Happily, I arrived at the budget terminal for the midnight flight to Cebu. It was my first time at this terminal and was quite surprised at the small size of the departure hall. There are just 7 of us for this dive trip to Moalboal and I've been so looking forward to seeing the sardine bait balls. Previously I can only dream of seeing these magnificent sardine runs in South Africa but apparently a more "toned down" version without the larger sharks, dolphins and birds started appearing on a regular basis in Moalboal in the last couple of years. Who knows how much longer are they going to be there and I'm not going to wait until they are gone before I go visiting.
Given the lack of a queue at the check-in counter, I was quite surprise to see a full flight and getting seated right at the last row. But I sure felt quite like a VIP for being the first to disembark onto the parking apron after stepping off the rear exit door 4am in the morning. The van ride to Moalboal took around 3 hours. Just as expected, I didn't manage to catch any sleep throughout the entire journey.
We arrived at Tipolo Beach Resort where we'll be staying for the next few days. As it's only 7am in the morning, only two out the three rooms were available. I dump my bags into one of the room and proceed for a quick breakfast at The Last Filling Station where we have a large number of our meals. Tipolo is a small operation with just a handful of rooms, located at the more peaceful end of the "beach". There's also a minimart at this end of the beach for some basic necessity and tidbits should you need any. The rooms though small, are clean and come complete with free WIFI. The Last Filling Station is the resort's restaurant which serves some great pizzas and killer mango juice which is really thick and wholesome! The only issues I have in general were the food which are often too salty but that is fine after we ask them to go easy on the salt.
On arrival outside The Last Filling Station at Tipolo (Photo courtesy of RL)
Courtyard of Tipolo Resort with my room on the right (Photo courtesy of RL)
Minimart near our resort and dive centre (Photo courtesy of RL)
As the time was a little tight, we couldn't make it for the 1st boat dive at 8.30am but instead opt to do a checkout dive at the house reef once we're ready. We're diving with Blue Abyss dive shop for this trip, with G as our DM. In total, we did 3 dives today. As we started a little late and due to some miscommunication, we couldn't do our night dive today. Dinner was done at The Last Filling Station. GT, RL and myself shared a vegetarian and funghi pizza which were baked in a wood fire oven. The funghi pizza is the winner here. Together with the thick mango juice, life couldn't have been better.
Upper deck for chilling out at Blue Abyss Dive Shop
At Blue Abyss Dive Shop (Photo courtesy of RL)
Then it's back to the room to prepare my camera and gear for the next day of diving. We're going to see the sardines at Pescardo Island tomorrow morning! Woohooo! I just can't wait for that! But for now, I really need sleep after missing a night of rest. Good night world! :)
Good time doesn't last and we're heading for home. We proceed to the airport after a simple buffet breakfast at the hotel. Nothing fancyful but I guess it's not a fair comparison after getting pampered at the resort. As per my estimation, my check-in luggage was just 200 grams shy of 25kg! So glad we're doing a group check in. Phew! After checking in, many of us go crazy with souvenir t-shirts. Haha.. I wonder why we all love buying and wearing dive related t-shirts on a dive trip. It's not as if the rest doesn't know we're divers. Regardless, I too have gotten a few pieces for myself. :p
Our flight goes to KL for a transit at the LCCT (Ha! What a mouthful. Low cost carrier terminal! Maybe it sounds better than just budget terminal?). Transit time was much longer on our return flight so we managed to head to the canteen for lunch. The nice thing about the terminal is the availability of free wifi (1 hr). Got a little delay for our flight so it's more shopping for me. So glad to spot the Reese's peanut butter chocolate! Tried it once previously and couldn't find it anywhere so I quickly grabbed two packs. If anyone saw it for sale at any supermarket in Singapore, please let me know. I'm addicted! :p
Again I had a close call with excess carry on luggage when the person in front was pulled over to have his smaller bag weighed. Phew..
