Mabul - Sipadan, 3 - 8 February 2011 (Day 5 & 6)

Day 5

Diving at Sipadan! This is the climax of the trip. People all over the world come here to dive. Here's me at the island's jetty. Entrance is controlled and based strictly on issued permits. Maximum of 120 divers per day

Anis tagging on our dive guide. Before our guide pulled the shark's tail fin hehehe

Map and profile of Sipadan Island. See the profile? It's like a vertical wall around Sipadan. All the way down to a depth of 600m!

Anis, stressing a point

But here trying to fish, sans the fishing rod

See that? The wall on the left and darkness into oblivion on the right. Scary

I just love these small fish

Army post on Sipadan Island

Some scenery shots of Sipadan Island. Taken during our surface interval

Another view

Our third dive. Straight away greeted by the view of this school of jackfish. Amazing!

Turtle. There's so many of them at Sipadan

Bumphead fish. Check out the size of the fish!

Me, trying to keep up with the turtle (and failed miserably)

That's a school of barracudas. They do have scary, sharp teeth!

The school of barracudas. Amazing!

A big jellyfish

Anis & me!

See that boatload of oyster? It just costs RM20. It's being sold by Bajau Laut people who lives in small boat around Mabul Island.

Then did sunset photoshooting. Practising my off camera flash skill

Another shot
Day 6

Last day here. No more dives as we are not allowed to dive 24 hours before flying. To avoid risk of decompression sickness. That's Yoko, my dive instructor. We call her Cikgu Yoko. She's a Malay speaking Japanese

Anis & Kenot!

We spend the day visiting this place. Kapalai Island resort, which is a high-end resort on the sandbanks of Kapalai. A really, really nice place.

See what I mean?

Another shot of the resort

Catch of the day. Big tunas!

We left later in the day on the last flight out of Tawau. I am determined to be back to Mabul - Sipadan soon!

Mabul - Sipadan, 3 - 8 February 2011 (Day 3 & 4)

Day 3

Spent practially the whole day diving. Completing my open water dive course. Did 3 dives today doing some skills which I myself not sure why I have to learn e.g. removing & putting on scuba gears on water surface, removing & attaching weights, and the scariest to me, removing and putting on the scuba gear under 18m of water! But I did completed all of the skills test

But managed to capture some nice sunset shots at the end of the day

More sunset shot

View at dusk. The transition time between night & day. Nice!

Another view

Day 4

I completed my open water course! Done the tests the night before and passed! So did my first dive together with Anis around Mabul

Underwater shots using our Canon S95 + underwater casing. It's so hard to take pics underwater! You keep on moving up & down in the water. That's a giant morey eel by the way

Black spotted morey eel. Nice huh?

The ever popular 'Nemo' fish

Our guide, being surprised by a huge turtle from behind

Can't remember what's this. Just underneath our homestay actually

Underwater plant. A very pretty sight down there

A school of fish

More underwater plant

Later in the day, spent some time walking around the island and explore more of the village. These are children of Mabul. They're all seems so happy even with such comparatively poor living condition. Makes us think for a while, how lucky we are eh? BTW, they are always happy to pose for you!

See what I mean? Hehehe

In the evening, the children are all out doing physical activities. Unlike pampered children in the big cities. Busy with playstation & Facebook. And grow soft in the process

Anis & children of Mabul. Check out their pose

Fish anyone? RM2 only

We found this nice jetty with the beautiful sunset light. So, portrait time!

Anis & me. The camera placed on the floor hehehe
On the way back. Anis & chicken wing are inseperable

See this? Black one is soy sauce, yellow one is cooking oil, etc.. etc.. They repack stuff in smaller package to be sold at 20 cent. To cater for demand. Very creative