48. Epilogue

So It’s pretty much 6 years since I returned from that long jaunt to south east asia. It has been strange to finish writing it up after all this time.
I thought it would be fitting to wrap up with a bit of a summary on what long term travelling was like for me and how it compares to my plans to go abroad for a few months this year.

When I was away, I was miles out of my comfort zone. It certainly taught me a lot:

• I vastly improved my ability to talk with people I’ve never met and learned to make friends with other travellers
• I learned how to be more self sufficient and make decisions
• On a day to day level I learned how to get outside and find things to do in a completely foreign place
• I became accustomed to being without the usual creature comforts
• I also was interested to learn that my most enjoyable experiences were those that were done with others.

During the trip I identified very much as a backpacker. In some part of my mind I thought that this made me somehow different to the other types of tourist. However I came to realise I wasn’t very different at all, since we’d all generally be foreigners; and would end up visiting the same places and doing similar things. The only difference was that I had no job, no plan and enough cash to get by for the next few weeks.
That being said it was a fantastic and unique way to travel. I was able to meet and journey with some awesome and like minded folk. I also had much more time on my hands, which meant I could see how people lived day to day over a longer period. I had more time to explore the sites and culture of a place. All of that meant I felt more inclined to try new things and I certainly gained some new perspectives.

Another freedom that backpacking affords is that ability to be spontaneous. For example my decision to try scuba diving was done somewhat last minute, just before heading to Ko Phagnan for the full moon party I changed my mind and booked a ferry to Ko Tao instead. I’m not sure what motivated the decision, possibly remembering how much I enjoyed snorkelling, possibly the idea was put in my head when an old flame said she thought I looked like a scuba instructor, or maybe just that it sounded like fun.
Whatever the reason when I got my advanced diving certification it was one of the proudest things I had achieved in a long time. It was quite a life changing whim.

Since then I’ve not gone on another long trip like that, but have always had vague plans to. I heard it’s a common thing for people that have returned from travelling to be determined to leave again, but don’t. Instead they get caught up with their job, or a mortgage, starting a family etc.
A few months ago whilst writing this I started to think that maybe I wasn’t quite ready to properly settle down like that yet. So I made a decision that the time was right to head off again and spend a few months on foreign shores.

This time it’s going to be a little different. Rather than “proper” travelling I’m going to Cyprus on a 5 month internship, working in a scuba diving centre. During that time I hope to train up to be a divemaster and maybe even an instructor, which could allow me to then work in that industry. I’m not certain at this point whether that will be something I continue with long term, but I’m excited about the opportunity to work with people, to teach and to do a heck of a lot of diving!

Whatever the outcome it has instilled in me that same feeling of excited apprehension that I felt those years ago before heading off to Asia. Just like then then a part of me is terrified and unsure of myself, but wondering if it could eventually yield something truly memorable.

47. Hanoi

And so I was headed to the last city of my solo trek: Hanoi.

My tactic to eat only cakes to avoid tummy problems going to Hanoi backfired massively. For the whole 10 hour trip I suffered stomach cramps, intense pain and trapped wind. I was once again crammed into another plastic bed seat that was too small for me. I attempted to angle myself in such a way that I could fart without anyone noticing - but that had mixed success. My fellow travellers shot some pretty unsavoury glances my way.
This whole thing was quite ironic since I hadn’t had any issues for the entire trip, and now, one time I did, it was as a result of actively trying to be careful.

However for better or for worse, we arrived in the city and disembarked in a cloud of faintly green air.

Hanoi was a big, clean, modern city which I wandered around a little. I spent the last of my small saving on some souvenirs, and felt sad about the impending end to my jaunt. The weather matched my mood somewhat. There was a perennial blanket of heavy cloud over the city, occasionally breaking out into patches of chilly rain.

I had just enough money to fund 2 excursions.

City tour

The first was a tour around the tomb of Ho Chi Minh. At this point I was bedraggled, skint and road weary. My tour-mates in contrast were affluent holidaying Americans. I felt very much like the odd one out. It rained the whole day. Two of the old folks I was with didn’t even want to get off the bus when we stopped.

Halong bay

Hanoi was a good staging point for tours of the famous Halong bay. I booked myself on a 2 day cruise as the last trip on my travels. In short: it was stunning.
Again, it was somewhat cloudy, but this made the little islands of the bay seem quite cool and mysterious.