And that's the end of the trip. Nothing much to "report" for this final day of the trip but perhaps just a little recollection. Overall, I'll say it's a wonderful trip for me, a first time visitor to Sipadan. I came prepared with the mindset that the visibility may be crap and the weather may not hold up. The visibility was indeed pretty bad on some dives but still within expectation but I certainly have a bonus with the weather which was just great! There was a couple of disappointment, particularly with the no show of the videographer which we've booked in advance, or the much reduced sightings or even absence of some marine creatures. But still I saw most of what I've hope to see, even for just a fleeting moment. The swirling barracudas definitely takes the cake and will stay in my memory for a long long time to come. Honestly, I think 3+ days on the resort is just too short to fully enjoy the place. There's still many more dive sites that we haven't explored and many more things that I wanted try but doesn't have enough time to do so. Apart from the diving, I was hoping to do some snorkelling around the crystal clear water just around the resort, to kayak around the resort and to just simply chill at the sandbank to enjoy the breeze and sunset. Rates at Kapalai is among the higher end among the resorts around Sipadan area but it's worth the experience. I just feel so cut off from the world and the environment is just so peaceful and relaxing. I enjoyed even the simple act of just walking along the boardwalk around the resort, being surrounded by water and the large number of starfish. Kapalai, a truly wonderful place to relax and recharge.
As a parting note, I just found out about some shark fining activity going on around Sipadan area. If you could spare a second, please help to sign the following petition for the Malaysia authorities to take action before it's all too late. The link to the petition can be found at http://apps.facebook.com/petitions/2/stop-sharkfinning-in-sipadan/ I've put up my petition (see below), I hope you can show your support too. Thank you.
Dive: 81 Duration: 69mins Avg Depth: 11.9m Max Depth: 13.7m
This was potentially one of the best dive of the trip but ended up a fustrating one. Murphy decides to pay me a visit. Soon after descent, the DM show us a pair of ghost pipefish. Oh boy, after so long I finally saw them for the first time! Totally thrilled and happy to see these and I started to take a shot. Wait? No flash. Checked the settings and make sure the forced flash is on. Nope still no flash.. Took out the sync cord and give it a good shake, turn off and on the camera.. The flash just didn't trigger. Then it finally hit me! Damn! I didn't pop up the flash (mechanical trigger) on the camera after I took it out the night before. I always did a test fire each time after I took the camera out and I missed it this time! You can literally hear my cursing and swearing at myself and the camera underwater. Ok, now I just gotta salvage the situation and make the best out of it. I promptly proceed to dismantle my focus light and use that for illumination. Apart from the initial pair of halimeda ghost pipefish, there was also a ornate ghost pipefish and a zebra snout seahorse. Then we spotted a very cute juvenile shortfin lionfish. The tinest I've seen so far for this species and it sure was cute. Just about smaller than the size of a Ricola candy. Next I saw a waspfish for the first time. And the finale was seeing 2 halimeda ghost pipefish and 1 ornate ghost pipefish all together. It's really such a pity that the strobe cannot be fired to get the full colours of these amazingly beautiful creatures. A painful lesson to me for sure.
Zebra Snout Seahorse (Hippocampus barbouri) at Paradise 1 (13m) - Mabul, Malaysia
Juvenile Shortfin Lionfish (Dendrochirus brachypterus) at Paradise 1 (12m) - Mabul, Malaysia
Ornate Ghost Pipefish (Solenostomus paradoxus) at Paradise 1 (13m) - Mabul, Malaysia
Dive 12 - Kapalai House Reef
Dive: 82 Duration: 53mins Avg Depth: 12.6m Max Depth: 18.6m
We descended around house #5 to the right of Kapalai housereef. Saw a couple of different shrimps at various locations and I have some fun getting their photos. Along the way I also saw a couple of jawfish which I initially thought was just some blennies. Too bad they aren't incubating any eggs. And finally a giant frogfish greeted us goodbye just before we ascended and end our dive for this trip. There are certainly more that I wished to see here but nonetheless, it's still a great trip. Looking forward to be back for more in the future.
