Bintan Dragon Boat Madness, 6-7 September, 2014

The weekend of September 6th and 7th 2014, saw the Gaelic Dragons head to Bintan Lagoon Resort for their inaugural Gaelic Bintan Madness dragon boating event, along with friends from the German Dragons, Austcham Paddle Club, Spanish Armada and American Dragons. Competitors were split into three Barbarian teams, each competing to take out gold in a combination of serious dragon boat sprint races, obstacle dragon boat challenges as well as fun, but extremely competitive, beach games!

After a welcome speech, the race was on, beginning with a dragon boat sprint. This was made a little more difficult than usual with the interesting dragon boats that were used for the competition – with paddlers needing to straddle the boats’ sides while racing and the steers using short steering paddles to control the boats, resulting in some close calls and some interesting versions of racing in a straight line! All of this added to the “madness” of the weekend!

After a delicious lunch on the beach, the obstacle course dragon boat race took place. This involved a sprint for paddles, then to the boats out in the water, resulting in some interesting entrances into the boats as teams tried to paddle while still beached and others taking off too early leaving many paddlers scrambling highly ungraciously into their boats!! After navigating buoys, the teams had to make it back to shore where one paddler leapt out, balanced a can of beer on the end of their paddle to the finish line on the beach, where another teammate awaited to down the beer! Unbelievably the final ended in a dead tie with teams taking out equal points.

The serious racing was broken up with some fun beach events, from balloon relays (it’s not as easy at it appears to run with a balloon between your legs then drop it into a bag without using any hands!); Frisbee Flick ‘n’ Sticks in which competitors showed great sportsmanship with the constantly changing rules; and finally Ping Pong Push – using water to push a ping pong ball around an obstacle course.

The days’ events were wrapped up with medal presentations and a fabulous buffet dinner with plentiful drinks to be consumed. Of course the highlight of the night (after lighting lanterns to send skyward) was one of the most anticipated events – the inevitable boat race (the beer drinking variety)! Blink and you’ll miss it though – that’s how fast the winning team was, finishing at least one head in front! Needless to say this team incorporated two Gaelics (‘nuff said!!), one Gaelic partner and an Austcham paddler!

Being an International Dragon Boat Community event, of course the party did not end here. Off everyone headed to the resort’s karaoke bar. The few guests enjoying the peace were quickly overrun by the dragonboaters! It was a fight for the microphones! More than one throat was a bit sore the next day!

Sunday saw most people nursing their heads and relaxing by the poolside, making the most of the lovely day before having to board the ferry for the return to Singapore.

This was the first international event hosted by The Gaelic Dragons and it is sure not to be the last. Everyone is already looking forward to the next Gaelic Bintan Madness in 2015. Don’t miss it!

With thanks to the sponsors of the event: Journeyful; Bintan Lagoon Resort; AAM Advisory; and the Gaelic Dragons Bintan Madness organising committee.