Looking from the Labrador hillside. Some of Singapore's petrochemical processing sites can be seen in the distance.After strolling the neighborhoods on Saturday, the Passengers decided Sunday was a good day for a walk in the (tropical) woods. Ironically, we set off on the MRT for Harbourfront, the train stop for shoppers descending on the VivoCity megamall or for revelers catching a bus, cable car, or monorail to the island playground of Sentosa. Though we did call at VivoCity for lunch, our primary destination was Labrador Nature Reserve, parkland and recreation area. In the nineteenth century the British deforested this hillside and set up gun batteries to defend the port of Singapore. They proved an effective deterrent until Japanese forces overran the island in 1942. Today the jungle and its birds and ants and lizards have overtaken the concrete bunkers and visitors can walk along steep, shaded paths or picnic by the water.
The trail along the Bunker Path has been marked with appropriate flagstones.
The remains of a gun emplacement. A tree has grown up through the central platform for the cannon.
This 6-inch gun was unearthed further north in Kallang. It has been mounted here with a couple resin figures it pith helmets can keep it company. Passenger H worried that they "don't dispel the stereotype of Britons with flat bottoms."
The strategic effect of this lookout point has diminished over time.
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