Dwarf Hawkfish (Cirrhitichthys falco) at Kapalai house reef (13m) - Kapalai, Malaysia
Peacock-tail Anemone Shrimp (Periclimenes brevicarpalis) at Kapalai house reef (14m) - Kapalai, Malaysia
It was our last day at the beautiful resort on Kapalai. Having missed the sunrise the last few days on the resort, there's no way I'm going to let this last chance slips. Still, I woke up later than I wanted. Very quickly, I grabbed the camera and got out of the room. I was late! The light was already slowly creeping up on the horizon. Without much time to scout for a good location, I just settle on a spot and start shooting. Phew. There's barely enough time to squeeze in a timelapse of the sunrise. The haste was evident in the timelapse video which was quite jerky at the start as I was manually triggering the camera by hand while setting up the intervalometer. :p
Sunrise at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
Sunrise at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
Early morning at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
Helipad in the early morning at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
As there's still some time before breakfast, we managed to spend some time for some final shots around the resort. By now, we got quite used to the usual routine. Breakfast around 7.30am at the dining hall before gathering at the dive centre for our dives. As we're checking out after lunch, we could only have two dives in the morning. The first dive was back to Mabul island and that's when Murphy struck! Honestly, that was among best dive this trip besides the sipadan dives. But anything that can go wrong, will go wrong! The whole fiasco made me quite upset with myself for that silly little mistake. Due to time constraint, our second dive was at Kapalai just around the resort (house number 5).
It was quite a rush after the dive. The dive centre takes care of rinsing our dive gear and sending it back to our room. Speaking of efficiency! It wasn't long after we reached back at our room before the crew turn up with our gear. Fortunately for us, there was a good breeze with the sun out in full glory. Thus we can lay our wet dive gear out to dry in the sun before we head out for a quick lunch. Surprisingly when we got back, our gear were almost dry. The gear could easily adds a couple of kg in baggage if left wet. The crew promptly swing by to pick up our luggages. Taking a last look, I reluctantly leave the room and heads towards the jetty. The speedboat is already waiting for us. After a quick goodbye with our two DMs (Lito & Yvonne), we got onto the boat. When we arrived back at Semporna jetty, it was starting to drizzle a little. We have been so fortunate! The night before we came over to Kapalai, it was raining so heavily at Semporna and the weatherman warned of rain and thunderstorm over the next few day. But it was all well and sunny the entire duration when we're there.
We have a quick pitstop at the resort office on Semporna before taking the hour long van ride to Belmont Marco Polo Hotel in Tawau. It was already late afternoon by the time we arrived at the hotel. Had a little rest before everyone heads out for some seafood dinner. I heard seafood was cheap and nice there but I can't comment on the quality since I'm a vegetarian. But the veggies and tofu was really nice I think, especially the special "homemade" tofu. So smooth and tasty. Just splendid! Some of them stayed on for a drink while I retired back to the hotel for an early rest. All the late nights and early mornings is taking its toll and I'm getting tired.
Dive: 77 Duration: 50mins Avg Depth: 15.7m Max Depth: 23.5m
Visibility was again pretty bad at this dive, particularly towards the deeper end. Finally we found a frogfish in the dive. I've heard from a friend who was here the previous year that they're practically everywhere. Perhaps the changing weather from the current La Nina cycle is causing the reduced numbers of all the creatures. First the vastly reduced number of sharks and turtles at Sipadan. And the reduced encounter with the frogfish. Even the mandarin fish at Kapalai have "shifted house" from what the DM says. Despite that, this was still a wonderful dive as I saw for the first time a juvenile pinnate batfish. Unfortunately I didn't have a decent shot due to the poor visibility. The juvenile was just so beautiful with its orange red margin all around its body and fin.It wasn't wary of us and was just calmly swiming around in a figure of 8 path. One strange observation was that I heard some continous growling sound while I was around the batfish but I'm not certain if it was coming from the fish or something else. On hindsight, I should have done a video clip instead.
Giant frog fish (Antennarius Commerson) at East Fort (22m) - Siamil, Malaysia
Tube dwelling anemones (Ceriantharia sp.) at East Fort (13m) - Siamil, Malaysia
Dive 9 - Danawan Reef (Siamil)
Dive: 78 Duration: 55mins Avg Depth: 13.5m Max Depth: 20.7m
The visibility was still pretty bad. As usual, I was towards the rear of the group and the DM found a black frogfish ahead. By the time I catch up, the poor fellow was already covered with all the sand and silt that was kicked up. Looks like it's will be yet another time to try some shots on a black frogfish. Halfway through the dive, a white leaf scorpian fish was spotted inside a small opening between some rocks. After waiting my turn, I spent some time trying to get a shot of the scorpianfish. And during this time, my dive comp went into deco for around 2 minutes before I realised it. The depth at which it occured was at 17m. Damn! Totally didn't expect to go into an unplanned deco dive. It wasn't too bad as I noticed it early and have more than sufficient air to complete the deco obligation. Wasting no time, I quickly move to shallower depth. Finally the deco time was cleared just in time before the group ascend. Lesson learnt to be more mindful of my NDL time esp when being focused on some interesting subjects.
