First and foremost, let me tell you that if you want to go for a GOOD island holiday, to appreciate the wonders of marine life the way mother nature intended, you have to travel, and travel far! The ones which are in easy access by the general population, well, believe me when I tell you that the marine life has been destroyed. Regardless of what that travel brochure says and what websites promise, islands within easy access of the human race are basically destroyed. Why? Well, mankind is destructive. This is a fact. Look around you, everywhere that mankind goes / touches, nature gets destroyed, some areas to a greater degree than others. It's true... I know I do it, even though I tend to preach a lot about saving our environment. We may not mean to, I certainly don't but we do. Look at Langkawi, Tioman, Redang etc, all island "resorts" in Malaysia. They WERE fabulous islands to go to for a snorkeling / diving holiday but now, most of the marine life is destroyed. Even Perhentian. To those who have never EVER experienced the wonders marine life first hand, these islands will be miraculous to you. For people like me, ones who have been going to the sea for years, it is SAD to watch the destruction of marine life, particularly at the hands of those who are selfish i.e. "ooohhh that coral / shell would look SO GOOD on my coffee table". I'm digressing here...

So, prior to us leaving for the trip, I did some research into our destination. Turns out that this island is lesser known than the all famous Sipadan island (one of the top dive spots in the WORLD) but is a better dive spot. Serious divers in the know would know about this island. As I am yet to be a serious diver, I had never ever heard of this island before! So what is this island I am talking about... I am reluctant to say but as a person I know works for the company that promotes is, I agreed to name it. Why do I not want to name this island? Well, I am SELFISH. I don't want too many people going there are stuffing up the environment. If, after you, my dear reader do decide to make a trip there, please, please be mindful of what you are doing. So, the name of this island is SANGALAKI, located off the East coast of the Indonesian portion of Borneo... and believe me when I say that the marine life here is SPECTACULAR. More on that later.

Now, getting to Sangalaki is an adventure in itself. The BF and I had to fly from Kuala Lumpur (KL) to Kota Kinabalu (KK). There we spent the night. We took an "Air Asia" flight from KL to KK... the cheapest way to go. Here are a few tips when flying Air Asia:

try to book your ticket AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Why? Well, Air Asia ticketing works much like the stock market. If there is demand for the flight, the prices go up. The prices could go up by 10s of ringgit in the space of 5 minutes. So as soon as you've decided on your dates, BOOK YOUR TICKET.

Once you've booked your ticket, you can't reschedule the flight without paying a penalty. Once booked, it is booked and confirmed. The airline works on a ticketless system btw, so don't lose your booking number!

Air Asia is a no frills airline. This means you have to pay for EVERYTHING on board e.g. drinks and food. There are no blankets available, no pillows, nothing. They sell souvenir items on board if you so desire to buy a baseball cap / t-shirt with the Air Asia logo on it.

The cabin crew SEEM more attentive to passenger safety than the Malaysian Airlines (MAS) one which is kind of worrying... I mean, just how many times does the cabin crew need to check our seat belts or do a head count? They are VERY thorough, so much so I started thinking that there could something wrong with the plane.

As with any other public scenario where Malaysians are involved, toilets aren't very clean. It could be me but the toilets on Air Asia planes aren't as well maintained as those on MAS ones... also, they seem smaller. As my pilot BF (yes, he ALSO has a pilot license... can you say over achiever?? ) pointed out, Air Asia planes are smaller, hence the lavatories HAVE to be smaller.

Air Asia works on a free seating system, so there is a mad rush for seats when it comes to boarding time.

There is no "classes" on these flights e.g. no first class, no business class etc. Everyone is a passenger and is treated the same.

Passengers are allowed a max of 15 kilos of check in luggage... many of the divers who were going on the same flight as us had to pay excess fees... FYI, it is RM5 per kilo for flights within the peninsula and RM8 per kilo for flights headed out of the peninsula.

