BORNEO - Sipidan

As per usual, getting a bus somewhere is never as easy as it seems. I had to head to the bus terminal in town to get the bus to the terminal outside town. Of course when I got to the terminal there was only a taxi driver to help who said there was no bus, but he could take me by taxi. Sod that, so I walked to the other terminal and managed to get a bus and was just in time to get my main bus to Semporna.

I had to pay a ridiculous price for the bus, but was glad it had a toilet onboard. However, I only had to force myself once. After that I just stopped drinking cos I couldnt face the stench of it again.

10 hours later we arrived in Semporna. I had been chatting to a Russian girl who had been in Malaysia for 11 days and not paid a nite's accomodation. She had been using couch surfing and staying at people's houses. I couldnt believe how tight she was with her money tho when she came with me to where I was staying and demanded a discount. She even asked to speak to the manager who quite rightly told her to sod off! I would have been well pissed off if she had got a discount!

Anyway my first day of diving and it was about an hour before we got to Sipidan. In we hopped to our preheated aquarium and my god! I was in heaven. It was amaaaaaaaaaaazing! I gave up trying to count the number of turtles and sharks, and the number of photos I took put the Japanese to shame. Although over the 3 days we dived the same dive sites - Barracuda Point (no Barracudas!), Turtle Tomb (a cave where turtles go for a wee swim and get lost then cant get out to breathe and die, there are skeletons inside, aw wee shame!) and West Ridge - I was never bored. I have never seen so many fish and I really thought I had died and gone to heaven. In fact if I could choose anywhere in the world to suck in my last breath then the underwater world of Sipidan would be it.

Not only was the diving good, but the accomodation at Scuba Junkie'e was good too, especially the fry up breakfast. And having free internet, life just cant get much better!

BORNEO - Kota Kinabalu

From Singapore I took the Causeway bus over to Malaysia. I really wish I had not tried to do this on a weekend tho cos the immigration queues were huge and I had to stand for ages with my backpack breaking my back. Eventually at the other side I hopped on a bus to the Kotorays terminal then on the airport shuttle and had 3 hours to kill at Johor Bahru airport.

One and half hours later I was in Kota Kinabalu and picked up and taken to my accomodation in town where I just flaked out (after a few visits to the toilet!). The next day I headed into town to do a bit of sight seeing and to get some info. There really weren't any sights to see, but I managed to wander round for most of the day. I headed back (just as the heavens opened) via the museum, but it didnt even look open. It was just one big construction site so I was buggered if I was paying 15RM to go inside a health hazard!

Back to the hostel I just spent the nite on the toilet and listened to the rain that was totally lashing down.

SINGAPORE - Sentosa Island

After a nite's kip on the very hard floor at Singapore airport I hopped on the MRT to Little India to my hostel. Unfortunately I couldnt check in so I had to just dump my bags, then I jumped back on the MRT to Harbourfront.

From there I got the skytrain to Sentosa Island and was pleasantly surprised. It had a nice beach and is a great place to entertain the kids for a day. I entertained myself by going to see Underwater World. It was great, although I dont know how natural it is to have touch pools where people are constantly sticking their hands in and touching the fish. There was one pool full of sting wrays and they seemed to love people touching them. They came straight over and would flap up out of the water for some attention. It certainly seemed strange to think that such a friendly creature had managed to kill Mr Irwin!

Included in the price was a dolphin show, so I took a wander back along the beach to Dolphin lagoon. I stopped off and had an Ais Kacang which is a huge pile of crushed ice dripping with syrups and sauces and at the bottom is a mix of red beans, jelly and even sweetcorn. Wierd, but wonderful.

The dolphin show was performed by 2 pink dolphins and was pretty good. They did as they were told and got paid with fish.

I headed back to the skytrain station and stopped off to check out the huge replica Marmion monument. Then I headed back across to the main land where I treated myself to a Mie Goreng and iced coffee which then treated me to the first dose of the scoots I have had since going to Egypt over 5 years ago!

INDONESIA - The Gilli Islands & Sengigi (Lombok)

I did the lazy way of travel to the Gillis and did it with the shuttle bus and I am so glad I did. It was an early start at 6am from Bali to Padangbai where we arrived about 1 hour before the ferry and were, funnily enough, dropped off at a cafe. I refused to eat there so took a wander round the beach and found a cheap warung for a cip of coffee.

Padangbai is a cute wee place with a crescent shaped bay with a nice beach. Not much to do there and most people only head there to get the ferry to Lombok.

It was a four hour boring ferry ride to Lembar on Lombok. At Lembar we were collected by our shuttle and taken to 'the office' in Mataram, which turned out to be a bench in the middle of the pavement balancing precariously over a large gaping hole in the pavement! Here we were informed that we would need to buy tickets back fromt the Gillis or we would be stuck and would need to charter a boat for a ridiculous amount of money. I was well aware that this was total bullshit so I refused to buy one until he reduced the price to less than what I knew the other companies charged. Another couple also refused to buy a ticket, so the guy was a real twat to them. They were supposed to be staying in Mataram, but the bus had stopped 6km from the main strip and the guy refused to take them any further and told them they would need to get a taxi. Kind of defeats the purpose of paying for a door to door shuttle bus!

Anyway, we got back in the bus and were taken to Bangsal, which was a beautiful drive through the mountains with loads of monkeys at the side of the road. At Bangsal we could barely get out the bus before the 'Bangsal Mafia' were upon us trying to carry our bags for a disgusting amount of money.

After a bit of hanging about and being harrassed by umpteen touts selling crappy necklaces we boarded our boat to Gilli Trawangan. Once more the 'Bangsal Mafia' appeared and made a crap for bags and took them onto the boat then harrassed the tourits for ridiculous sums. Then it was a near death experience on this wooden bath to the Gillis, but we made it and stepped off onto shore.

I found a cute wee place to stay and ventured out on my first night to have a Bintang in front of a movie. I had an early nite, but was woken up in the early hours by the girl next door who had pulled some random guys and was making sure the whole world knew about it!

The next day I walked round the island, which took an hour, then I did a dive in the afternoon - which I defo wasnt impressed with. It was pretty boring and the coral was crap. Another nite with a Bintang in front of a movie, and this time I wasnt rudely awoken.

The next day I did a snorkel cruise cos it was so cheap and I'd have been bored otherwise. It was great the first place we stopped and I jumped in and I think it as better than where we had been diving. then it all went downhill when I skipped the next snorkel and then some Indonesian guy put sun tan lotion on my back and then started to massage me. That was it! He would not leave me alone and even tho I told him I had a boyfriend he would not bugger off. Even the next day when I went to get the boat to leave he was there waiting with a packet of biscuits and bought me a mango. What a loser! I was glad to leave.

At Bangsal we jumped on the bus and we went all the way to Mataram then I had to change bus to go all the way back to Sengigi. No idea why that was. I stayed at a really nice place in Sengigi, but there was nothing much to do. I ventured out along the coast a bit and caught up in a 6km run, but apart from that I was bored and glad to be leaving the next day.