It was 2 days & 1 night on the boat. Unlike the city tour my fellow cruisers were a younger bunch. For the night stop we moored up alongside another cruise boat. There was a buffet put on and we were provided with plenty of booze and a karaoke rig. I didn’t want a repeat of the Bohemian Rhapsody incident, so instead a few of us decided to head out onto the deck and chatted with some cruisers on the other boat.
They seemed friendly so we clambered over there to socialise. One of the “other boat people” was a girl who said her boyfriend had paid for her to go on a world trip for several months. I remember talking to her at length but other than the fact that she had just started a world tour I don’t really remember what we chatted about. I think I probably was moaning about having return to England because when I woke up the next day I found her in my bed, so can only assume she wanted to provide some comfort. I don't think anything happened though, we were both fully still clothed.

And  before I knew it I was in a taxi headed to the airport, my heart filled with a strange dread. However at the same time I was happy I'd made it to the end of my trip, and I was looking forward to seeing my friends and family again. 

46. Hue

So the night out in Hue commenced. Tam met me at my hotel and we headed out to meet up with his friends. It was a good laugh, we ate some good food and wandered around a few places to drink. The night wore on and eventually we ended up in a karaoke bar.

My host and his friends were seasoned karaoke goers, so were quick to get involved and bang out a few pop hits.

This is the best shot I could manage in my drunken state

When It was my turn, I had to spend a good few minutes leafing through the giant ring binder filled with reams and reams of songs from across the globe listed in tiny writing. It was a job to find a song that was actually in English - let alone a song I actually knew. I settled on Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen. It was a stupid choice in hindsight. It was nothing like what we’d been hearing so far. I forgot that it’s bloody long and a little unusual as pop songs go. None of them knew it either, so they sat in confusion whilst their new English friend badly attempted to sing an avant garde prog rock suite.
Eventually I finished, and normal service was resumed when Tam smashed out another Vietnamese pop belter. I decided to win back favour with my new friends by going to fetch drinks for everyone - but only managed to get lost and ended up wandering about for ages in the garage under the building.

On the final day I had a self guided walking tour of Hue. Historically the town used to be where the emperor lived, and still boasts a huge imperial city grounds and nearby citadel you can visit. They are absolutely incredible and well worth it.

The next day I’d be headed to my Final stop: Hanoi so I decided that I should get something “safe” to eat. At this point I really wanted to avoid any digestion based troubles since I’d be on a long bus trip to Hanoi, and not long after that: a mammoth flight back to England. As such on the way back from the citadel (after some extensive wandering and searching) I found a normal looking shop and picked up a box of prepackaged “twinky” style cakes which I figured wouldn’t trouble my innards.

45. Hoi An

It was a real struggle finding a coach for my onward trip. I was attempting to be frugal, however it was approaching Chinese new year so lots of people intended to travel and see family / friends so lots of tickets had sold out. It meant I had a fun afternoon wandering around numerous travel agents to find a bus ticket that was not extortionate.

Eventually I managed to buy one, and set off for the next stop: Hoi An. It was a beautiful town. Lots of waterfront areas, flowers everywhere and quaint streets with little coloured lanterns criss crossing above them.

From there I headed to Hue.

As we pulled into the town I did the same thing I did in the last two towns. Disembarked to find any hotel reps that might be there to haggle with. There were dutifully a couple of reps there, so listened to their offers. I accepted one and we headed off. On our way I got chatting to the driver, Tam. He asked me what my plans were for the new year celebrations. I confessed that I didn’t have any plans at all, really, being a foot loose and fancy free solo backpacker.
“But it’s Chinese new year!” I remember him exclaiming.
He didn’t seem able to accept my lack of plans - so invited me out that evening to celebrate with his friends. I was honoured and accepted.

44. Nah Trang Chopper Tour

The day before leaving Nah Trang I was approached by a man offering tours of the area by chopper bike. I decided quite quickly it sounded like fun, and said I was interested and asked how much it was. The guy had quite a rehearsed sales pitch though, so ploughed on with what he was saying, proceeding to produce a laminated booklet with lots of pictures of previous customers sat on his bike with big cheesy grins. I patiently scrutinised each picture, nodding and making interested noises as he leafed through.
We eventually agreed on a price and he hurried off to grab his bike.

He quickly returned on a large Harley, which was pretty impressive. He handed me a hard hat to wear and we set off. We rode as far as his house.
He hopped off and went inside, emerging with 2 bin liners full of clothes. He explained that this would be a charity donation to some villagers we were going to visit, and dumped them in front of me to hang on to.

