Sabah - Off The Beaten Track (-Get Wrecked in Sabah-)
So you want to go to Sabah, you know, scuba-dive virgin reefs, explore virgin shipwrecks, and basically discover anything else virgin, and wind it all up with a bit of souvenir shopping - something that’ll register big on the brag-o-meter back home.
Trouble is, you’ve only got a week off. What to do?
Easy. Set your sights on Kota Kinabalu, the gateway to Sabah's delights. Being the main jumping-off point for thrilling encounters with The Big Blue, KK certainly has a lot going for it - and for you.
Lying closer to Manila than KL, this formerly sleepy old cowboy town has in recent years been transformed into a, well, sleepy modern cowboy town. Still, it's become a vortex for visitors with adventure on their minds - particularly underwater ones. The Eco-Challenge was here. Survivor was here. Does that tell you something about the potential to have fun with Raw Nature?
With its beautiful, banana-yellow beaches (well, at the nearby marine park, at least) bathed in never-ending breezes, this quirky town is a great place to get oriented for the surrounding reef.
But last year was a bad year for Sabah - and for scuba-diving Malaysia's best sites. The dodgy security situation over there brought a lifetime's worth of the wrong kind of attention to a proud state. And Sabah's tourism industry was just shifting into high gear...
In a show of typical Sabahan resilience, the state has pulled itself up by the bootstraps. And now, with the security situation sorted, this not-so-remote corner of negaraku has come up with an impressive new range of scuba-diving attractions - Sabah's speciality. Chief among them is the hottest new dive resort in all of East Malaysia - Mantanani Dive Resort.
Virgin Reef
Sabah and Sipadan are synonymous to many scuba divers. But there ARE other places in Sabah where the diving is just as good and much closer to KK. An absolute gem of a place is a smattering of islands called Mantanani. To get there, it's a 2.5 hour van/boat trip. This cluster of three islands is home to an isolated Bajau fishing community, thousands of magnificent frigate birds that swirl in the cool of dusk, and a small, cosy dive resort which can cater to just 18 people.
Mantanani is a premier diving destination just waiting to be discovered. Why? Well, for one, some of the most pristine reefs in all of SE Asia can be found here, and only 10% of them have been explored so far!
Secondly, the University of Sarawak did a study of where the healthiest diversity of marine life can be found in East Malaysia, and the top three sites were Sipadan, Layang-Layang and - surprise! - Mantanani.
Thirdly, while Sipadan and Layang-Layang are tiny unremarkable scraps of land, Mantanani boasts caves and trails just waiting to be explored by foot or bike (there are no roads on these islands). The very cool Bajau fishing village is a 45 min. walk away through a rambling coconut plantation.
Finally, and perhaps most intriguingly, the finest World War Two shipwrecks in Malaysian waters lie within diving range. This will get your adrenaline going if nothing else will: It is thought that there are at least six huge wrecks in these waters - but only two have been dived so far! The ones the Dive Resort brings its divers to are only now being documented by wreck divers of the British Royal Navy. But anyone with a PADI Advanced Open Water certificate may dive there. In the coming months, recce dives by the Mantanani Resort dive masters will be conducted on two more wrecks, some are so untouched that they still have ammo clips in their machinegun turrets...
While the reefs are among the best in Asia, sharks are noticeably absent. The reason, Jillie - the charming and extremely knowledgeable dive operator at the resort - explains, is that until recently, all the Bajau fished for were the lucrative sharks' fins, an unfortunate delicacy among the Chinese.
The fins are dried and often command prices of up to RM650 per kilo. Apparently, there is no scientific evidence whatsoever to back up claims that the fins possess any beneficial medicinal qualities, though here in SE Asia, sharkfin soup is as much about prestige as anything.
That said, the reefs around here are simply PACKED with a kaleidoscope of marine life that will leave you with visual overload. And leave it to Jillie to make a casual dive holiday into an exciting aquatic adventure. The day starts with pre-breakfast, followed by the first of three daily dives. Come back for hot breakfast and have a nap attack.
Second dive is at 11AM, back for lunch, nap; third dive at 3PM and back for a snack attack. As the resort is TV-free, the lazy late afternoons are spent playing volleyball, paddling canoes among the half dozen resident green turtles, chatting to the ever-obliging Jillie about what amazing stuff you've just seen, or just sitting in front of your veranda staring out at the mesmerising vastness of the sea. Or napping.
Or you can trek across the flat part of the island for a cross-cultural experience like none other. The Bajau are a semi-nomadic seafaring people of Filipino origin, often referred to as sea gypsies. While they speak their own language, they do speak basic Malay and are open and curious about any visitor who wanders into their village; something that doesn't happen very often.
As you stroll back along the beach at sunset, look across the sea to your left. There, in the soft evening light rises the dark hulk of Mt. Kinabalu, seemingly out of the sea.
Though she is over 70km away, the mountain is your only connection to the rest of the world. This is the thing about Mantanani. It's as rock'n'roll or as quiet as you want it to be. Dive huge battleship wrecks, dodging 2-meter Garoupas - or doing less than nothing. It's as if the waves slowly wash away your memory of anything outside of this cluster of islands which crowns an aquatic Garden of Eden.
Currently, Air Asia offers the best flight-packages to Sabah (out of Subang!) at just RM650.
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Air Asia
Tel: 03-202-7999
Fax: 03-202-8137/7997
Mantanani Dive Resort
(Borneo Sea Adventures Sdn. Bhd.)
Tel: 60-88-230000
Fax: 60-88-221106
Email: bornsea@pop1.jaring.my
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