only one legal outdoor climbing venue in the whole country (well the whole island is only around 42 x 23 km in size). It’s pretty easy to get to Malaysia, where there is good climbing near Kuala Lumpur and it’s pretty cheap and easy to get to Thailand, which is said to have amazing climbing. I’ll come back to those when I get chance to go. For the time being I’ll focus on the local scene. The only outdoor venue is called Dairy Farm Quarry. It’s on the edge of the Bukit Timah nature reserve, and features a handful of sport routes, mainly in the 6a 6b/+ grades, some limited trad routes and some bouldering. I found out about the place on this web site: Dairy Farm Climbing. I contacted the site owner and asked if I might be able join him and his friends once I arrived. The very next morning I received a reply. He told me that they would be honored to have me join them, and sent through his contact details (along with loads of information about the local walls) – fantastic!

Arrival and training plans

Our apartment complex has some great on-site training facilities; there’s a big pool and a gym so getting fit and lean shouldn’t be a problem (especially with the appetite-killing heat). There’s outdoor training areas and kids playground’s dotted all the way around the complex too so I’ll be looking for interesting ways to do some climbing specific training. I’ve  made a couple of contacts for indoor climbing now, and I’m meeting one of them tomorrow evening. It looks like it’ll take me about 45 minutes to get there by public transport.

My first attempt to climb

We arrived on the Saturday and by Monday I was keen to pull on some holds. I ordered a taxi to the biggest wall on the island. The taxi ride took around half an hour and cost me $14. I was dropped off at a leisure complex called Yishun Safra. I ambled up to the reception desk and asked for a pass. “Sorry sir, the climbing wall is not open on Mondays” was the response. Agggh! “Oh well, never mind. Please could you call me a taxi” I replied. The lady behind the desk asked where I was from and how long I had been in Singapore. When I told her, she insisted I return by bus and the MRT (Singapore’s metro). This actually turned out to be great as I found that it’s really easy and cheap to get around using the public transport system, and I took a walk through China Town, which was really enjoyable. Stalls selling chicken’s feet, cuttlefish and pig snouts, mmmmm tasty!

First day climbing

It was Thursday before I found myself in a position where I would be able to have another crack at getting some climbing done. I emailed my contact ‘Junior Tan’ asking when he fancied meeting up for a climb, thinking I would be meeting him within a week or so. By a stroke of luck it turned out that he and his friends were planning to climb that very afternoon at Dairy Farm Quarry – Awesome! I say awesome, I actually had mixed feelings… I felt terrible through lack of sleep caused by jet lag. I suspected my performance would be terrible but I was really keen to get on that rock, so I agreed to go along. Junior picked me up and off we went to meet his mates for a spot of climbing.

Dairy Farm was great. Super hard granite, sport bolted routes with shiny, new chains at the top and literally no polish on the rock. Junior and his friends were great and made me feel really welcome. We climbed a couple of routes; The first, a steep, balancy route with some brutal rock overs, I managed by the skin of my teeth. The second I failed on about a third of the way up. It then started to rain. Thunder, lighting and torrential rain! Undeterred, my new friends suggested we move around to another part of the crag, an overhanging spot with a short but interesting 6b route called Nanometer. The strongest climber of the group, Aizat, lead the climb, making it look pretty easy. The rest of us climbed on a top rope. The route was steep but with positive holds. The crux was the second to last move; a throw to the right for a very small crimp which was really just used for balance, you then had to move your feet, placing your right on a horrible sloping surface that none of us really trusted, then a hard but brief pull on the left hand and step up very high with the left foot. Only one other climber in the group after Aizat managed to complete the route. My first attempt was pathetic, but the next was better, only failing at the crux. Next time, with a good night’s sleep I’ll do much better!

I’ll update you with my progress in about a week.