We headed off to our first stop to deliver the clothes. It was about a twenty minute ride - and not the greatest start to the trip. I had to hold on to the bags but still keep myself on the bike, which I just about managed through tactical use of buttock muscles. When we got there we gave them the clothes bags. They eagerly rummaged through - picking out various garments. I suppose it was payment of sorts because we were then allowed to have a look around the village and the guide told me about their lifestyles and the various wicker creations they made there.

It was a great tour, and my guide was fantastic. He took me to various other interesting spots like scenic points in the countryside or workshops where they made incense, noodles and mats. I think my favourite place was a little local eatery in the middle of nowhere that my guide liked going to. I have to say it was easily the best bowl of Pho I’d ever had.

43. Last dive for a while

I left Ho Chi Minh City and caught a coach to Nah Trang. It was a coach unlike any I’d been on before because the aisle wasn’t lined with seats, but little plastic beds. I think these beds must have been designed for the Vietnamese physiology, because mine was a good few inches too short for me. It was a pretty fidgety, uncomfortable 10 hours.

When the coach eventually pulled in I unfolded myself from the bed and had a good stretch. As I got off the coach I was immediately pounced on by a gang of men who had various offers for rooms in hotels. Despite having scouted a place to stay beforehand I decided to haggle a little anyway and got a pretty great price from one of the guys. I hopped on his bike and we set off there instead of the one I'd picked out from the guidebook.

One of the first things I did in the town was to book a couple of dives in the area.
In the dive shop whilst I waited to go off on them a severely drunk Russian man stumbled in. He spoke in slurred English to the girl working there, demanding she phone the police. He claimed he had been swindled out of 20 dollars by the people working at the bar next door.
The unfortunate proprietor of the bar was actually outside the dive shop trying to reason with him through the door. For a few minutes the Russian man kept slurring his demands that the police be summoned, and I started to wonder if I could intervene. The girl in the shop stayed resolute, firmly telling him that they would do no such thing, and so he eventually lost interest and wandered off.

The dives that day were fun. The slight problem was that I had last been diving in Sipadan - and that is quite an experience to live up to. Indeed the Nah Trang waters felt relatively cold and fish free by comparison. That being said there were some stunning coral formations there, and I had a lot of fun - so was not disappointed at all.

42. A confession

If I’m honest after leaving Ho Chi Minh the remaining 3 or so weeks in Vietnam were not really the best. It’s nothing to do with the country, which was stunning and full of things to see and do, and I had a few amazing experiences.

I think one of the problems was that early on I had decided to stay in Vietnam for four weeks for no other reason that it was what my tourist Visa got me. I figured my severely depleted funds would just about suffice, but to be honest I should have cut it short. I didn’t consider doing that that though. I suppose I wanted to keep the dream alive for as long as possible. It was a mistake which contributed to a few problems:

• I was severely low on money, so was forced to spend (and therefore do) as little as possible, which was a problem given I had 4 weeks to fill.
• I found it much harder to meet people here. Largely due to my lack of money forcing me to not do as much - but also because I was not staying in more social “hostel” style accommodation.
• I was getting sad that it was the end of the road - and had some anxiety about returning to England and the “real world”. I think this was affecting my mood as well

As a result I spent a lot of time in Vietnam by myself feeling a poor, lonely and depressed that my travels were coming to an end.

That being said I was aware that this was still the opportunity of a lifetime - so made every effort to fight the negativity and make the most of the rest of my time in south east Asia.

41. Ho Chi Minh City

After landing in Ho Chi Minh City I headed to the area my trusty guide book suggested was good for low priced accommodation. Here, like in Phnom Penh, instead of roads there were rivers of scooters. I had to readjust to the knack of crossing the road, which was to step into the motorised maelstrom and keep walking trusting that nobody will hit you.

Once I found somewhere to stay I rang Mike, the guy who I’d saved the life of in Cambodia*. He was working in the city and had extended an invite to visit him in the new year.
We chatted for a while during which he told me a fitness boot camp was happening that night and invited me along. I thought: why not.

I hadn’t really done any exercise since Cambodia, so that night was a strange combination of being happy to catch up with Mike and almost dying of exhaustion.

