Diving at Sipadan

I finally got my act together and went diving. I have mixed feelings about it now that it is done. What I mean by this is that I happened to dive at one the best sites in the world for my first real open water dive.

I did three dives during the day at Sipadan and cannot begin to describle how incredible it was. There was so much vibrant coral and multitudes of brilliantly coloured fish that it was almost overwhelming. I could never decide which way to look. There were so many huge sea turtles I lost track of how many I saw. A couple of sharks made appearances, the largest being about 6 feet long. There was a huge clam that had to have been over 4 feet long and almost as high and as wide. I feel if I had really tried I could have climbed inside it, though what the point of that would be I could not say. I saw a school of about 100 giant parrotfish, which was very impressive, a couple of barracuda, a lion fish and so many other things that I have no idea what are called. There was seriously way too much to do any justice describing it. It was an experience unlike any I have had.

So now it seems like any diving will be downhill unless I go to one of the other handful of places in the world that can compare. I think I understand how heroine addicts feel, always chasing that first high knowing they will never again get to experience it. Oh well, at least I won't wind up living in an alley selling myself for sex to get the next hit... at least not because of diving anyway.

I wish I had pictures but unfortunately my camera doesn't know how to swim. Here is a wikipedia link that give a small amount of info on the island. Google it and lots will come up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sipadan

Ye olde Orang-Utan Factory

After leaving the Philippines, we flew to Malaysian Borneo, a very rainy place around this time. I guess I should not complain as it was pretty much sunny skies the whole time in the Philippines.


The first thing of interest we saw was the Orang-utan sanctuary and rehabilitation center in Sepilok. The center takes in displaced Orang-utans and after getting them healthy again gradually coaxs them into the adjacent protected rainforest. There are two daily feedings that draw in the tourists. We missed the one at 9 am and had to wair around all day in the rain for the 3 pm feeding. Luckily there was a botanical garden/arboretum nearby which offered a nice distraction.

The wait turned out to be worth it as the Orang-utans were in top form for the 3 pm feeding. Apparently in the morning a few had come, eaten some bananas and then left. But the afternoon Orang-Utans were much more interesting. A bunch of them them had disturbingly human-like sex for a bit, while others sat around eating. Then a big troupe of annoying monkeys came and there was a small confrontation which the monkeys seemed to win by sheer numbers, though the orang-utans were pretty well done eating and sexing each other up at that point. I feel that if it really came down to it the Orang-Utans would have brought the pain hardcore to those blasted monkey interlopers.




It seemed like it was over at that point until one curious Orang-Utan came onto the boardwalk and stole some guys water bottle. Then she looked guilty and gave it back. Then she basically hung around looking annoyed at all the people who were crowding around her. It was quite fascinating to observe altogether.

El Nido

The town of El Nido is a nice little tourist trap towards the north of Palawan island/state. The main draw here is the Bacuit archipelago, which is an amazing series of limstone islands that shoot up straight out of the ocean. White sand beaches are too numerous to count and the snorkelling was great.

The town iteself is quite small and located right at the base of some towering limestone cliffs. The place was fairly catered to tourists with nice cafés and many places to stay, most a little overpriced.

Island hopping combined with snorkelling is the main thing to do. Well, that and diving but I didn't end up getting my act together for that and now regret it slightly. But nevertheless I had a great time. Some of the places we were brought to on the island hopping tour were just mind blowingly beautiful. A place called 'Small Lagoon' just looks like a little inlet that ends but as you swim up to the limestone wall and small passage is revealed and once you pass through it you find yourself in Small Lagoon, which is actually fairly big with towering limestone cliffs on all sides of you and turquoise water below. The only downfall of this tour was the amount of tourists. Part of you feels like you've discovered this secret hideaway but then reality hits when you realize that so have thousands of other people. But beautiful is beautiful and I suppose it is nice that many people get to experience it... much to the chagrin of the local coral and sea life I'm sure.

