libertus

For welcome visitors from this comment on Sheffield Forum. You want to see Boot the cat shagging his lucky lady, who am I to refuse?

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Overall it was an uneventful journey back to Sabah, Malaysia.

Here’s the itinerary. Say goodbye to Liberta at the bus station in Singapore. Get on the bus, short journey through the city to the causeway immigration centre, get off the bus, go through immigration, get back on the bus, cross the causeway into Johor Bahru, get off the bus again, go through Malaysian immigration, get back on the bus, another shortish journey to Larkin bus station, get off the bus, find a taxi, 30km journey to Senai airport, check-in, pay RM30 excess baggage, wait, get on the plane, 2hr flight to Kota Kinabalu, get off plane, collect baggage, leave airport, smoke, sweet-talk a couple of backpacker lodge touts for a lift to hotel in town, attempt hotel check-in to find that it is full, short walk to aforementioned backpacker lodge, get room, dump bags, drink 3 cans of beer in quick succession, go to bed.

Easy, eh?

The Malaysian side of the causeway has a couple of features that are different from the Singaporean. First, there is an ATM. Second, the embarkation forms are not kept by the place where you fill them in - they are at the immigration desk you have to go through. Plus, they ran out of forms just after I got one. I don’t know how the remaining passengers made it through!

This is primarily for Kevin, but anyone else who knows me will probably have a decent laugh. Question: what would I look like if I didn’t cut my hair for over six months while regularly drenching it in salt water and drying it off in tropical sunshine? Answer

Note that we don’t appear particularly tanned. That is an illusion. I’ll try to get Liberta to make a piccie of me baring my bum. Then you’ll see!

Updated 16th April 2005

The sun shines out of my behind!

Just back from a 10 day diving/relaxation expedition to the Perhentian Islands. Well, one of the Perhentian islands - the small one. Our last full day was spent on a diving trip to nearby Redang Island.

Some of the diving was great, most was good, some so-so and a couple terrible. The dawn dive at “Temple of the Sea” (Tokong Laut) was memorable as the first time I have seen fish waking up and going about the business of getting breakfast. The first dive on Redang was also exceptional due to the crystal clear water and resulting 30m visibility.

The terrible dives are worth mentioning. My dive on the “Sugar Wreck” was a disaster; rotten visibility, boredom and an accident on the boat on the way back leaving me with deep gouges in three fingers on my right hand which have only now stopped being painful. The dive at “Shark Point” was also disappointing due to low vis and, well, just nothing to look at.

Overall, though, it was a wonderful experience. The crew at Coral Sky Divers deserve high praise for the way their operation is run and I cannot hesitate to recommend them to anyone thinking about diving around the Perhentian Islands.

That said, there is the problem of the island’s rubbish, but I think I’ll leave writing about that to Liberta!

We are now in Kuala Terengganu on our way south to dive Tioman Island. From there we spend a few days in Singapore and then we go our separate ways.

A milestone of sorts. I have now made 100 dives with a total of 3 days underwater. Many thanks to the crew at Coral Sky Divers.

The last time we were in Kota Bharu, we were on our way to Thailand. This time we are on our way to the Perhentian Islands to dive.

Being a diver has an useful social effect, especially in places that are dive-oriented such as here. The likelihood of bumping into other divers is quite high so it is easy to get chatting to random people you otherwise wouldn’t and consequently good for getting advance information about dive sites and operators. I found out last night that the Perhentian sites are fairly undamaged and the names of a couple of sites that are worth diving. In exchange, I described diving Sipadan and Mabul. Heh… who needs guidebooks?

Kuching is the capital city of the state of Sarawak and very nice it is too. It is totally tropical (i.e. it rained heavily daily) with a riverside waterfront, civic sculptures and plentiful sightseeing so it is popular with tourists. Since there is no diving, we were just tourists!

First day after flying in, we settled down then went off to find the cat statues. There are at least three, including the large one which stands one paw raised beckoning either customers or prosperity at the city gate.

Next day we first set out to explore the old colonial fort which has been converted into a police museum. Getting there was the first difficulty as the signs pointing to it directed us to what appeared to be a police compund with an ominous sign warning unauthorised persons to keep out! A local man must have seen our confusion and assured us that it was alright - we just had to ignore the warning signs. The fort is very small - much smaller than it looks from the river, which is quite clever I suppose. The sign out front promised that the police museum contained reconstructed opium dens so I was quite excited to see them. I was rather disappointed though because the reconstructed dens looked to me exactly like modern washroom facilities right down to the male/female icons outside the doors. Liberta then pointed out that they were washroom facilities! So we didn’t find the dens. Sigh.

