There’s a place in Singapore where you can enjoy the benefits of natural hot water… and a half-boiled egg. Follow yg as he enjoys the Sembawang Hot Springs, which he first visited over 40 years ago.

The natural hot spring was discovered 100 years ago exactly, by a Chinese cultivator on his pineapple plantation, and it later became the focal point of the aptly-named Kampong Air Panas. These days, the spring is open to the public, but fenced off from the nearby Sembawang Airbase.

I think I first visited the Sembawang hot spring in 1961, the year I sat for the Primary School Leaving Examination (psle). After the PSLE, my form-teacher Mr M Z A Rahim organised an excursion for the class.

We went to Macritchie Reservoir park and the Sembawang hot spring. I do not remember seeing this well although it seems to have been existence then.

What we saw were some kampong houses around a stream and some puddles. Quite a number of kampong folks were around the spring, some washing their clothes and some cooking their eggs, like what we did today.

The spring regained some popularity a few years ago, but these days the well is quiet with only a handful of visitors in the weekedays. And it wasn’t all cemented up too. Check out yg’s visit to Singapore’s very own Hot Spring on his blog.