Another day in Paradise...

26st of September - 1st of October 2006

Variety is the spice of life. Therefore I had decided to leave the big, noisy and busy city of Kuala Lumpur in favour of the very quiet, laid-back and simple Perhentian Islands. And as we all know, great minds think alike, so the Fantastic Four (Vinnie, Naim, Micha and Reena) we doing the same thing. Moreover, Jim was already there as he left a day earlier. Good stuff.

All five of us were completely blown away when we saw our night bus that should take us from K.L. to the Perhentians. Despite the price of RM30 (48 DKK/10 AUD), it was the nicest bus we had ever seen, with it's huge, wide leather seats. Didn't manage to sleep a whole lot on the bus though, because of the bumpy roads and because we reached our destination, Kuala Besut, at five in the morning. But what sucks even more is that I forgot my beloved Sennheiser headphones on the bus, plus a very gripping Dan Brown book (Digital Fortress). Damn it $#@#£$*#!!!! Anyway, after two hours of waiting at the jetty we jumped in a boat that took us to Perhentian Kecil (direct translation: Small Perhentian, the smaller of the two Islands. Guess what the other island is called? Yes, Big Island. They must have spent years making those names up). It was a beautiful morning to watch the sunrise. If any of us were feeling sleepy still, this was definitely cured by the bumpy speedboat ride! We had a huge laugh sitting in the front, struggling not to fall of (video), until the guy driving the boat told us to get our asses back on our seats. Guess he was tired of saving tourists from drowning :O) Never mind, this made it a bit easier for us to enjoy the stunning scenery.

As we approached the island, we were about to hit the coral reef, so we had to transfer to a smaller boat which took us to the beach. We checked in at Suria Resort in Coral Bay, and got some quite nice rooms that had baloneys with awesome views! After having a massive breakfast with eggs, fruit, french toast, cereal etc. we did what we had all been waiting for... We went to the beach! Brilliant... I got a bit sunburned though, as I was hanging out on a jetty for too long talking to some Canadians. After lunch we went for a ten minute walk though the jungle to Long Beach on the other side, the more crowded part of the island, to find Jim who was staying here somewhere. When we were about to ask for him at the reception at his resort, we suddenly saw something move. At first, I thought it looked like a turtle because of it's huge back, but it was a massive monitor lizard! It was at least 2 metres long. Holy crap. No luck finding Jim at his resort, but we eventually found him by playing Vin's famous bollocks game (which quite simply means yelling a word, in this case Jim's name, louder and louder for each time you say it) :O) After a few drinks on Long Beach, we all walked back to Coral Bay though the jungle. Later on at night, we sat on our balcony and watched a huge thunderstorm, probably the biggest I've ever seen (which makes sense, since I've never been this close to the Equator before)! It was amazing... I could swear that I both took photos and videotaped it, but both seem to have disappeared :(

Next day it was time for some scuba diving. I had decided to do two adventure dives, which would certify me as an advanced diver, rather than an adventure diver. Other than the compulsory navigation dive, I decided to do a wreck dive as the other adventure dive, since there's a sunken sugar transport near the island. I spent the first couple of minutes in the water getting used to breathe though a regulator again, and then we started our little adventure. It was very different from the dives I did in Australia. Obviously because it was at a wreck, but the aquatic life was quite different as well. Saw quite a few Lion Fish (spiky poisonous bastards), about one billion Barracudas and more. But the coolest thing was probably just the fact that I was swimming around a shipwreck! The highlight of the dive was when swam into an air pocket underneath the boat, where we could talk to each other and all... Awesome!! The visibility was all right most of the dive, except for a couple of minutes where it was about a metre. Couldn't even see my own fins :-D Next day I did my navigation dive, which was a lot easier than I thought. My sense of direction sucks, and it sucks even more under water, but it was pretty straightforward :) So I am now an advanced diver... Wohoo!

The following day I did another two dives - first one at a quite nice coral garden. But obviously, I forgot to bring my brand-new underwater housing :-S Eeeeeeeidiot. Finally got myself one at a cheap price in K.L., but it's kind of hard to take photo's when you leave the camera and housing at your hotel... Anyway, I brought it for the next dive! It was a really good dive, as we saw loads of special stuff, most remarkable Stingrays, actually about seven or eight of them! Some of them were missing their tails for some reason, like the one on the picture. Really weird. And as you can see, we saw quite a few Nemos (aka Clown Anemonefish) as well. But there you go, my first underwater photos. I'm not super pleased with them, but I guess everything comes with practice :)

The brits Jim left a couple of days earlier than I did. I stayed a bit longer, as I did my diving and generally loved staying on the Perhentians :) It has a true island atmosphere, where no one rushes, everyone is open-minded and relaxed, enjoying life...

What a great place. Guess life isn't too bad after all :)