Someone (other than Kat's dad) from Qantas must be reading the blog, as this time the service from check-in to disembarkation was exemplary.
Perhaps they put their best people on the lucrative AU to LAX route, or maybe it's the sight of me in a polo shirt that really gets the staff going..... I'll leave it up to you to decide.
Thanks must as usual go out to Mark for the super-cheap fares. I think this might be a different flavour of posting if we'd had to fly cattle class. Moo.
So our first taste of the USA was the 3 hours spent clearing customs and getting checked in to our connecting flight. SOMEONE decided to roll her eyes and get shirty with the customs officer, who asked whether she "had a problem with that". Thankfully we just had to fill some different forms out. Never mind.
Strangely, I'm going to go out on a huge limb here and say that in Australia we do the "self serve check-in" a whole hell of a lot better than Delta Airlines at least. The software was confusing, required swiping of passports, and there most certainly NOT a surfeit of air-conditioning. Bag scanning and loading was in a different place, and the queues to the gates were not very clearly marked - we stood in the wrong line for about 20 minutes, before getting to the front and realising we were in the wrong place.... Yay.
Anyhoo. Salt Lake city was uneventful, and I passed out from tiredness on the flight to Calgary. I awoke to flying over what looks like it could be a city of 100 million, but really only has just over 1. It's huge, as big as Melbourne, with 1/4 of the population. Oh well, makes for nice golf courses.
The weather's great, and catching up with Kat's family was also good. Of course we were well fed and boozed up, so by the time we arrived at Denis and Janet's place (Kat's cousin, and soon-to-be-wife-of-cousin) we were ready for a snooze....
This is already a bit long for most of you, so tomorrow I'll take some pictures and intersperse them with more words. Toodle-pip!
Friday 31 August 2007
Saturday 25 August 2007
Happy Birthday to Me!
31 years ago, my parent's life was made infinitely harder by my arrival into this world.
31 years on, it's not just my parents, but the world who are suffering.
Oh well. So thanks to Ben, Minas, Fletch, Wang, Murdoch, Bonne, Bec, George, Mags and Buddy for partying on with us last night. Apparently all our other friends are cunts. HARDEN UP!!!!
So what's with this no smoking in pubs business eh?
Sure it doesn't smell like smoke anymore, but now it just smells like rancid rotting beer and ass instead. There was something a little disturbing about a smoke free Union Club..... or was that just because it's turning into a gay hangout? I swear at one point I heard the bus boy/girl/it say something about employing only "lickers". Hm. Maybe it was something to do with a carpet cleaning business.
Stay tuned for more mayhem...
31 years on, it's not just my parents, but the world who are suffering.
Oh well. So thanks to Ben, Minas, Fletch, Wang, Murdoch, Bonne, Bec, George, Mags and Buddy for partying on with us last night. Apparently all our other friends are cunts. HARDEN UP!!!!
So what's with this no smoking in pubs business eh?
Sure it doesn't smell like smoke anymore, but now it just smells like rancid rotting beer and ass instead. There was something a little disturbing about a smoke free Union Club..... or was that just because it's turning into a gay hangout? I swear at one point I heard the bus boy/girl/it say something about employing only "lickers". Hm. Maybe it was something to do with a carpet cleaning business.
Stay tuned for more mayhem...
Monday 20 August 2007
China Mike, Dynamite!!!!!
5 nights in Hong Kong.
4 nights of non-stop drinking.
Only one, China Mike.
Who's the only white man, who can speak both Mandarin and Cantonese..... MIKE!
Who's the only white man who can read the language toooooo?..... MIKE!
So I suppose I should explain this. Mike is my oldest mate. Not oldest in age, but oldest in time. We suffered together through the Mentone Grammar Gulag. Mike has also been living and working in mainland China for the last 5+ years. Mike was a real hit at dinner. His poise, his grace, his looks and his success. That coupled with his command of the Chinese languages, and culture - means he is the newest addition to the extended Clark family.
Congratulations Mike, your feats will live on forever in my dad's boring family tree.
So it's really hard to say where we went, and how many Long Island Iced Teas we drank, or how many strange looks we got, or how often we wore our pants up to our elbows. But hell, my kidneys are crying and my liver is weeping, so I guess it was a fuckin' good time.
Some highlights:
The Tuesday Night from Singapore - 1 litre of alcohol consumed.
The Wednesday Night from Columbia - Many visits to the toilet cubicle.
