It's a hard life this travelling lark!

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This little update is a round up for the ten days or so we spent on Tioman, because as you will see we didn't do an awful lot!

So following on from KL we caught the overnight bus down to Mersing. This has to be our coldest ever (ever!) bus trip (just for good measure here's another ... ever!). Within the first five minutes I was shivering and had put on my jacket and socks. All to no avail, we were both absolutley frozen. Neither of us slept because we were too cold and when we eventually got off the bus at 3.30am we were only to glad to fall out into the heat!

The bus station was naturally deserted and the few people that were on the bus with us all disappeared. We knew this was going to be the case so sat down and waited for the wee hours to pass and for the ferry office to open. About an hour later we were approached by a man, inviting us down to the all night cafe - hadn't we spotted it - he asked, well obviously not!!! We decamped to there and he gave us instructions on where to go to get our tickets and at what time. So at the appointed hour we walked down to the ferry terminus, bought our tickets and then boarded the ferry for a two to three hour crossing. Having not slept a wink due to the extreme weather conditions on the bus, I promptly fell asleep and didn't wake until the ferry got to Tioman. We then alighted and headed for the accommodation. Our room was a beach hut which to the left was the beach and aquamarine seas and everywhere else was jungle!

We spent our time on the Island snorkelling and well just chilling out! The snorkelling was fantastic. We saw the most amazing fish of all colours, rays, corals, jellyfish and finally turtles! I got nibbled by fish and they were all there the moment you stepped into the water. Truly amazing and truly fantastic, the ultimate being able to swim with a turtle. On land the monitor lizards were daily visitors, we spotted a green mamba (we think), there were pythons in the trees and fruit bats hovered at night. The electrical storms lit up the night sky and to top it all the food was good too! Added to this there was an international delegation of war ships out in the ocean playing war games, which provided a talking point. One american couple we met were exceedingly concerned that they weren't safe - we did try and failed miserably to point out that they would be perfectly alright!

Anyway I would highly recommend a trip to Tioman. We stopped at ABC Beach and it was incredibly laid back, everyone was really friendly and we really enjoyed our time there. The waters are brilliant and what's on land isn't so bad either!

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