Leaf Scorpionfish (Taenianotus triacanthus) at Danawan reef (17m) - Danawan, Malaysia
Dive 10 - Lobster Wall (Mabul)
Dive: 79 Duration: 50mins Avg Depth: 14.4m Max Depth: 22.6m
Upon descending, I saw the DM concentrating on a small seafan. I'm pretty sure he found a pygmy seahorse but I couldn't see where it was so I just waited beside until he pointed it out. Gosh, finally saw my 1st pygmy seahorse and it was indeed small! Probably about the size of a grain of rice or just a tad bigger than that. With the macro filter in place, it sure wasn't easy trying to catch this fellow on the cameara. At that magnification, the moment you look at it and back at the camera, you can't find it on your screen anymore. Phew. In retrospective, maybe it is easier to use a fine stick as a pointer to locate the subject and moving it out of the way just before taking a snap. A two person tag team should work better for this I guess. Also saw a couple of very pretty nudibranch but unfortunately as it was on a wall, all I have are ass shots as I do not want to reposition them for a shot.
Willan's chromodoris (Chromodoris willani) at Lobster Wall (10m) - Mabul, Malaysia
Female spinecheek anemonefish (Premnas biaculeatus) at at Lobster Wall (5m) - Mabul, Malaysia
Dive 11 - Kapalai House Reef
Dive: 80 Duration: 40mins Avg Depth: 9.9m Max Depth: 13.4m
A very short night dive at the housereef. We could have stayed much longer given the very shallow depth but some of the other divers was clearing their AOW prior to the night dives and hence have run out of air earlier. Saw a super fat moray eel at the start of the dive. I think it was just irritated with all our lights that it decides to swim out of its hole. That's when I realised how fat it actually was. The fattest I've seen by far and it's a pity I didn't have it on camera or video. Apart from that, also saw a couple of very well camouflaged scorpianfish at the bottom. And quite a number of tiny shrimps and crabs among the corals and crevices too.
Many-Spotted Sweetlips (Plectorhinchus chaetodonoides) at Kapalai house reef during night dive (3m) - Kapalai, Malaysia
It was a beautiful morning here at Kapalai. Nice morning to sleep in except for the natural alarm clock provided by the numerous gossiping herons outside the resorts. I bet they're boasting to each other about the size of their catches for their breakfast. As there's still some time before our breakfast, I couldn't resist getting out to the balcony to get my hands on some shots of our noisy neighbours while they're having their fish party.
Got a little too engrossed with the birds photography that I've forgotten the time. Very quickly, we head out to the dining hall for our breakfast, which again was quite a spread. For some reason, I love the fried bee hoon and the breads which was warm and moist inside. It's hard not to gain weight here! Fortunately I was out late so I didn't have the luxury of time to stuff myself silly with all the yummy food.
Silhouette of a passing heron from my balcony at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
Passing heron from my balcony at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
Next stop is to the dive centre after the breakfast where we get changed into our wetsuit before getting onto the boat. For non Sipadan diving days, the standard schedule appears to be 2 boat dives in the morning, followed by 1 boat dive after lunch. Thereafter you're free to do unlimited housereef dive if you're in the mood. All you need to do is to put your name up on a board with the expected time of your dive and your gear will be prepared. After you're done from your housereef dive, just erased your name so they know you're back. This looks like a wonderful arrangement that seems to work pretty well to handle the fair amount of guests (it's the peak Christmas season) while we're there.
The morning dives for this morning is to Si Amil island and Danawan island which is located slightly further away than Mabul and Sipadan. Just like the dives at Sipadan, the resort have another boat to bring us some tea and snacks while we rest at the island during our surface interval. Lunch is back at Kapalai and it's off to the nearer Mabul island for our third dive. And finally we end the day with an additional night dive at the housereef.
