Kapalai Island

The second island we dive at is Kapalai Island, a few kilometers east of Sipadan. It can barely be termed an island anymore. It used to have palm trees on it, but erosion has made it just a sandbar, and only at low tide. A dive resort has bravely built a whole resort of luxury bungalows on stilts above it though, giving it a better claim to 'island' status. You can just about make out each of the individual bungalows in this photo of the 'island', taken from Mabul.

The waters there feature some small wrecks, some big grouper fish, and lots of little critters. I had a crap dive (tired, with headache) while we were there on our first diving day, so I'm unreasonably biased against diving there again.

Sipadan

We have been diving on 3 islands off the east coast of Sabah, and thought we would introduce you to them.



The first island, seen above on the horizon, is Sipadan, the main diving attraction. The island, barely rising a few meters above the sea, is actually the tip of a huge mountain, and just a few meters offshore, it drops off in a vertical wall 600m in depth (we only dive the top 25m). It is the only oceanic island in Malaysia. Turtles nest here (we've seen tons), while huge schools of fish, including giant humphead parrotfish, jackfish, trevally, barracuda, and other exotic species, swim here. The island lives up to its hype, as we saw all of those things there, and were even getting blasé about seeing turtles. Aaron was closely examining the wall today, looking for small seacritters in the nooks and crannies, when suddenly he was looking into the mouth of a giant green turtle, more then 1m in diameter. They are well camouflaged against the tan and sandy wall (they aren't actually green). I was laughing (as hard as I could given the regulator in my mouth) when I saw him jump back (as fast as he could given that he's floating at 15m and doesn't want to touch the sea life on the wall).


Sipadan also has some scarier history for divers and is the main reason that the Canadian government advises travelers not to visit Eastern Sabah. In 2000, a group of divers were kidnapped by Phillipino guerillas, and held until large ransoms were paid. This makes Sipadan likely the best protected island around, as the Malaysian military have set up a base and lookout post on the island, control access to it, and conduct anti-piracy maneouvres in the surrounding waters. Significant income is earned from the tourists, and the Malaysian government wants to keep it that way. This picture is of the jetty / lookout station on Sipadan.


Just a couple years ago, the island was declared a protected marine park and visitors were banned from staying overnight on the island. The military has settled into the rooms of the resort that was there and keep the beach volleyball court in good shape.

Below is a Google Maps chart of the Mabul Island where we've been staying (on the east end of the island). Sipadan is to the Southwest.


View Larger Map

A turtle tried to kiss me

All of the readers who are divers will recognize this scene, the post-dive log filling and what-was-that-fish session. We just got back from two afternoon dives off of Mabul island. We were supposed to dive Sipadan, which is the main attraction, but we couldn't because the max number of divers (120) had been reached. The alternate dive sites were pretty good with huge (1000s) schools of jack fish, and some very friendly turtles. While we were looking at three large green turtles resting on the reef wall, another came up right beside us, only inches away. Turning to see this big critter right in our face was quite a shock! Then he did, as turtles do, calmly paddled away. Sipadan tomorrow, 5h30.

Dayus tripus

Borneo is not the untamed jungle wilderness that I expected. Instead, oil palm plantations stretch to the horizon. Some parts of the banks of the Kinabatangan River have been protected as wildlife sanctuaries and are homes to many species of tourists, who descend on the river at dusk, forming small packs of less than 10, with protubing cameras clicking from the relative safety of 40hp powerboats.

We were of the dayus tripus species, although most are of the overnightus variety, who seek shelter at night in nearby jungle lodges, complete with running water and power.

I'm glad we spent what seemed an exorbitant amount (8 times what we will pay for our hotel tonight) to do the tour. We saw snakes coiled around tree branches, probiscus and long tailed macaque monkeys chattering in the trees and throwing nuts at us, birds swooping over the water, and lizards relaxing on the sunny mudbank, but most importantly we saw a bit of untamed Borneo before it is lost. However, I'm glad we are not staying overnight there as the bugs started to come out at sunset and I'm looking forward to getting back to our wonderfully comfy room at the @ease boutique hotel to watch olympic highlights on the LCD TV and send this post over the free wifi.

Right now though, our excellent driver cum guide-in-training, Rain, is playing chicken with oncoming traffic on the dirt highway we are on and I'm happy to concentrate on typing this blog post instead of on watching the road.

Going batshit crazy

We just visited the Gomantong Caves near Sandakan, Borneo. Having seen the Discovery Channel special about them some time ago and having read Andy's blog entry about them, I thought that I had already pretty well experienced them. But I wasn't really prepared for the grand cathedral majesty of the cave, the stink of the guano, and the horror of the slippery boardwalk covered in guano and teeming with cockroaches. I concentrated very hard on not needing the similarily covered rickety handrail, let alone not falling off the boardwalk and onto the pile of bugs and crap underneath. As we crept up the slipperiest parts and saw the birds and bats above us, we realized that we could suffer the same fate as the walkway, and jumped (still carefully) when drops of water fell onto our heads.

Locals gather the nests of birds that live in the cave and make between $1000 and $2000 per kg (birds' nest soup is a Chinese delicacy). They are only permitted this harvesting during 4 months of the year, and we were lucky to see them in action. In the distance in the left of the photo, you can see their lights, ladders and ropes. They climb up and down like sailors comfortable on the rigging of a schooner, even though any misstep would likely kill them.

Stepping back into the light of day, we wiped our encrusted soles on the grass (our shoes will never be the same to us again), and hopped into the van off to our river nature cruise. We are nearing the river now.