The Friday Night from Hell - more seedy bars and long island iced tea than ever drunken before.
Other more family oriented highlights were:
The Saturday Morning Yum Cha after the Friday Night from Hell - with my Aunties (everyone's an Auntie in Hong Kong) at the Renaissance Hotel - more room there than Euan and Jen's entire block of apartments.
The Saturday Evening Dinner - with my godparents, godbrother, and China Mike. It's been a long time since we all saw each other, but everyone was very very welcoming. What can I say??
On Saturday evening I was feeling very ill (read: soft) so wanted to go to bed. Mike and Euan on the other hand decide that going out drinking was a good idea. We spoke to them on Sunday morning at 6am when we were going to the airport, and they were going home. Ahh.....
....and now Melbourne.
4 nights of non-stop drinking.
Only one, China Mike.
Who's the only white man, who can speak both Mandarin and Cantonese..... MIKE!
Who's the only white man who can read the language toooooo?..... MIKE!
So I suppose I should explain this. Mike is my oldest mate. Not oldest in age, but oldest in time. We suffered together through the Mentone Grammar Gulag. Mike has also been living and working in mainland China for the last 5+ years. Mike was a real hit at dinner. His poise, his grace, his looks and his success. That coupled with his command of the Chinese languages, and culture - means he is the newest addition to the extended Clark family.
Congratulations Mike, your feats will live on forever in my dad's boring family tree.
So it's really hard to say where we went, and how many Long Island Iced Teas we drank, or how many strange looks we got, or how often we wore our pants up to our elbows. But hell, my kidneys are crying and my liver is weeping, so I guess it was a fuckin' good time.
Some highlights:
The Tuesday Night from Singapore - 1 litre of alcohol consumed.
The Wednesday Night from Columbia - Many visits to the toilet cubicle.
The Friday Night from Hell - more seedy bars and long island iced tea than ever drunken before.
Other more family oriented highlights were:
The Saturday Morning Yum Cha after the Friday Night from Hell - with my Aunties (everyone's an Auntie in Hong Kong) at the Renaissance Hotel - more room there than Euan and Jen's entire block of apartments.
The Saturday Evening Dinner - with my godparents, godbrother, and China Mike. It's been a long time since we all saw each other, but everyone was very very welcoming. What can I say??
On Saturday evening I was feeling very ill (read: soft) so wanted to go to bed. Mike and Euan on the other hand decide that going out drinking was a good idea. We spoke to them on Sunday morning at 6am when we were going to the airport, and they were going home. Ahh.....
....and now Melbourne.
Friday 17 August 2007
Honkers
Well here we are in Honkers.
Courtesy of Mike and Euan we've been touring various bars and bars, and some bars.
It's been great to catch up with them, and my realisation this week is that when you're with friends, it seems to be home no matter what country you're in! Aww...
I think I'll have to make a proper blog post when my liver comes back from where I left it.
Courtesy of Mike and Euan we've been touring various bars and bars, and some bars.
It's been great to catch up with them, and my realisation this week is that when you're with friends, it seems to be home no matter what country you're in! Aww...
I think I'll have to make a proper blog post when my liver comes back from where I left it.
Tuesday 14 August 2007
Drinks
For those that read the blog, in honour of my birthday (the 21st, all donations accepted - you can paypal to lamaison at iinet.net.au) and our brief stopover in Melbourne, we will be having drinks of the evening of the 24th.
Not sure where (but probably inner east, like the Union or the Grand).
Not sure when (late afternoon most likely).
Further details here, later. Please spread the word.
Bye bye Singers, next stop Honkers.
Not sure where (but probably inner east, like the Union or the Grand).
Not sure when (late afternoon most likely).
Further details here, later. Please spread the word.
Bye bye Singers, next stop Honkers.
Saturday 11 August 2007
Redang Wrap Up, KL, SIN
So yesterday (Friday) we finished up at the Redang Kalong resort.
I recommend it for diving - http://www.redangkalong.com/webtoolz2/article-10.html
I do not recommend it for "resort" activities, but anyway...
The dive operation is great, the food is good (not as good as Seaventures, and a little more targeted to their mainly Malaysian Chinese customers), and the dive sites not too bad at all.
So a few pictorial tidbits before the underwater upload.
First up: Keeping with my macro fascination - a grasshopper that was on the wall outside our room. The underwater business has improved my not-so-mad skillz immensely, and I think my results with normal flash photography are improving.