The next day, rather sore, I decided to check out some cultural sights in the city. It didn’t take long to track down an enterprising bike owner with a custom tour offer.
I hopped on and we charged off into the blizzard of scooters, but almost as we’s set off we had to slow to pass a crowd in the road. There had been an accident. A scooter was on it’s side and people were gathered around a prone individual being given CPR. I couldn’t help but give my diver a pat on the back and urge him to be careful.

On the last night I met up with Mike again and a friend of his. It was a fun evening. We visited a few bars, ate some truly exceptional street food and watched a random fist fight that erupted between some Russians.

* Carried some distance from a sunbed to his guesthouse whilst unconscious

40. To Vietnam

The following day Cassie and I said our goodbyes. She was the last of my “long term” travelling companions. Travelling with her had been good fun, and it felt very sad to part ways.

The route to Vietnam began with a brief visit to Kuala Lumpur. It was a clean and modern city, but if I’m honest a little dull. I had one night in chinatown. There was just enough time to walk to the impressive Petronas towers and then the grand mosque, before heading back to the airport to catch my flight to Ho Chi Minh City.

I had a strange feeling of apprehension as I embarked on the last leg of my journey. It was a similar feeling to the one I had when I’d first got on the plane at Heathrow. I think the reason was that I was once again destined for a completely new place by myself. I’d not actually done that since leaving Ko Phangan in Thailand some months before. Even then it was only the next day that I bumped into Pat.

Really I’d been very lucky to have the company of some awesome and like minded traveller friends for all but a couple of weeks of the trip so far.

Still, whilst I was feeling some apprehension - I can’t deny that I was still excited to visit Vietnam

39. Monkeying Around

We’d seen an awful lot of wild proboscis monkeys thus far in Borneo - as they were almost a daily fixture at nature lodge cruises. But we’d not had enough of them, so took a short bus ride to a sanctuary dedicated to their protection: the sandakan proboscis monkey sanctuary.
Once there we were lead up some walkways to a tree lined clearing. That’s where we found them - relaxing in the trees; on logs and so on; even on the walkway as we passed.
We wandered around for a while, taking pics and saying “wow” a lot.

After a while we came across the alpha male of the group (we could tell he was the alpha as he had the biggest nose of all). He was sat on a handrail of our walkway a short distance ahead.
I got my phone out for a quick snap. As I did that he turned to look at me. Then he gave an almighty whoop, jumped down from the handrail and came thundering at me! I had a “rabbit in the headlights” moment and just stood there, wondering what was going to happen.

Just about got a pic of the alpha before he charged

Luckily must have just been interested in seeing off a rival male or something because he just charged straight past.

That evening we decided to have a farewell feast of pizza and beer, since Cassie and I would be parting ways. She was destined for the Kingdom of Brunei and I was headed to Vietnam.
Earlier in the day we had coincidentally bumped into a Belgian chap we’d met diving in Sipadan. He was also staying in our hotel so we invited him along to our shindig.

It was a good evening, marred slightly by this guy saying a lot of blatantly racist comments in an attempt to be funny. Turned out we’d forgotten how annoying he was so I decided to try and get so drunk I didn’t notice.
We eventually stumbled to bed.

Shortly after nodding off I was rudely awoken by a loud banging on our door. I groggily put something on and went to answer. I was confronted with our Belgian friend, now appearing to be both amused and irate. Apparently we’d wandered off from the bar and not bothered to pay our tab, leaving him to pay all of it! I apologised and gave him some money, feeling silly.

He left, muttering “Typical sneaky englishman”

38. Bird Cave

We left the reserve and continued up the coast. It would be a few nights till my flight to Vietnam so had planned one more stop in Borneo at a town called Sandakan.
On the way there we stopped at a huge cave where they harvest nests to make bird’s nest soup: A delicacy in many parts of east asia.

The van dropped me and Cassie off. It appeared that we were the only visitors there so got a guide to ourselves. He walked us to some raised walkways and into the cave. Once inside we could see workers clambering up enormous rickety ladders to the ceiling where the birds nests were. It was gloomy, lit only by a gap in the roof at the far end.

The smell was pretty dreadful - most likely caused by the huge piles of bird poo that lay beneath us. The piles seemed to have lives of their own. The brown black surfaces constantly moved and shifted, and as our eyes adjusted we realised it was because the piles were full of cockroaches. There were millions of them everywhere. On the ground, the walls, the walkway and the handrails. At one point I idly flicked one from a handrail into a poo pile. Cassie noticed and was horrified. She gave me a bit of a telling off. I tried to make the case that at least I wasn’t regularly making countless birds homeless, but somehow what I did was far worse.