The other main highlight of El Nido for me was climbing one o the limestone cliffs directly behind the town. I had an afternoon with nothing planned and figured I wanted to do something. One of the local tour companies offered cliff climbing and I thought I'd try it out. I had to pay a little more because no one else had signed up but it ended up being well worth it. My guide was this tiny Filipina named Grace. She was maybe 5 feet tall but probably not even. When I first saw her I was a little taken aback. Every guide or boat driver or anything we have had in the Philippines has been a man. Generally women just don't end up doing that sort of thing in this country. Her appearance was certainly misleading as she turned out to be a crazy adventurous girl. The climb itself was no walk in the park. It was well more of a climb than a hike, and all over extremely sharp rock. No ropes or anything involved and even a small wrong move would give you bloody scrapes and cuts, a bigger one would kill you. But Grace did the whole thing in flip flops because her shoes had been 'retired' and she couldn't afford new ones yet. She told me about how once a month she would swim across the bay to the nearest island (aprox. 2.5 km one way) by herself and how the last time she had done it a large shark, much bigger than she was, was swimming around her until she said she 'shooed' it away. I think I would have just passed out and been eaten. The climb was a ton of fun and offered the finest view I've seen yet. It felt like I was just sitting up in the sky looking straight down on the town below and the bay beyong it. It was hard to decide to climb back down.

Underground River + Port Barton

Underground River

One of the big tourist attractions around Puerto Princessa, the capital of Palawan province, is the underground River. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and is reputed to be the longest navigable underground river in the world. It goes in something like eight kilometers. Though it is one of the prinicple attractions of Puerto Princessa, it is actually located near the small town of Sabang, about a three hour bus ride away.

One of the highlights of the trip was actually the jeepney (small buses) ride to Sabang where I got to finally experience the thrill of sitting on the roof of a dangerously overcrowded bus. This is a common thing in Palawan province as transportation can be limited so every jeepney is packed to the brim with people and cargo. It might sound strange to say that riding on the roof of a bus was a highlight but it really was. In Canada we'd get a hefty fine for trying something like that whereas here no one gives it a second thought. I got a really great feeling of freedom holding onto the roofrack while speeding along a bumpy dirt road and over rickety wooden bridges. It was really a fantastic experience. (forgive the blurryness of this photo)

The underground river itself is quite spectacular... well maybe spectacular is the wrong word. It is just a bif hole in the rock with a river flowwing out of it, but there just isn't much else like it in the world and i've certainly never seen anything like it. The entrance is rather unassuming but as you go in deeper huge galleries open up stretching as high as 65 meters! There are thousands of bats and interesting limstone formations.

The tour only took us in 1.5 km, but it was impressive nontheless, the fact that it continued on for another 7 km after that is really mind blowing. Pretty crazy what water, limestone and a few million years will do.

Port Barton

After the underground river, we headed to a small town called Port Barton, a sleepy little tourist town not too far from Sabang. It was possible to take a boat from Sabang to Port Barton but we were too unorganized and ended up going back to Puerto Princessa for a night and then took another Jeepney to Port Barton.... On possibly the worst road i've seen in the Philippines, and that is saying something.

The first thing we saw upon arrival, aside from the beautiful scenery, was a small boy being carried out of the water by his mother. He was screaming in agony, like really screaming. Turns out he got stung by a jelly fish, one of the badish ones. There are lots all over the place but the bay at Port Barton seemed to be particularly swarming with them. Both the annoying itchy ones and the make you scream in pain ones. It was enough to limit my swimming to only twice staying there four nights.

But on the bright side we found a fantastic room at a very reasonable price. This was the best place i've stayed at in the Philippines, it was huge and had a massive deck and we were the only people staying at this place. It was called Villa Marguerita, and was owned by an Australian who uses it as a cottage and rents it out when his family is not there.

Though it was too bad about the jellyfish in the bay there was plenty of fantastic island hopping and snorkelling to be done. (these were relatively jelly-free) Our boat-man was named Dong and he was a nice fellow all around. He took of to a nice snorkelling reef first off, and then to an Island called paradise, and it seems to be called that for a pretty good reason.

A man named Alvin lives on Paradise. He was a very nice fellow and took us snorlelling, the highlight of which was seeing a sleeping sea turtle. We never would have found it if it weren't for Alvin. He has been on that island for like 5 years and has no salary from the owner, so he charges a small entry fee to go there, we were happy to tip him extra. After that we went to Exotic Island and just kind of hung out on the beach. I was already burned and fairly snorkeled out but it was a pretty nice beach to just take it easy on.



Port Barton also had a bit of hiking to a nearby waterfall (I didn't post pictures of it because it kind of paled in comparison to the falls at Guintubdan, see earlier post). The trail getting there was a little tricky to follow but some nice locals showed us the way. They pointed out a really cool snake we would never have seen without there keen eyes.



Port Barton has been a big highlight of my trip and it would have been easy to stay there another week.

(yes this should have been two seperate posts, but I am a lazy and disorganized man)