There's still some time before dinner so we head back to the room for a washup. Being our last night on the resort, I didn't want to waste any opportunities and thus set up my camera for another star trail shoot on the balcony before I head out for diner.
Startrails from my balcony at Sipadan-Kapalai Resort - Sabah, Malaysia
During diner, the video captured for today's group at Sipadan was put up for viewing. That really got a number of us really disappointed given the no show the day before. We didn't stay too long after dinner as we need to get our stuffs packed for our departure the next day. Back at the room, I was busy switching task between packing my stuffs, preparing the camera and underwater housing for the next day and doing various shoots. Naturally, I'm not a good multitasker and that resulted in a stupid blunder which comes back to haunt me the next day.
The water below the balcony for each room is beautifully lit and you may get to see some fishes and stuffs getting around or even the occasional turtle too. Being curious about what might pass by, I quickly set up the camera to point at the sea below our balcony for some timelapse shots. Looks like it's a quiet night with just one lone fish around throughout the shot.
Planned to set up for a final star trail shot before heading to bed but the sky wasn't cooperating with clouds aplenty in the sky. Not giving up, I just go ahead to aim the camera towards the horizon for some timelapse of the cloud and water movement. Surprisingly, the results came out pretty well. The time lapse video below comprises of 402 shots captured from 23:57 to 03:53, and compressed into the 1:20 mins video. Quite a busy scene with many stuffs occuring. At times, you see fishes (those streak of lights in the water) swimming by. The changing water surface.. The clouds rolling in and thunder flashing. And at the top, you can even see some stars moving at spots where it's not covered by clouds. But you probably need to open it up in youtube and view it fullscreen in HD mode to see the stars though. See if you like it too. :)
Dive: 73 Duration: 47mins Avg Depth: 12.2m Max Depth: 20.7m
Finally the dive that I've been so looking forward to. So excited am I for my first dive at Sipadan island that I actually forgotten my fins! Phew.. I'm very sure I took the fin and placed it beside me. Then I proceed to defog my mask, clipped off my camera, mask on, reg on and here I go with a backward roll. Woohoooo!! Ooops... Wait, where's my fin??? Haha.. I think in mid air while rolling in, I can almost hear someone shouting in slow-motion, "Fiiiinnnnnn...."! It sure was embarrassing and there isn't a crevice I can hide my face in. Phew.. With that red faced moment behind me, I started the dive. Soon upon descend, I saw a jellyfish in midwater and grab a couple of quick shots before continuing the dive. I'm glad I did as that turn out to be among one of the favourites pix from the trip. :)
Jellyfish at Coral Gardens (9m) - Sipadan, Malaysia
The initial part of the dive started with quite a bit of finning/drifting along the wall until they came up to the shallows before the end of the dive. Visibility was better than the day before but wasn't exactly great. Occasionally we did see a passing reef shark or turtle from above or below us. I was almost somewhat disappointed having not seen anything after all the finning until we came up to the shallows. That's when things starts happening. At one point we saw a school of barracudas passing through. Not the swirling tornadoes and also, it happened too quickly for a decent shot. Then finally I have my first close encounter with a free roaming reef shark. It was initially lying there on the bottom while we approached. It took off while we lie in position, waiting for it to return, and it did! Not a big fellow but it was a nice encounter.
Whitetip reef shark (Triaenodon obesus) at Coral Gardens (10m) - Sipadan, Malaysia
As we're ending our dives, we also saw the famous train of bumphead parrotfish passing through. It was a distance away so again, no chance for any nice shots by the time I fin into position. Unfortunately that was the only sightings of the bumphead for this trip. There's also some folks snokeling around where we ascended.
Dive 5 - Hanging Garden (Sipadan)
Dive: 74 Duration: 51mins Avg Depth: 13.7m Max Depth: 22m
2nd dive at Sipadan. It was again mostly finning/drifting along the wall. The least interesting dive among the four Sipadan dives. My memory card came up almost empty. There wasn't a single pelagic, shark or turtle that I've caught. OMG, how can this be happening? No turtles at Sipadan? I hope I won't be the joker who never saw a turtle at Sipadan. What I heard from those who were there previously in Sipadan, the number of sharks and turtles encounter was very much lesser this time round. Indeed, I've heard previously that people will stop pointing out the sharks and turtles at Sipadan as they soon got sicked of them being around everywhere. Now I'm eagerly anticipating, where's all the sharks and turtles? Keeping my finger crossed that my luck will change for the better in the next 2 dives there.
