Singapore recently celebrated its 44th birthday on 9th Aug, a Sunday. Thus, Mon, 10th Aug was a gazetted public holiday. We decided to drive into Johor Bahru for a one-day Malaysia shopping trip. As usual, we managed to drive to our destination without losing our way with the aid of our Garmin global positioning system and Tesco shopping was on our list for the day.
Bumper to bumperQueueing up before reaching Woodlands Checkpoint
Johor Bahru from the CausewayWe left home at 1130hrs and stopped by to top up petrol at a nearby petrol station as Singapore has a ¾ tank rule if you are leaving Singapore by car. This being a public holiday, it looked like many others had the same idea and there were tons of cars queueing up at the Woodlands causeway. There was a long tailback at the Singapore end of the Singapore Johor Bahru Causeway. Even the Causeway bridge had some holdup especially towards the Johor end of the Causeway.
The new CIQ Complex in Johor Bahru
By the time we finally cleared both sides of the Singapore Johor Bahru Causeway, it was already 1315 hrs. This was definitely much longer than what we normally experience.
Even as we followed the directions of our Garmin Global Positioning System, we realized that traffic was heavier than what we were accustomed to. That was odd as Monday was a working day for the Malaysians unless we had clashed with their lunch hour.
Our first shopping stop on this otherwise beautiful day was at S’mart. Although this was our second time here, as we did not have the time to walk the whole area the last time, we took this opportunity to take our time exploring the area today. It was a pretty huge area and we spent approximately 2 hours here. Part of the area is the huge S’mart wholesale store and supermarket whilst the other area is occupied by the wet market where you can get some fruits and vegetables at great prices. Some mini starfruits were being sold for RM0.10 (USD0.03) each and we also managed to get some kaya balls which cost RM2 (USD0.57) for 10 pieces, great snack for kids and adults alike!
Wet marketFruits galore
Clothes on saleFloral and wedding decorations
Next stop for our shopping was at Tesco. We had joined as Tesco members earlier this year and as we had received our Tesco statement with a RM3.50 (USD1) rebate voucher together with some other vouchers totaling RM13 (USE3.71) in total, we decided to make use of them.
Tesco shoppingWe love shopping at Tesco as we can always find some great buys there. For example:-
Coffee buns @ RM0.99 (USD0.28)
Curry puffs @ RM0.99 (USD0.28)
Baguette @ RM$1.59 (USD0.45)
Sugar Doughnuts (pkt of 4) @ RM2.99 (USD0.85) – Buy 1 pkt & get 1 pkt free
Anlene 700g refill pkt @ RM20.99 (USD6)
They also have their weekly specials.
After shopping to our heart’s content, we left Tesco at 1730 hrs to make our way back. Again, traffic was quite heavy and it took us more than double the time it would normally have taken us, a full hour and a half, to get to Gelang Patah near Tuas Checkpoint. Even topping up petrol, you had to queue and 90% of the cars were Singapore vehicles waiting to top up before going through the immigrations. Instead of going back by the Woodlands Causeway, we decided to take the 2nd Link also known as the Tuas Checkpoint and again it seemed that everyone had the same idea.
After topping up petrol and getting onto the highway, the traffic jam was already building up before we reached the toll booth. This was the first time we experienced such a long queue as this and we were stuck in the jam for about an hour and a half. Despite the unexpectedly slow traffic and the jam that we faced, today was a great Malaysia shopping trip and we definitely look forward to more of such trips in the future. Without the jams and the slow traffic preferably. :) By the time we cleared the Malaysian customs and immigrations, we were fortunate to be able to get through the Singapore end in a breeze.
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