Henderson Waves & Southern Ridges

Henderson Waves is Singapore's highest pedestrian bridge — a 274-metre undulating steel structure that connects Mount Faber Park to Telok Blangah Hill Park at 36 metres above Henderson Road, and walking across it feels like riding a frozen wave through the forest canopy. The bridge is part of the Southern Ridges, a 10-kilometre hilltop trail that connects five parks from Kent Ridge to Mount Faber and is one of the best free experiences in Singapore.

The bridge's design — seven curved 'ribs' of steel and yellow balau wood that rise and dip along its length, creating sheltered alcoves at each trough — was completed in 2008 and immediately became the most photographed piece of infrastructure on the Southern Ridges. The alcoves, inset with wooden benches, look out over the tree canopy and the container port below, and at night the bridge is lit with LED lights that change colour and make the structure glow against the dark forest.

The full Southern Ridges trail takes about three hours and passes through primary and secondary forest, a canopy walk, a series of elevated boardwalks, and the Reflections at Bukit Chandu museum (which tells the story of the Malay Regiment's last stand against the Japanese in 1942). The trail ends at Mount Faber, where a cable car connects to Sentosa Island, making it possible to walk from a nature reserve to a beach resort in a single afternoon. The entire trail is free, well-maintained, and remarkably uncrowded for a city of 5.5 million people.