Secondly: The tide goes RIGHT out at Redang Kalong, so much so that the boats end up sitting on the bottom.
Lastly: A fish, but not the kind you might expect.
So we met a chap named Raj at Redang Kalong, who works on merchant ships. I found it fascinating, as I've always been interested in big boats for some reason.
Did you know that for a big container ship (that holds around 5000 containers - there are bigger, I think the biggest holds over 14,000) it costs over USD1.5 million to fuel it? The same ship at maximum cruising speed burns over 160 cubic meters of fuel per day....
This is a picture of the biggest one in the world:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Emma_Maersk_2.jpg
Anyway.
Raj gave us a lift back to KL, and drove us around the city and stuff, and then dropped us off to where we were getting the bus from. What a great bloke... I hope some day we'll be able to repay the hospitality.
We got a fairly luxurious bus from KL to SIN, but for some reason even though it was 11:30 at night, they insisted on putting a movie on (complete with audio, whether you liked it or not).
No one should be subjected to Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, especially when trying to sleep.
Five slightly sleepless hours later we arrived in Singapore, and made our way back to Chateau Curran, and here we are....
Latest, and probably last for a long time, batch of underwater photos.
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/PulauRedang
The housing has to go back to Ikelite for repairs, due to crappy manufacturing. Grr.
Later!
I recommend it for diving - http://www.redangkalong.com/webtoolz2/article-10.html
I do not recommend it for "resort" activities, but anyway...
The dive operation is great, the food is good (not as good as Seaventures, and a little more targeted to their mainly Malaysian Chinese customers), and the dive sites not too bad at all.
So a few pictorial tidbits before the underwater upload.
First up: Keeping with my macro fascination - a grasshopper that was on the wall outside our room. The underwater business has improved my not-so-mad skillz immensely, and I think my results with normal flash photography are improving.
Secondly: The tide goes RIGHT out at Redang Kalong, so much so that the boats end up sitting on the bottom.
Lastly: A fish, but not the kind you might expect.
So we met a chap named Raj at Redang Kalong, who works on merchant ships. I found it fascinating, as I've always been interested in big boats for some reason.
Did you know that for a big container ship (that holds around 5000 containers - there are bigger, I think the biggest holds over 14,000) it costs over USD1.5 million to fuel it? The same ship at maximum cruising speed burns over 160 cubic meters of fuel per day....
This is a picture of the biggest one in the world:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Emma_Maersk_2.jpg
Anyway.
Raj gave us a lift back to KL, and drove us around the city and stuff, and then dropped us off to where we were getting the bus from. What a great bloke... I hope some day we'll be able to repay the hospitality.
We got a fairly luxurious bus from KL to SIN, but for some reason even though it was 11:30 at night, they insisted on putting a movie on (complete with audio, whether you liked it or not).
No one should be subjected to Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, especially when trying to sleep.
Five slightly sleepless hours later we arrived in Singapore, and made our way back to Chateau Curran, and here we are....
Latest, and probably last for a long time, batch of underwater photos.
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/PulauRedang
The housing has to go back to Ikelite for repairs, due to crappy manufacturing. Grr.
Later!
Wednesday 8 August 2007
Pulau Redang 02 (or 03 if v2.0 counts as 02)
Gosh it's late. 21:51 and I'm already ready for bed.
So much so, that I'm considering canceling the batch of 5 images that I'm trying to upload.
Kat has already retired with an angry stomach. Weak I tell you.
Today was our first full day of diving here, and this afternoon I managed to get partially over the photographic lull that has plagued me for the last day or so. Still screwed up a bunch of potentially good shots, but that's life I guess.
It is funny that no matter where you go, there will always be some white guy boasting about some big project or some crap. Maybe this is the same if you actually understand what yellow people are saying, but until I get mad language skillz I will have to assume it's not.
Grr it's going too slow, the mozzies are taking a liking to my feet. Bedtime. No pictures tonight.
So much so, that I'm considering canceling the batch of 5 images that I'm trying to upload.
Kat has already retired with an angry stomach. Weak I tell you.
Today was our first full day of diving here, and this afternoon I managed to get partially over the photographic lull that has plagued me for the last day or so. Still screwed up a bunch of potentially good shots, but that's life I guess.
It is funny that no matter where you go, there will always be some white guy boasting about some big project or some crap. Maybe this is the same if you actually understand what yellow people are saying, but until I get mad language skillz I will have to assume it's not.
