Will's Fountain of Useless Info: Reloaded

Haha yeah I know, I was supposed to post details about my Sipadan dive trip like 2 weeks ago. But had been busy over the weekends (watching Heroes season 1 and 2, hanging out with friends etc). Anyways here it is:

On the 30th Sept, after work, I went home, had my dinner, packed my bags, and then went over to B and C's place to crash. Gotta wake up very early (4:30am) the next day to catch the cab to LCC Terminal for the early flight to Tawau.

The next morning, we arrived at the airport right on time for check in. This time around everyone made it and nobody got left behind (unlike the last time where 2 guys missed the flight).

After checking out from Tawau airport, we have to take a rental van to get to the Pulau Sipadan Resort (PSR) pier, which is about an hour's drive away. And from the pier, it's another 45min to 1 hour of boat ride to Kapalai (where PSR is at). On the way we passed by Mabul as well, which is a bigger island (I heard there's like 3 resorts, and a town community there).

When we reached PSR, it was like WOW... the whole resort is like on stilts sitting on a semi submerged sandy island. And you can see a lot of sea critters (especially starfishes) in the water. Other than no airconditioning, the facilities on the resort is pretty complete. The dining hall has an opening right smack in the middle like an aquarium and you keep seeing lots of fishes just hanging out below. In the room, the balcony has got deck chairs looking out to the sea.

Diving here was awesome. Creatures which are considered rare in east coast semenanjung is like in abundance here. Pipe fishes, lionfishes, starfishes, groupers, jacks, blue spotted rays, even bumphead parrotfishes would just be swimming around the resort. We get to see so many creatures like white tip sharks, green turtles, hawkbills, lots and lots of barracudas (esp on Sipadan itself), colorful nudibranches, pygmy seahorses, leaf fishes, frog fishes etc. Even the anemones would house big families of clownfishes (I've seen like tens to twenties of them hanging around a single anemone).

The only grudge we have is because of recent policy changes, we need permits to dive in Sipadan. And the thing is that the permit was randomly awarded. There are people who get to dive there everyday, and some didn't get a chance to dive in Sipadan after staying for 5 days. Our group managed to get a dive (some get 2 dives). We were supposed to get another dive actually, but while waiting for the personnel to approve our, one stupid gwai lou went to reason with the personnel and talked so much until he got fed up and shooed us all back.

All in all, it is a great trip. Great dive, good food, friendly people and staffs. I would definitely want to come back. No wonder some of my friends who dives call this place their second home. Time to save up for another trip... maybe next year. :P

Just got home not long ago. Air Asia delayed again. Sipadan was awesome. But there's some new restrictions on diving there, only got to go there once. The rest of the diving was done in Kapalai, Mabul, and Siamil.

Off to sleep. More details next time.