BootsnAll Travel Network



Mabul Beach Resort

It’s been a tough couple of days.  Well, tough is relative –it’s not like I have stressful tele-conferences all day or million dollar decisions to make.  Maybe it’s more appropriate to say it’s been an exhausting couple of days.  But I am SOOO HAPPY!!!!  Last year, I decided I was born to heli-ski.  But maybe I was born to live at a dive resort.

Yesterday the boat left Semporna at 8:00.

By 9:00 I was at Mabul island, had all my kit put together and was already boarding the next boat to start the dive day.

the sign greeting you at the dock as you arrive

First dive, I was a bit disappointed with visibility.  I was expecting more like

dive shop at the end of the pier

Malta, Belize, or Cozumel visibility.  But it’s not that kind of diving here.  Referred to as “muck diving” (named because you’re basically diving over a bunch of muck – sand, disposed tires, dirt, etc), it is not world class visibility but it is most definitely world class in terms of variety of marine life.  And to a certain extent, the more challenging conditions force you to get up close and pay attention – meaning you start to see teeny tiny nudibranchs, juvenile fish, sea slugs, pipe fish, seahorses, and the like.  Plus we’ve seen a multitude of more “traditional” sea life including various eels, green turtles, lots of fish, and so on.

Yesterday culminated in my first dive during a monsoon storm. We watched the wind and rain for a good 20 minutes before deciding to just go for it.  So we back-rolled off the boat, right at the jetty, with the plan to dive out towards sea and get picked up there.  Apparently the different dive masters were not all aligned with the plan, because after 2 of us were in, divemaster #2 told the boat captain to drive out.  Which he proceeded to try, getting washed back towards the jetty, blown around and basically almost running over us 3 times.  We kept swimming back and forth to get out of the way, almost washing into the jetty in the process.  I wanted to just descend, but one of our divers was still on the boat so we couldn’t do that either.  Chaos.  Finally sorted out, we had a good dive, making it three for the day.

For those of you also seeing my FB posts, the night was not extremely restful.  My room reservation got screwed up, and I ended up in a 10 bed dorm last night.  Which was good to meet people – and there are some really nice and interesting fellow travelers here – but not so good for sleeping.  One person came inside at about 3:00am, after apparently finishing a bottle of gin on the porch (at least there was an empty one there this morning).  Someone was snoring a bit.  My pillow was lumpy and the air a bit stale.  And then there was the mentally unstable rooster, who started crowing at 3:45am instead of waiting until sunrise.  Either mentally unstable or confused – did someone not accurately explain his role and responsibilities?!  He was of course joined 2 hours later by all his buddies, so by 5:45 the single crowing turned into a cacophony of sound.  And as you can see, I was awake for all of it.

No matter: breakfast at 7:30 as there’s diving to be done!  We boarded the boat, all geared up, at 9:00 and headed out to MantaPoint.  Which we were pretty excited about, until we learned 20 minutes later during the dive briefing that the dive site has a serious misnomer: no one has seen Mantas there for years.  Already cold, we rolled into the water and…got colder.  Really – I can’t remember much of anything about that dive besides how miserable I was.  Shivering and getting stomach cramps (not only altitude makes me have to pee, so does extreme cold), I kept checking my dive computer to see when would be an acceptable time for me to bail out.  And then it was a long cold 20 minute drive (umm,  it is a drive with a  boat?) back to Mabul island.  Ran for hot tea and dry clothes, tried to warm up, then back out to the jetty for dive #2.  Do I really want to do this?  I ventured into the dive shop and my favorite dive shop guy was there (what luck!).  I asked if he might have an extra shirt floating around for me.  He found an XL and I agreed better than nothing.  Then he cocked his head, thought, and said “wait a minute.”  He wandered into the back and returned with a wonderful, thick, cozy feeling long sleeve, hooded dive shirt. Size XS.  Eureka!  It apparently is someone’s private gear (luck y for me Malaysian guys are small), and the dive shop guy said it was his good friends’ and I could use it.  He saved me!!!  I was able to enjoy myself again and had a great second dive, out at Seaventures (an oil rig turned dive resort of sorts, with lots of scrap gear underneath attracting loads of sea life).  Giant grouper, crocodile fish, frogfish, mantis shrimp, sweetlips, puffer fish, scorpion fish, the list goes on and on.

Only to be topped by dive #3 after lunch – we dropped in at stingray city and caught an amazing current.  So we did a fast-moving drift dive, floating for miles past a wall that dropped into nothingness.  And on the way, saw over 20 green turtles (the biggest one almost the size of a smart car!), the biggest great moray I’ve ever seen, ribbon tail ray, blue spotted ray, pipefish, … again, an endless list of exciting marine life.  The drift we caught was so good, we actually did 3 dive sites in our 58 minutes – what fun!!

Of course by the end I was again freezing cold despite my extra shirt, and was absolutely beat. But good news: I got to move into the my new (private) room today!  Hot shower, hot tea, and dove into bed for a power nap before dinner.  I love my room!  It is a cute little beach hut, with bedroom, bathroom, porch out front and finally space to myself.  At dinner I drank hot water instead of cold and between the 29 degree air temp outside and hot food and drinks inside, I’m finally warm again.  Heading to bed early as tomorrow is my Sipadan day.  Sipadan is one of the worlds’ premier dive sites, and we are heading out at 6:15 for a 4-dive day.  I sure hope we get some sun tomorrow so I can make it through without hypothermia!  I know, seems strange to have 21-22 degree water and 29-30 degree air, and still freeze.  But such is the sport of diving.

The Scuba Junkie resort bar - a cozy place to hang out

Downside to the wet season (besides being so cold) is that everything is soggy and turning moldy.  You can hang things up to dry, but they don’t.  Days later they are still damp – not so great for someone allergic to mildew. But one of those things that is, quite simply, out of my control.  And one thing that makes going home start to sound good even though I’m loving my time here.  Seeing my loved ones again, and clean, fresh clothes.  Ahhhh.  Sweet dreams of home tonight!

And here, some images of the neighborhood…

the local village as seen from our pier

watching the "traffic" on the beach

A typical village home



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One response to “Mabul Beach Resort”

  1. Dorit says:

    Hi there! It’s a pleasure reading your Blog and joining you on your trip that Way!!! It really sounds like lots of fun and quite a few challenges! So Sorry you lost one of your contact lenses – thinking of that… Oh wow, how are you handling that!!??? Take care, don’t loose the 2nd one, keep on enjoying & looking forward for more to come 🙂
    Btw, thanks for setting up this Blog and not only doing posts on FB 😉