Grr it's going too slow, the mozzies are taking a liking to my feet. Bedtime. No pictures tonight.
Tuesday 7 August 2007
Kuala Terengganu and Pulau Redang v2.0
I think I was prepared for another Tawau, and after the debacle that was the Berjaya Incident I'm not sure whether we had high hopes for Kuala Terengganu (or KT as we will now call it).
Surprisingly though, things have turned out to be very pleasant here. We arranged another trip to Pulau Redang (which was much more reasonably priced, and included diving, meals and transfers).
We're staying in an extremely simple room above the travel agent, but it's clean, has airc onditioning, and was MYR38 for the night.
The ATM was easy to find, and didn't eat my card (although one took so long to get to the "please enter PIN" prompt that I was having flashbacks to KL).
The internet cafe had good bandwidth, so as you might have seen I've uploaded the remainder of the Sipadan/Mabul/Mataking pictures that I deem worthy of your esteemed viewing. Nearly 2 hours of internet usage for the two of us was only MYR7, which is good value given I moved a couple of hundred meg up and down.
An interesting thing about Malaysia is the Pepsi Max comes in two different flavours. There is a "plain label" version which tastes like it's watered down, and a "funky label" version that's more similar to the Australian version. Fascinating huh?
Tonight we wandered down to the waterfront and had dinner at a little restaurant. The food was delicious, especially as we hadn't eaten in 10 hours. We tried the ABC, which is a cendol like desert, but a little richer - I'm still struggling with the concept of sweet-corn in sweet dishes. Perhaps it's just me.
While we were there, a massive thunderstorm rolled through. A couple of the lightning strikes were very close, and scared the shit out of us. Rain you say? Yes there was rain. A torrential downpour, sideways. Thankfully it had passed by the time we left.
On the way back to the room, we were treated to the sight of hundreds (if not thousands) of swifts swooping about - I assume hunting insects. Ahh for a tripod.
Nerdy Camera Bit - just realised I had the Adobe Camera Raw plugin resampling the images to a different final resolution compared to the resolution that they wer originally shot in. Allegedly this leads to lower image quality. I apologise.
This morning the journey BACK to Redang was smooth, and the resort, whilst not luxurious, meets our needs for diving, eating, drinking and sleeping. Maybe pictures soon, but another update tomorrow.
Read it up, nerds.
Surprisingly though, things have turned out to be very pleasant here. We arranged another trip to Pulau Redang (which was much more reasonably priced, and included diving, meals and transfers).
We're staying in an extremely simple room above the travel agent, but it's clean, has airc onditioning, and was MYR38 for the night.
The ATM was easy to find, and didn't eat my card (although one took so long to get to the "please enter PIN" prompt that I was having flashbacks to KL).
The internet cafe had good bandwidth, so as you might have seen I've uploaded the remainder of the Sipadan/Mabul/Mataking pictures that I deem worthy of your esteemed viewing. Nearly 2 hours of internet usage for the two of us was only MYR7, which is good value given I moved a couple of hundred meg up and down.
An interesting thing about Malaysia is the Pepsi Max comes in two different flavours. There is a "plain label" version which tastes like it's watered down, and a "funky label" version that's more similar to the Australian version. Fascinating huh?
Tonight we wandered down to the waterfront and had dinner at a little restaurant. The food was delicious, especially as we hadn't eaten in 10 hours. We tried the ABC, which is a cendol like desert, but a little richer - I'm still struggling with the concept of sweet-corn in sweet dishes. Perhaps it's just me.
While we were there, a massive thunderstorm rolled through. A couple of the lightning strikes were very close, and scared the shit out of us. Rain you say? Yes there was rain. A torrential downpour, sideways. Thankfully it had passed by the time we left.
On the way back to the room, we were treated to the sight of hundreds (if not thousands) of swifts swooping about - I assume hunting insects. Ahh for a tripod.
Nerdy Camera Bit - just realised I had the Adobe Camera Raw plugin resampling the images to a different final resolution compared to the resolution that they wer originally shot in. Allegedly this leads to lower image quality. I apologise.
This morning the journey BACK to Redang was smooth, and the resort, whilst not luxurious, meets our needs for diving, eating, drinking and sleeping. Maybe pictures soon, but another update tomorrow.
Read it up, nerds.
