Following my day looking around the southern part of Bintan, my second day was going to be spent exploring more of the island.
The room rate for my extremely comfortable hotel also included a buffet breakfast, so I went to the breakfast room to see what was on offer. As I’ve said before, I’m not a foodie and I’m extremely cautious about trying things I don’t recognise. I will generally stick to toast to be on the safe side, but in South East Asia I’m always intrigued by the little cakes they have on offer at breakfast. I don’t normally eat cake for breakfast, although I have been known to have blueberry muffins from a hotel breakfast buffet, but the bright green cakes I was faced with on the buffet this morning, I had to give them a try.
In Indonesia if you see a green sponge cake, it’s invariably a pandan chiffon cake which is flavoured with the juice from the leaves of the pandan plant. The leaf juice is green, therefore the cake is green. A chiffon cake has a lighter sponge than a traditional sponge cake and pandan tastes rather like vanilla. So it’s a essentially like eating a vanilla flavoured, green coloured, light sponge. And quite possibly the only Indonesian cuisine I ate during my time on Bintan. It’s what happens when you’re a picky vegetarian!
The first place we were going to this morning was Tanjung Berakit, which is over in the northeastern tip of the island not too far away from Trikora Beach.
It’s deceptive how big Bintan Island is. It’s much bigger than Singapore, but it’s less built up and has a smaller population. So as this was the furthest point from our starting destination it took us quite a while to drive there.
There wasn’t a lot of activity there when we arrived. It was early in the morning, the population of sea gypsies that live here were presumably still fishing out at sea. I had a couple of photos of me standing in empty locations and then we moved on.
After this we were heading to Grotto Santa Maria which is close to Trikora Beach. Ahmadi had warned me it could be really bad with insects as you walked through the trees to get to the grotto, so I went armed with repellent and waterproofs to keep the mozzies off me. In actual fact there were hardly any insects at all and I was boiled in my waterproofs, I could have left them in the car.
From the entrance the path leading up to the church has the 14 stations of the cross along it and then you reach the grotto, a small cave with a statue of the Virgin Mary inside it. Next to the cave is a small chapel.
A small Catholic community was established in Trikora in the 1960s and the Virgin Mary statue, acquired from Java by a French priest, was installed in the grotto on Bintan in the 1970s. The deceptively heavy statue weighs 250 kilos. The current larger grotto and the neighbouring chapel and the 14 stations of the cross were constructed in the last 20 years and this is now a place of pilgrimage.
It is a very peaceful location and no one else was around when I was there, but it was relatively early in the morning. If you’re in the area it is worth a visit, but I wouldn’t make a special journey there. However, it is worth making a special journey to see Trikora Beach.
Trikora Beach on the eastern coast of Bintan is the largest beach on the island, a beautiful sand beach with very few tourists. At the southern end of Trikora Beach there are some resorts. Ahmadi explained to me that these catered to the Chinese tourists who came to Bintan whereas the Westerners all headed to the resorts at Lagoi on the island’s north shore.
The stretch of Trikora Beach that Ahmadi took me to was deserted for most of the time, just one other local couple turned up briefly.
Trikora Beach has a pizza place run by Italians who moved over to Bintan, unfortunately we were here too early for the pizza place to be open. It was also a Monday, so it could have also been one of the days they closed.
I wanted to spend some time enjoying the beach, so I decided to have a fresh coconut. What could be more tropical than drinking coconut water with a straw from a fresh coconut on the beach? I have to admit that coconut isn’t my favourite flavour, but I do enjoy coconut water which has a much milder taste than coconut flesh.
I then took a walk along the edge of the beach, just ankle deep in the sea, where you can briefly see your footprints until the next wave comes in and washes them away. Bintan is practically on the equator, so it’s always warm there. I’m not a person who can sit around on a beach all day. After I’d had my coconut water and my walk along the seashore, I was ready to do some more exploring.
Ahmadi had suggested I might like to go snorkelling in the afternoon, but as I can’t swim in seawater or swim very well at all, for that matter, he had to think of something else.
He drove me right over to the opposite side of Bintan to Gurun Pasir Busung, the island’s mini desert in the west, which is actually the result of previous bauxite mining. When the mining was stopped the land was just left to nature and the result is a series of solidified sand dunes. At various spots around these solidified dunes there are tacky cardboard cut-outs of camels and suchlike for a desert inspired photograph or two.