We made it to Sandakan and booked a room in a mid range hotel. The town was quite pleasant, if a little run down looking. We had three days here. On the first day I decided to follow instructions for a walking tour of Sandakan that I found in a tourist leaflet.
I have to say the tour was a little underwhelming. It took me to a temple which was closed, a dirty clocktower in the middle of a roundabout and a chinese graveyard which, whilst expansive and probably more interesting than some of the other tour items, still was not anything to write home about.

The next day, after writing my mum a postcard about the Chinese graveyard, Cassie and I researched what was nearby and decided to book a ticket to an interesting looking proboscis monkey sanctuary that afternoon.

37. Kinabatangan Nature Lodge

It was getting late in the afternoon by the time we arrived at the Kinabatangan nature lodge. It was pretty a rustic place. It comprised of a series of wood cabins dotted amongst the jungle. Slippery wooden walkways sat over the leafy and muddy forest floor connecting the cabins.
We didn’t have much time to dump our stuff before needing to gather at the reception building for an evening river cruise.

There were around six of us. We headed down a gangplank to a small wooden motorboat. After clambering aboard, the boat chugged into life and set off down the river. It was a stunning trip. I was amazed at the range of animals we saw dotted around the jungles of Malaysian Borneo: orangutans; proboscis monkeys and hornbill birds to name a few.

Apparently the river cruises would be done every day - one at dawn and another at dusk. I was not at all sad to hear that.

It was a typical “ecotourist experience”. A term that I hadn’t heard of before now, and certainly had never actually done. On the other hand some of the fellow guests were quite the eco warriors, coming prepared with hiking boots, explorer hats and those sort of lightweight trousers that you can turn into shorts with a zip at the knee. I felt a very much like the odd one out essentially having lived the last 2 months as a beach bum.

The following night we took a nighttime jungle trek. We’d been told that there had been a lot of rain recently so the trails were waterlogged. We decided to rent wellingtons, since I guessed my trusty flip flops wouldn’t quite cut it. Unfortunately it seemed that every single pair I tried leaked pretty badly, so I just tried to pick the pair that seemed to let in the least amount of water.
We set off and my boots instantly filled with water, but I still enjoyed squelching my way round the jungle, and seeing the nocturnal wildlife our guide pointed out.

Later we got back to our room and I took a shower. I was shocked to find that an opportunistic leech had attached itself to my chest. Got knows how it managed to get in there.
I couldn’t remember the thing you are meant to do with them so I grabbed it’s body and sort of flicked it’s gob to make it let go. It seemed to work. I told Cassie, who was so horrified she immediately jumped back into the shower to double check that she was not carrying any unwanted passengers too.

On the last day one of the cruises took us to see a wild herd of elephants. As we approached we could just about see them moving through the trees, chomping on leaves and trumpeting quietly. It was quite stunning to see them in the wild.

The elephants were obviously a big draw because as we approached we saw a little gang of boats full of tourists straining to get snaps where the trees were less dense. One lady on a boat in front of us was so eager, in fact, that she got out of her seat and clambered up the small muddy river bank to get a better view. It was a short lived effort, because just before the top she slipped, and with a squawk toppled down the bank landing in the shallows with a splash. She was fished out, unharmed and embarrassed. I did wonder how many leeches she’d probably have to evict from her person later.

36. Trip to Kinabatangan

The time had come to move on from one of the world’s finest diving spots. It was bittersweet. Cassie Crosby was leaving at the same time we were. We had got to know each other quite well over our stay on Mabul Island. Around mid-afternoon we all caught the boat back to the mainland together. We had one evening in Semporna before heading on.

During dinner we discussed our plans. Cassie, who was on holiday for 2 weeks, would be stopping at a few places to do jungle treks and river cruises and that sort of thing in Sabah on her route up the coast and ending in the Kingdom of Brunei. It sounded fun, and she invited us to join along. It fit in quite nicely to my vague plans, which were to get to Vietnam at some point in a week or 2 as my last “stop” with what money I had left. Pat wasn’t interested though. He’d overspent a lot and wanted to go straight to Laos.

So Cassie and I agreed to be travel companions for a week. She sent off an email to the first place: a jungle lodge, so they could add me on to her booking.
The next morning dawned and we headed to the bus station. Cassie noticed there was no word from the lodge - so send a follow up email, just to be sure.

