Blogs from Semporna, Sabah, Malaysia, Asia - page 8

Trace: After our time at Uncle Tan's we travelled south to the coastal town of Semporna, then over to Mabul Island where we stayed at "Uncle Chang's" diving lodge in the middle of a fishing village for four nights. We used this as a base to do some diving at Sipadan, an island famous for it's fantastic diving. I had the best six dives of my life here, Mat and I dived with huge turtles (about 1.5m in shell length), sharks (leopard and white tipped reef sharks), loads of coral and squillions of fish including bump-head parrot fish, unicorn fish etc etc. Absolutely fantastic. We also had Mat's 30th last night - a big party with a live local band ... pictures will follow shortly. The people from Sabah have all been so friendly, welcoming and ... read more

I have officially fallen in love with the dirty, smelly, corrupted, beautiful country and it's beautiful people. Borneo is absolutely everything I imagined it would be, and more. From the villages to the markets, the Jungle to the ocean; it all has such life and vivality (is that a word?) to it. Every time I look out a window or down a street there is something there that amazes me and fills me with awe. Mostly I love the people here. They are always greeting me with a smile and a hello, and are more willing to laugh and smile than anyone I know back home. They seem to have a zest for life that is unparalleled back home. And considering that compared to western standards these people have so little, it is quite amazing. Maybe ... read more

Diving still incredible! Dived at different islands of Mabul and Kapalai yesterday, which was macro muck diving - very different from the pretty corals of Sipadan - lots of sand, wrecks, and random large objects and rocks to look under which was very fun. Saw completely different types of fish - crocodile fish, HUGE cuttlefish, massive groupers (literally twice the size of me) and the weird looking stonefish, frogfish, leaf fish and pipefish - very cool! Today was my last day of diving at Sipadan - was a fantastic day and one of the dives was the BEST dive I've done here so far - more sharks than I've ever seen in my life, they were literally everywhere! And turtles gliding around every direction you look, and even saw a big school of squid mating - ... read more

We're back in the steamy heat of Kuala Lumpur. After an extra day of not doing very much, we board a plane to somewhere which promises to be very special. We're flying to North Borneo, to the Malaysian province of Sabah. Here, right near the border with Indonesia, where the Sulu and Celebes Seas meet, is Pulau Sipadan, reputed to be one of the world's great dive sites. Pulau Sipadan and a wealth of other tiny islands are dotted around the coast between the towns of Tawau and Semporna. We fly (Air Asia again !) to Tawau from KL before hopping in a minibus (complete with chickens in the back - sadly one of them succumbed to heat exhaustion, poor thing) to Semporna. There followed two day of the most extraordinary diving we've ever done. There ... read more