Monday 6 August 2007
Burn Down Berjaya Beach Resort
A couple of days ago we left KK for KL to prepare for our trip to Redang.
We got there eventually, but KK airport is no fun when your flight is delayed. I was also suffering from the after effects of a "Cantonese Mee" that I ate at Tawau airport.
Why is it, when you really need to take a crap, the only toilets available are the nasty squat ones?!
Thankfully I clenched my teeth (and bowels) and resisted the urge....
When a cubicle with a normal toilet became free, I hiked up my shorts to keep them off the wet floor, and did my explosive business. Luxury indeed.
On arrival in KL we turned on the laptop to post to the blog and look up the hotel details. 5 minutes later the battery went flat. Not sure whether the battery is fucked, or whether I forgot to charge it. Let's hope it's the latter.
The Hotel Grand Continental (not Chancellor - which doesn't exist, despite us thinking it did) is neither grand, nor continental (unless continental is a packet of peanuts a'la Malaysia Airlines). It is however, apparently a favorite hangout for fundamentalist Islamic tourists, and cheap-ass Indians who are staying in KL.
The mattress hadn't been changed since 1980, the air conditioning didn't work, and someone had left a milky drink in the fridge. Ahh well, apparently that's what you get for MYR170.
Keeping with the jihad theme we found an internet cafe run by an Arabic bloke, who was very nice and gave us MYR1 off our internet and printing bill. I've never seen a keyboard with Arabic script before, nor have I ever tried to log into the jihad version of Google mail.
Time passes, and the next thing it's 05:30 and we're getting up to travel to Redang.
A small taxi fare comparison:
- Coupon from Sentral to Hotel: MYR11
- Fare agreed on the next morning from Hotel to Sentral: MYR15
- Fare the meter showed: MYR6
Hmm.
MAS were doing the usual airline trick of having 2 staff manning the check-in counters, and 2 staff manning the counters for people who were still in the queue but the flights were closing. Never mind, at least they weren't running late today.
We arrive at Terengganu, get a transfer, ride a boat for a couple of hours and arrive at Pulau Redang.
It is here that everything starts to go very very wrong.
1. Even though it was the hotel transfer, the room isn't ready. Seems like 90% of the other rooms are, but there are an unlucky few condemned to wait in the lobby for several hours. Including us.
2. Despite booking a room with a king bed, ours allegedly has two single beds.
3. I present to you the text from the Berjaya Beach Resort website:
"Rates inclusive of daily breakfasts, 3 boat dives with tanks & weight for certified divers only or a choice of 1 spa treatment (60 minutes massage/ Body scrub/ Reflexology/ Facial) for non-diver and welcome drink for the number of paying persons booked for each room."
I had foolishly thought that "3 boat dives" meant "3 boat dives per day". NOT SO MY FRIEND! It means 3 boats dives each IN TOTAL. I had also not paid close enough to the meal allowance, as nothing but breakfast was included, and there is only resort restaurants to go to.
Faced with spending several hundred dollars more on diving and eating, we decided to check out the next day. A very disappointing experience, as the hotel staff weren't willing to come to the party with.. well... anything.
We slipped in a cheeky dive, which was quite nice. Had a huge buffet dinner (at the tiny price of MYR110), and quickly left without signing for the bill.
Neither were charged to us. WE WIN!! HAHAHA DIE!!
Anyway. We're off somewhere else tomorrow. Back to Pulau Redang. Older, and wiser.
Now... some pictures. First some embedded ones.
Here is a photo of James (red shirt, on the left) and Yong (red shirt on the right) from Seaventures. If you look closely you will notice that our time was not misspent, as they have rightly learned how to salute the Slayer way.
Next is just a picture of Seaventures as we leave. *sniff*
Our palatial residence on Mataking Island:
The view from the beach (well not always, unless Kat is on the beach every night while I am not paying attention. Possible, but unlikely):
Phew. Second last is my second gallery of images from Sipadan & Mabul:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/SipadanPhase2
Last, but not least, images from Mataking:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/Mataking
** Photos done. Captions done. Goodnight **
Until next essay,
Us.
We got there eventually, but KK airport is no fun when your flight is delayed. I was also suffering from the after effects of a "Cantonese Mee" that I ate at Tawau airport.
Why is it, when you really need to take a crap, the only toilets available are the nasty squat ones?!
Thankfully I clenched my teeth (and bowels) and resisted the urge....