After the fort we made our way to the Muzium Kucing or Cat Museum which forms part of the North Kuching City Council building. Wow… what a bizarre and enjoyable exhibition. Everything you ever (or never) wanted to know about cats. Certainly the largest collection of cat ornaments I’ve ever seen. Also some interesting historical background to the city of Kuching including speculation as to how the name was chosen. All good fun.

In the evening we walked into a less touristy area to eat at a vegetarian Chinese restaurant that a similar establishment in Miri had recommended to us. Mmmm… laksa and tom yum!

A short flight from Miri, the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Gunung Mulu National Park offers a variety of jungle walks and cave exploration adventures for the intrepid and timid traveller alike. We were attracted by the prospect of exploring the show caves - effectively the entrances to what are, all told, some of the largest, longest and deepest cave systems in the world - and spending a few days in the relative calm of one of Sarawak’s few remaining areas of primary rainforest unsullied by decades of logging.

It didn’t quite work out that way

On the evening before leaving Miri, I came down with another bout of the dreaded traveller’s tummy. So, for the first two days in the park Liberta was able to do some of the walks and see some of the show caves while I was stuck in our room to be near the toilet!

I felt well enough on our last morning in the park to join Liberta on the 8km return walk to the Wind and Clearwater caves via the Moon Milk cave. A highly enjoyable walk, if a little strenuous. It turns out that most visitors to the former caves travel there by boat. Our cave guide told us that we were the only people that day who had done the walk. This surprised me until I observed some of our fellow cave visitors - they wouldn’t have made 1km along the track let alone navigated through the Moon Milk cave purely by torchlight!

As for the caves… well, they are very large holes in the side of the mountain. Nice enough, if you like that kind of thing, but I would not have bothered going by boat as the walk there and back was far more enjoyable.

So, we’re back in Miri at “The Highlands” Guest House (which I recommend - cheap but good) getting ready to fly to the capital of Sarawak - Kuching, which is the Malay word for cat. Apparently the city has a certain cat theme which both of us are quite looking forward to experiencing.

Then we’re off to the Perhentian Islands for some more diving.

Sorry for the lack of updates. I’ve been quite busy and, I suppose, haven’t quite been able to figure out what to say. It’s been an amazing month of diving, socialising, diving, drinking, diving and self-realisation. Did I mention the diving?

Met Liberta in Tawau for the trip to Sipadan and Mabul. The diving was, in a word, awesome. We planned to spend four days there but felt obliged to add another day. If these islands do not represent the best diving in the world then… well… bugger me! Cuttlefish, octopus, turtles (many), a sea dragon (wow!) and schools of fishes so large they overwhelm the senses. 11 dives.

We travelled back to Kota Kinabalu so that Liberta could meet some of the people I met while diving there. We made some dives. We socialised. We dived and socialised some more. 6 dives.

During all this time I was humming and hawing about whether to continue my diving education up to Divemaster level - quite a decision as it is the first professional qualification.

One evening, while drinking beer with Markus and Jeffrey, I took an opportunity to ask if I could join Markus with his Open Water students the next day, strictly as an observer. After a little persuasion there was agreement and the next day I was playing the role of a divemaster-in-training, almost! Wow… what an experience, especially with the hangover headache! It had to be some of the most enjoyable diving I have ever done watching a good instructor take students through the course. I enjoyed it so much I asked if I could do it again! And I did. After the second day, my decision regarding divemaster training was made. 5 dives.

We did two specialty courses, Naturalist and Navigation with Markus. Wow again! Not only is Markus and experienced and professional instructor, he is an excellent and knowledgable marine biologist. After one dive he pretty much opened up a whole new world-within-a-world showing us the tiny organisms that live symbiotically with other marine lifeforms as well as some of the invertebrate lifeforms that tend to get ignored because people are more interested in the pretty fishes. He taught us how to navigate better underwater. We all (students and instructor) thoroughly enjoyed the dives. 3 dives.

My dive total so far: 84

We are now in Miri, Sarawak staying in a nice and cheap little backpacker lodge. Tomorrow we make two dives on the patch reefs near Miri. Should be good.

Phew! What with 11 dives over 6 days and the attendant heavy drinking sessions, I’m a little pooped to the point where I think I’m going to skip the drinking tonight!

I have been enjoying myself here in a very simple way. No walks or tours or other touristy things. Just diving, eating and drinking. I’ve met some wonderful people, diverse in background and opinion. There have been some animated beer-fuelled conversations that will stay with me for a long time. I have already forgotten the hangovers.

And now our next step has been prepared; Liberta and I are doing a 4 day/3 night diving trip to Sipadan, described as one of the world’s best sites. I hope it lives up to its reputation in the same way that the Yongala wreck did.

OK, time for lunch and some relaxation.