Dive 6 - Barracuda Point (Sipadan)
Dive: 75 Duration: 53mins Avg Depth: 11.9m Max Depth: 17.1m
Oh yes, the famous barracuda point in Sipadan. This has to be it! But nope, still no barracudas after all the finning. But this was definitely more interesting than the previous dive. I was getting desparate. Saw a shark at a distance and I just take a snap, never mind if its just going to be a crap shot. Then finally I saw a big school of big eye trevallies and a school of another fish. As I was way behind, didn't really have time to adjust and get a decent shot. In the end I just opt to take some video of it. Still finding it hard to do a decent wide angle shoot on my current setup anyway. Then further down it gets really interesting. Before me, I finally saw a numer of garden eels for the first time! Always wanted to see and get some shots of them. But that's not all. Gosh! Now, beside the eels is a resting turtle. And behind the turtle is a resting white tip reef shark. It's such a torture deciding which to shoot. Phew. There's a little current slowly picking up and it's getting a little tricky to stay still for the garden eels. After a while, I just couldn't resist the turtle and shark pair. It's the closest I've gotten yet to a white tip that has totally ignore us. Oh boy, I need a wide angle lense!
Spotted garden eel (Heteroconger hassi) at Barracuda Pt (16m) - Sipadan, Malaysia
Dive 7 - Drop Off (Sipadan)
Dive: 76 Duration: 53mins Avg Depth: 12.6m Max Depth: 20.7m
Reluctantly, it was the last and final dive at Sipadan island for our trip. Our group has opt to drop in at the drop off and fin towards barracuda point. There was quite a bit of rubbish where we jump in. And right where we descent, there was a school of jacks. But for some unknown reason, the group seems to have totally ignored them and continue descending. Didn't have a chance to fin towards them for a shot. Damn! First destination was to the entrance of turtle tomb. The sea has taken its toll on the famous "No Entrance" signboard that everyone seems to have a pix of, The words and the picture of the skull on the signage has mostly faded. We stay a while at just the entrance area before continuing our journey towards barracuda point. Along the way, I chanced upon a titan trigger fish. It was busy feeding on corals and I guess it wasn't nesting. Thus I slowly inch forward for a shot. Even though it wasn't aggressive, I was still ever ready to put my fin out in case it decides to charge at me. That fellow just gives me the creep. Phew. Also saw a turtle in a nice pose on a rock. Just like a gatekeeper to what I'm going to see next!
Green Sea Turtle (Chelonia mydas) at Barracuda Point (13m) - Sipadan, Malaysia
Was quite disappointed that the dive is finally coming to the end and I've still not saw what I was very much hoping for, the school of swirling barracudas. Then just at the very end I saw the DM signaling to us.. Tornadoes!! Oh yes!!! The DM pointed out into the blue. Far ahead I faintly saw another two divers in the distance already. My air show just about 50 bars remaining. Grrrrr.. What the heck, it should at least last a while for a little rendezvous with the cuddas before I am totally out. And off we go charging out into the blue. And then there it was, right in front of my eyes, the swirling barracudas! The feeling was just so magical! I slowly inch closer and closer to the tornado wall, alternating between photos and videos. The adrenaline rush seeing the barracudas zooming pass me was just awesome. And then it just magically happens! Momentarily the wall seems to have opened up and there I was right inside the wall. Checking the video after the dive, that moment lasted just a couple of seconds but while I was engulfed, time seems to have come to a total standstill. The couple of seconds feels like an eternity. Sensing that my air is low, the barracudas made a quick exit and it's time to come up for my safety stop, ending the dive with just merely 10-20 bars remaining. I must say the barracudas have more than made up for all the earlier disappointments, making the trip a truly worthwhile experience for me.
Schooling blackfin barracudas (Sphyraena qenie) at Barracuda Point (12m) - Sipadan, Malaysia
A compilation of some of the underwater actions from the Sipadan dives is found in the attached video except for the last portion which was taken sadly on the last diving day but that's another story to be shared later.