We bundled onto a coach heading north on a jungle lined highway. After an hour or so the bus got to the stop Pat needed for his connection. We shook hands as he hurried past but I felt the farewell lacked some of the ceremony it deserved. Cassie had some signal so rechecked her emails, but still there was no word from the lodge. With that she tried to call them, but it just rang out.
At this point I felt it was a very real possibility that I would be homeless in the jungle, and have to survive on largely forgotten Grylls and Mears knowledge.

After another couple of email free hours we disembarked at the stop where Cassie’s transfer was meant to pick us up. It was a strange, remote sort of place: A disconnected few buildings lining the jungle highway. We waited and enjoyed a reasonably priced buffet of quite tasty local cuisine.

After a bit of a wait a small minivan pulled up, and we hopped on board. They did not seem confused that I was there, so with my mind a little at ease they set off into the murky green jungle depths.

35. Sipadan Finale

I had a healthy buzz from the day’s dives, which called for celebration. That evening a lot of guests were drinking out on the decking / common area, including the divemaster who had joined us that day: Marie. Before long we grew a little footloose and decided to go wandering around the little island. We went to one bar that was a part of a different fancy “east Side” resort. It felt a little sedate and boring to us rough and ready west siders, so we soon left and headed to one of the nearby beaches. There we found some locals that Marie knew. We sat with them on the beach. One passed around a milk jug filled with liquor that apparently had been distilled by his kindly old grandma.

The night drew on and thanks to granny's special distillations I had gotten quite steaming - so decided to go back. Pat said he would stay on for a bit. So I took the key and stumbled off back to the homestay. The only problem was that my guidance system was on drunk mode, so I got very lost. I remember getting to one side of the island and finding myself in various resort beaches and getting shooed away by security men. After much walking, tracking, backtracking and getting thoroughly confused I came across the familiar slum that hid my home. I got in and Pat still wasn’t there. It was around 4 in the morning so I passed out, leaving the door open so Pat could get in.

I awoke with a throbbing head and a horrible taste in my dry mouth. Pat had gone already. It wasn’t long before more diving. I tentatively opened the door and crept out to find pretty much everyone from the previous night all up. Turns out that Pat got back before me and banged on our door for ages to no avail - since I had the key but wasn't there. He did succeed in waking up half the homestay. Johnny Keely from next door apparently let him crash in his room. I felt terrible.

We did 4 dives around Mabul that day: panglimara reef; Lobster wall and kapalai or “house reef” which was a purpose built area made up of the skeletons of houses that were slowly filling out with coral.
That night we did a night dive at paradise 2 which was a cool. One thing I like to do on night dives (since it’s pitch black) is look entirely away from the coral, rocks and all torch light for a while. All you feel is weightless. All you see is black. The only sensory input you get is the breath in your regulator. Somewhere deep down there is an involuntary twang somewhere between dread and vertigo, forcing me to look back. Both to reassure myself the world still existed, and also that I’ve not lost control of my buoyancy and am shooting up to the surface. Or worse: down into oblivion.

I wasn’t we got back and it was fine. Although not all that fine since it was the last day :(

34. Sipadan - Parte the Thirde

Sorry it's been so long, team... I got carried away building a video game. Well the story has few remaining chapters - and I would be sad to not finish them. So despite this adventure starting nearly five years ago to the day, I'll now try to wrap up this write up of my travelling journal.

For the record this post covers the best day of diving I have ever done.

The following day dawned. I was up so early that I had eaten and was waiting on the jetty pretty much before anyone else had even got up! Eventually the lucky divers who would be on the boat for Sipadan turned up and we set off.

It probably comes as no surprise that I had an awesome time.

The first site was south point. We went down to 30m. The coral was spectacular and saw a huge quantity of white tip sharks & turtles. I hadn’t seen a shark before so to glide alongside these graceful hunters was a fantastic experience and was happy to check it off my bucket list.

The second spot was barracuda point. Almost immediately after beginning my descent along the guide rope I was engulfed in a wall of great trevali, we emerged beneath the shoal and looked back up but couldn’t see the surface above us. The coral was beautiful and abounded with life. There were jacks, more turtles; and black & white tip sharks.