Much better for photos is the impossibly coloured blue lake, also a by-product of the bauxite mine. As the lake has all sorts of nasty stuff in it because of its mining history, you can’t go in the water, but there are some lovely spots to get photos including a sort of wooden gazebo made of logs and a heart. There’s a wooden bridge to walk across and, my personal favourite, a swing. The swing isn’t in the best location for the greatest photos, the wooden gazebo takes that honour, but I just love swings, so I was happy to sit on that for a while.
There were plenty of stalls here at the exit to Busung, so I got a local refreshment, freshly pressed sugar cane juice. When it comes to drinks I’m a lot more adventurous than I am with food. I didn’t recall ever having fresh sugar cane juice before. It was very nice. I liked it better than the coconut water. But it was probably not as good for my health. I don’t know, sugar cane is a plant isn’t it? Coconut is a plant. So wouldn’t that bring them out about equal?
My final tourist attraction of the day, that I was planning on doing the next day, but was told by Ahmadi would be difficult to arrange from my accommodation, was the Lagoi Safari Park and Eco Farm. Since I had paid for a driver and guide for 10 hours, it made sense to let Ahmadi take me to the safari park and then at least I would get there and not spend the whole of the next day frustrated that I couldn’t get there from my resort hotel.
The safari park was not at all busy. In actual fact, it’s still being constructed and improved, hopefully that will mean better living conditions for the animals, but they seemed to be moving in the right direction.
I was practically the only one there. I was taken round by a man in a golf cart and since I was the only visitor, I got to see the animals quite close up. I went in with the tortoises, got quite close to the orangutans who were having a new living area constructed and I also saw my first Komodo Dragon.
Elephant rides were available, so I had a short elephant ride, although I was wearing a sundress today, so it wasn’t the ideal attire for riding an elephant. But I hadn’t expected to come to the safari park today. I had ridden an elephant before so I was content to have just a short ride before going to my resort hotel.
At the exit there were some miniature plastic houses in the garden area, they seemed a bit of an odd addition, but good for a couple more photos before I left for the resort.
Ahmadi was waiting for me to take me to my accommodation, the Cassia at Lagoi Bay. It was a huge complex, a maze of buildings and corridors, quite difficult to find your room and a long walk from reception. The room itself was pleasant enough, but this was a standard resort hotel and cost twice as much per night as the hotel in the capital Tanjung Pinang.
After I’d checked in Ahmadi picked me up to take me over to the Treasure Bay Hotel, which is part of the Lagoi Bay complex of hotels, where I could enjoy sunset on the beach and then look around the lantern park as it lit up after dark.
I found what looked like the base of a bed on the beach and sat on that to watch the sunset. As I was practically on the equator, the sun sets very rapidly. It was enough time to enjoy the sunset without getting bored sitting on a beach for too long. Boredom sets in very rapidly for me!
There was a small lantern park at the Treasure Bay Hotel and the silk lantern figures were all lit up at night. It was pleasant to walk around now the lanterns were lit after dark and I took a few photos of the lanterns.
And that was the end of my tour of Bintan Island. Tomorrow I would be staying in resort all day, relaxing on the beach before I headed back to Singapore. It would be like being on a beach anywhere in the world.
Just as a footnote, the day I spent at the resort was not for me. I wanted to get out and about and do things, not listen to music on my iPod and read a book on a sunlounger. That really isn’t my kind of holiday. I was very pleased I’d spent a couple of days exploring the entire island before I came to the resort.
If I ever went back to Bintan, I wouldn’t bother with the resorts, I would stay in the capital and maybe visit the local markets and do more shopping. I’d go back to spend an afternoon at Trikora Beach and have a pizza and a coconut water or a sugar cane juice. But I wouldn’t venture anywhere near Lagoi again.
My recommendation, even if you do enjoy relaxing in resorts, get out and see a bit of the island, check out some temples, Penyengat Island and take a boat down the Snake River to see depictions of hell at the Chinese temple. You get to see what real life is like on Bintan and the locals will love seeing you out and about exploring their island. Maybe you’ll even end up being a rock star for the day!
I visited Bintan in August 2019.
I did a private tour of the Bintan Island with Ahmadi from Bintan Adventure Tour. A private taxi for 10 hours cost 800,000 Indonesian Rupees (approximately £44).
I stayed at CK Tanjung Pinang Hotel and Convention Centre in the capital Tanjung Pinang in a superior city room which costs around 630,000 Indonesian Rupees (approximately £35) including breakfast. I booked through Agoda.
I travelled to Bintan from Singapore with Majestic Fast Ferry which departs from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal in Singapore and lands in Tanjung Pinang on Bintan Island. A one way ticket costs approximately £30 in 2022. The journey time is 1 hour and 40 minutes.
Read about my first day on Bintan
