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Published: March 29th 2012
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After a very pleasant 2 and a half weeks back in Australia visiting family and friends I caught a flight yet again to Malaysia. I arrived early in the morning, caught the bus into KL and then made my way to Bukit Bintang and found some accommodation. I had a quick shower and then caught a taxi to the Chinese visa centre to apply for a tourist visa. After a bit of confusion I eventually lodged my application and was told to return the following morning for an interview. The next morning I arrived early and after a 1 minute, 2 question interview I was told to come back a few days later to pick up my passport hopefullly with a 90 day visa in it.
Seeing it was still early in the morning I decided to check out of my room and catch the midday bus to Mersing which is the departure point for the ferry to Tioman Island. I arrived about 6.30pm and quickly found a cheap room in a hotel I had previously stayed at for $6 a night with squat toilet and mandi.
The next morning I made my way to the port at 10.30am
but had to wait until almost 12pm before the ferry left. A pleasant one and a half hour trip later I had arrived at the small town of Paya on the west coast of Tioman Island. It is a very nice setting with small mountains behind, a nice beach, and clear water. I walked the 5 minutes to Paya Beach Resort where my friend Jan had made a booking for me. I was staying in a 4 bed shared room with attached bathroom, air conditioning, a balcony, buffet breakfast, and use of the resorts swimming pool. A bargain at only $13 a night. The best thing is that over the 7 nights I was there I had the room to myself for 5 nights.
The next day I caught up with Jan, who had just returned after a couple of days off. Luckily for me Jan works as a dive instructor at DiversCove, the dive outfit based at the resort which meant I could go out on the boat a couple of times when they had divers and snorkel the wonderful sites for free. The snorkeling was very good with great visibility, plenty of colourful fish, black tipped reef
sharks, rays, turtles, and some nice coral. Most of the time I spent just relaxing by the pool reading my brand new kindle which I love, or eating at the local restaurants in the company of Jan and Vale, a divemaster from Italy who also works at DiversCove. On the weekend I had the chance to meet the owner of the dive school as well as one of the co-owners of the resort who were both very nice, down to earth people, that made me feel very welcome. Jan had a day off early in the week so we decided to walk to the Berjaya Resort a little way further up the west coast. It was a nice walk through the jungle, along a nice beach, and past the resorts golf course before arriving at the heart of the resort. After having lunch we decided to use the resorts very nice swimming pool and just act like we were guests there. They also had a kids waterslide which I tried out a few times although I was a little older than the 15 year age limit, and a little heavier than the 30kg limit.
So after a relaxing 7
days I said my goodbyes to Jan and Vale and caught the morning ferry back to Mersing and then a bus back to Kuala Lumpur, arriving at my guesthouse about 6.30pm. After having something to eat I found an internet cafe where I could print out a few documents I need for China the following night. In the morning I caught a taxi back to the Chinese visa service to pick up my passport with hopefully a visa for China in it. After paying the $50 fee I collected my passport and was rapt to find that they had given me the 90 days that I had requested. In about an hour I am off to the airport for my flight to China.
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