The last of the dives was known as “drop off”. We coasted along a sheer face of coral that sank vertically into the deep, it went way beneath our 30m limit. There was less wildlife here, but I still saw an octupus and some fish were to be seen. We also ventured into a cave on this dive. We didn’t go far in but it was a taster for what cave diving was like. Embarrassingly at one point I did lose control of my balance a little bit and my tank hit the cave roof before I could correct. Thankfully nobody appeared to notice.

After every dive after surfacing we all had big stupid grins on our faces. Even now I struggle to articulate how good it was. My expectations of the diving, and the stay on the island in general had been more than surpassed.

32. Mabul Island (Sipadan, parte the firste)

Before long we could make out the little island of Mabul approaching. It appeared to be a mess of wooden huts, piers and jetties tumbling out over the ocean. Through the man-made facade the occasional beach could be seen, and trees further in. Our boat approached a wall of rickety looking wooden huts. We docked onto a jetty and got off, excited to see what was in store for us.


The island itself was very small, you could walk end to end in about 20 minutes.
Given the island’s diminutive surface area, the difference in qualities of resort was obvious. The eastern side was mainly fancy, idyllic resorts. Our rickety home stay was on the the western side, in some kind of tropical shanty town. I quickly came to love it all the same. The whole thing was built on stilts over the water. It was laid out in a square U shape. The closed end was made up of  some hut-like staff areas, which lead to a foot wide wobbly gangplank leading onto dry land. The open edge looked out to a clear ocean dotted with some permanently moored long boats. We came to learn that these boats were inhabited by “sea gypsies”. Extending out from one arm was a small jetty and staging area accessed by a high, arching wooden bridge which creaked and wobbled when the wind picked up.

The decked central part of the homestay was where we ate and drank. The outer side consisted of the rooms. Once again Pat and I shared a twin room  in an effort to economise. Our room was cheaply decorated, and featured a nice hole in the floor near one of the corners that looked straight down to the ocean. We put a chair in front of it to avoid accidentally falling in.

31. Semporna

It was the day of our Sipadan booking. According to our docs we were meant to be off for a couple of dives around Mabul that very afternoon.

I had been careful to set an alarm for the crack of dawn to be there when the dive shop opened. However the boat we had supposed to be on departed earlier than the dive shop opened.  This  fact gripped me with an odd cocktail of urgency, fear and resignation.

We grabbed our things and dashed out to wait by the dive shop. The place was hidden behind a featureless metal gate. No windows or signs to betray that this was the place we needed, barely even a street sign but the lack of other doors indicated that it had to be this place.
It was very early, and of course: still closed. Pat and I nervously waited as the sun rose in the sky, and morning traffic began to trundle past. At some time after 8 a sleepy looking woman opened the door and we hurried in.

It was a cluttered place reminiscent of someone’s living room. We explained our situation to the woman, she asked us to wait in some faded yellow armchairs as she made a couple of calls. Her demeanour and assurances that everything would be fine assuaged my anxiety somewhat. 
Sure enough, after a few moments she told us that she had put us the last boat to the island that day, and our booking was still fine. A short while passed and someone turned up to take us to the dock.

We lobbed our packs in the back of a huge motorboat. It seemed that we were the only passengers on it. Everyone else must have made their transfers properly. We soon left Semporna and the harbour behind us and headed out into open water. I felt eager to explore the island we were headed to, to meet some new people and most importantly: Hyped that I would soon be diving in one of the most beautiful dive spots in the world!

30. Circumnavigating Borneo

I had assumed, seeing as Borneo looked quite small when viewed on a map, that the coach trip to Semporna (the staging town for Sipadan) wouldn’t take too long. It seemed that I underestimated the travel time for literally every journey I had been on that trip. It ended up taking over 10 hours!

After an early start, taxi ride, and short wait at the bus depot we got underway. The road left KK, where it quickly climbed and twisted its way up into the hills. We were driven past glorious tropical valleys, cliffs, and eventually mount Kinablu itself came into view. We went so high that we were almost driving past the summit! I suppose it was a consolation prize since we weren’t able to climb it properly. It was very spectacular, and I vainly attempted to capture the magnificence on my phone’s camera before the road left the mountains and wound its way down to flatter terrain.

I was sat next to a young family, 3 small children and their mother. The road was very winding, and this soon got the better of them and they promptly began filling numerous carrier bags with vomit. I made use of loud music and staring steadfastly at the awesome views to block out their distress.