When checking in, passengers are treated like cattle. For some stupid reason, there will only EVER be two counters open for a particular flight and my lord, they work slow. It could be that the mentality of Air Asia customers are less... ermmm how should I put this, refined than MAS ones. We are afterall talking about the CHEAPEST airplane tickets in Malaysia. So if you are flying Air Asia, take note... be there EARLY! Check in takes AGES. Lines are long and for some strange reason also, Air Asia customers tend to have a LOT more luggage so arguments and bargaining over the excess charges tend to happen. In all fairness, it took AGES in the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. However, when we were in Kota Kinabalu, Air Asia had their own terminal (Terminal 2) and service there was remarkable!! No queues, no waiting. However, the flight we were on wasn't full, approximately 50% capacity.

All in all, flying Air Asia isn't bad... I mean, like everything, you pay for what you get. If you want luxury and all the quirks that one expects in say MAS flights, don't fly Air Asia. It is afterall, a no frills airline. Tickets are cheap, planes are leave on schedule (most of the time or so I'm told) and the pilots know where the airports are .

So, we spent the night in Kota Kinabalu. Lovely, LOVELY place. I really like it there. From KK, we took the first MAS flight out to Tarakan, this little, little Indonesian town. The flight took about an hour. Clearing customs took around the same time. A quaint little airport... the immigration, bag retrieval and customs area is about 1.5 times the size of my bedroom and believe me when I say that the customs officers were most gung-ho. EVERY bag had to be opened and searched and I do mean EVERY bag.

After FINALLY clearing immigration and customs, we were met by outside the airport by a travel agent and transferred to the main jetty which was a hive of activity.

People, people, people, as far as the eye can see... they were EVERYWHERE and then we find out why... despite what we though and what the map above implies, Tarakan is an island! There were so many people on the jetty as that's their main mode of transport to get off the island.
A narrow and I do mean NARROW two way street. Cars and vans are allowed on the jetty... side mirrors, no more than 1 cm apart when cars pass each other. I wonder how many cars have fallen off?	A boat similar to the one we took to the island... a fairly fast boat. If you look carefully, you'll see a hose leading from the truck above to the boat... fuel for the boat. I notice an attendant actually sucking on the hose to get the fuel going!

After a bout of confusion, we managed to find our designated boat and by some miracle, the boat got loaded with our tonnes of luggage (there were about 18 people in our group, complete with diving gear and personal effects) with extraordinary efficiency. The "porters" slight as they were, were remarkably strong individuals. Now, picture this, bags weighing approximately 15 to 20 kilos each? We, the tourists had problems lifting one bag at a time... these porters were hauling THREE bags at a time. You could definitely porters from the rest of us lowly individuals... we were the ones with our mouths gaping open.

From Tarakan, it is a three hour high speed boat ride to Sangalaki. I personally found the ride VERY enjoyable as I spent a good 2.5 hours on the roof of the boat... that's my idea of heaven... wind in hair, sea spray on face, sun on my skin... ahhhh... I am NOT the kind of person who can sit quietly IN a boat for hours on end... I HAVE to be outside. When I told the BF that I wanted to be on the roof, his answer "NO". But, hehehe, we were sitting directly under the porthole which we opened and 5 seconds later, I was on the roof . It was a LOVELY, LOVELY ride... fast and fairly smooth.

The ONE thing that really stood out during the trip was the number of logs drifting in the water. Unfortunately, logging is BIG business in Indonesia.

Unfortunately, the zoom lense on my camera is a little lacking. That brownish bits you see in the picture, no it isn't the embankment, those are LOGS, cut down trees waiting to be transported. And that was only ONE site, there were tens of others enroute to Sangalaki. Judging from the number of logs there was in the water, loggers don't do a very good job in securing the wood down. It was like "driving through a mini obstacle course". Indonesian boatman do NOT pilot their boats at night as it is basically too dangerous with all the pieces of wood in the water and some were LARGE. Regardless, it was all very exciting, a little sad to see but very exciting.

So after nearly 36 hours of traveling, we finally arrive at Sangalaki and the Sangalaki Dive Lodge.

Sangalaki Dive Lodge

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