A group of retired Government servants organized a golf trip to the islands of Batam and Bintan in Indonesia. Departing by Malindo Air from Subang Airport, Malaysia to Batam took more or less 80 minutes by the small ATR plane. The flight was delayed by more than 1 hour and jeopardised our tee off schedule at Palm Spring golf club in Batam. The flight itself was pleasant cruising at 450 km per hour at 15,000 feet you can really enjoyed the view all the way to Hang Nadim Airport in Batam. After all immigration and customs formalities, we boarded the minibus to our first stop at Palm Spring GC, a 25 minutes journey from the airport. Due to the late arrival we regarded the game as practice session where scores will not be counted for overall standings at the end of 3 golf golf games. Only my flight managed to complete 18 holes, the rest managed 14 holes due to darkness.
We stayed at the BCC hotel, great spacious room and close to the Batam City Square, a shopping mall where food courts are available. Nearby the hotel there are also open food courts if your stomach can tolerate the less hygienic surroundings.
The next day off we go to the Tanjung Punggur ferry terminal about 45 minutes drive from the hotel. The organizer had a speedboat with 3 units of 200 hp engines to carry us to the Bintan Island. Just a short 15 minutes boat ride and we arrived at Bintan island at the Bulang Linggi Tanjung Uban jetty. A 45 minutes bus ride to us to Laguna Bintan Golf Course and it was raining. The course was beautiful but for a first timer I cant really put the ball in the proper spots for better course management, you can get a par but still I have not lost a ball after 2 days of golf.
I played 3 over my handicap on this golf course but most of my other flight mates did better.
After the game we were brought to a seafood restaurant for a late lunch ( 4 pm) and everybody eat like hungry piranhas devouring their food. It was just fried rice, fried eggs, vegetables, fish and cuttlefish. I asked for prawn and crab, they said no budget!
It took us another hour to reach our hotel in Tanjung Pinang and it was already dark. The Aston Hotel was not in town so we have nothing to do at the hotel, the organizer took the group for eating Durian fruit as it was Durian season there but I beg to decline and slept early.
The next day we travelled to Ria Bintan GC, a golf course rated no.10 in Asia and it did not disappoint us as it is truly a nice and beautiful ocean course. I spent some time to take photos of the course, no wonder I played 2 under my hcp here. Enjoy the photos...
It was a fun day at the golf course!
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