Around half way there, (a point I wrongly assumed was just outside Semporna) our young driver stopped and let some of his friends on. As we pulled away they put on a Malaysian music channel, for everyone to enjoy. The all then gathered around the driver seat laughing, drinking and chatting ready for a night out.

Spurred on by his chums, the driver drove a lot faster. I had been watching with some detached interest the malay-pop on the coach tv, but the drivers speed caused renewed havoc with the tummies of my travel-sick neighbours, so was again forced to retreat behind my own noise excluding headphones.
I was actually glad the driver was in a hurry. We were meant to be heading out to Sipadan on a boat at 7.45 the following morning, and so I wanted to go to the dive shop in Semporna and get everything sorted out that day. However the afternoon was rapidly drawing on and it was making me pretty anxious. Especially since I thought we were nearly there a few hours ago.
It was about 6pm by the time we finally rolled into town. I really wanted to get going, and also the vomit bags from the young family next to me had really started to stink - so Pat and I pretty much sprinted off the coach.

It seemed to take an eternity to find where the dive shop was. Once we found it we discovered, perhaps unsurprisingly, that it was closed. I was pretty gutted. At this point part of me was resigned to having lost the booking. In spite of that we resolved to return at the crack of dawn tomorrow and sort something out.

We made our way to a nearby hostel and attempted to get some sleep.

29. Kota Kinabalu

In the couple of days Pat & I spent in the city we explored it quite thoroughly. We visited a number of markets and covered a lot of ground.

It is a very nice place to be. I found it to be surprisingly modern and westernised, especially when compared to the most recent big city I had been in: Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital city. I had half expected that since this was Borneo that we would be landing in the middle of a jungle and need to stay in bamboo huts and barter with the tribal locals for bowls of rice or something. Not so. The roads and pavements were clean and well maintained; the traffic was ordered and sedate; the buildings were all new; and the meals we had were typically in modern, relatively fancy places.

We must have visited in "market season"

For a little while my inner geek had been a little restless, because I knew that “the hobbit” had just come out. KK looked equipped to meet my western needs, so I decided to try and watch it here. With a little research I managed to find a cinema that was showing it: inside a large mall not too far from Lucy’s.
We tracked this mall down and went in. The place twisted and wound around like a maze. I couldn’t quite make sense of where anything was, and there were no signs so this made finding the cinema quite difficult. After some time, and worrying that we would miss the start of the film we got to the floor where we thought the screens were. Unfortunately we still couldn’t see where to go. We ended up hurrying through lengthy corridors lined with crowded karaoke booths, eventually finding the entrance to the cinema just in the nick of time.

I enjoyed the film, despite the dismal picture quality (it almost looked like a stolen camera copy) and everyone in the audience chatting and messing about with their phones.
I remember thinking to myself during the film: What a jump the things I was doing in KK were from the rustic isolation of Otres beach. It oddly made me feel a little ashamed that I wasn’t doing travelling properly, since I was doing something that I would just do normally back home.

I needn’t have worried too much, we were soon to be launched into a something entirely different and unexpected.

28. Lucy's Homestay

Getting to Kota Kinabalu (or “KK” as the cool kids knew it) involved going through 2 border controls, which confused me immensely. Initially you arrive in Malaysia and they check your passport. Fine, that made sense. Then there was an internal flight to get to Sabah in Borneo which is where we wanted to go to, but still part of the same country. But once we were there everyone went through border security again! Well, at least I got another passport stamp.

We were staying in a hostel called lucy’s homestay. It was a little late when we arrived there, and had to navigate the intimidating locked metal gate and doors to get in. The eponymous Lucy herself dealt with everything in the hostel, including our late check in. She immediately made me feel at home, having quite a motherly manner. I almost felt I was staying round her house. I supposed in some ways we were.

The following morning after getting up Lucy, ensured that we knew where everything was for breakfast with typical brusque efficiency. I found a welcome comfort from England: marmite! I hadn’t had marmite in months so fondly guzzled some of that on toast and good old cuppa for breakfast. After the weeks of rustic beach life this almost felt like home.

We only had a couple of days in KK. Sabah boasts some incredible scenery and wildlife, one “must see” attraction is mount Kinabalu. We asked Lucy about some options of climbing it. However it looked like it would be a full day excursion and would not be a trivial activity. It was also fairly expensive. So we reluctantly decided against that. Instead bought 2 coach tickets to Semporna (where we needed to get to for Sipadan) from Lucy, and take it relatively easy for a couple of days.