When a cubicle with a normal toilet became free, I hiked up my shorts to keep them off the wet floor, and did my explosive business. Luxury indeed.
On arrival in KL we turned on the laptop to post to the blog and look up the hotel details. 5 minutes later the battery went flat. Not sure whether the battery is fucked, or whether I forgot to charge it. Let's hope it's the latter.
The Hotel Grand Continental (not Chancellor - which doesn't exist, despite us thinking it did) is neither grand, nor continental (unless continental is a packet of peanuts a'la Malaysia Airlines). It is however, apparently a favorite hangout for fundamentalist Islamic tourists, and cheap-ass Indians who are staying in KL.
The mattress hadn't been changed since 1980, the air conditioning didn't work, and someone had left a milky drink in the fridge. Ahh well, apparently that's what you get for MYR170.
Keeping with the jihad theme we found an internet cafe run by an Arabic bloke, who was very nice and gave us MYR1 off our internet and printing bill. I've never seen a keyboard with Arabic script before, nor have I ever tried to log into the jihad version of Google mail.
Time passes, and the next thing it's 05:30 and we're getting up to travel to Redang.
A small taxi fare comparison:
- Coupon from Sentral to Hotel: MYR11
- Fare agreed on the next morning from Hotel to Sentral: MYR15
- Fare the meter showed: MYR6
Hmm.
MAS were doing the usual airline trick of having 2 staff manning the check-in counters, and 2 staff manning the counters for people who were still in the queue but the flights were closing. Never mind, at least they weren't running late today.
We arrive at Terengganu, get a transfer, ride a boat for a couple of hours and arrive at Pulau Redang.
It is here that everything starts to go very very wrong.
1. Even though it was the hotel transfer, the room isn't ready. Seems like 90% of the other rooms are, but there are an unlucky few condemned to wait in the lobby for several hours. Including us.
2. Despite booking a room with a king bed, ours allegedly has two single beds.
3. I present to you the text from the Berjaya Beach Resort website:
"Rates inclusive of daily breakfasts, 3 boat dives with tanks & weight for certified divers only or a choice of 1 spa treatment (60 minutes massage/ Body scrub/ Reflexology/ Facial) for non-diver and welcome drink for the number of paying persons booked for each room."
I had foolishly thought that "3 boat dives" meant "3 boat dives per day". NOT SO MY FRIEND! It means 3 boats dives each IN TOTAL. I had also not paid close enough to the meal allowance, as nothing but breakfast was included, and there is only resort restaurants to go to.
Faced with spending several hundred dollars more on diving and eating, we decided to check out the next day. A very disappointing experience, as the hotel staff weren't willing to come to the party with.. well... anything.
We slipped in a cheeky dive, which was quite nice. Had a huge buffet dinner (at the tiny price of MYR110), and quickly left without signing for the bill.
Neither were charged to us. WE WIN!! HAHAHA DIE!!
Anyway. We're off somewhere else tomorrow. Back to Pulau Redang. Older, and wiser.
Now... some pictures. First some embedded ones.
Here is a photo of James (red shirt, on the left) and Yong (red shirt on the right) from Seaventures. If you look closely you will notice that our time was not misspent, as they have rightly learned how to salute the Slayer way.
Next is just a picture of Seaventures as we leave. *sniff*
Our palatial residence on Mataking Island:
The view from the beach (well not always, unless Kat is on the beach every night while I am not paying attention. Possible, but unlikely):
Phew. Second last is my second gallery of images from Sipadan & Mabul:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/SipadanPhase2
Last, but not least, images from Mataking:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/rogue303/Mataking
** Photos done. Captions done. Goodnight **
Until next essay,
Us.
Saturday 4 August 2007
War and Peace
Looking back at Sipadan
It's hard to think of the highlights of our time at Seaventures, let alone sum it all up.
Here's a few things that come to mind:
- Diving towards a Leopard Shark as it swims by with its remora entourage.
- Seeing giant turtles watching you watch them, as they lie/swim/eat - they're very graceful underwater, and at least at Sipadan don't seem too concerned by your bubbling, flapping presence.
- Seeing Kat being attacked by a Titan Triggerfish. This was VERY funny. It was slightly less funny when it tried to take a chunk out of my bio-fins though...
- Finding a giant, black frogfish - so black, that it was impossible to take a picture of (well for me anyway).
- Watching huge schools of fish congregate around the rig on a couple of nights. There were many hundreds, if not thousands of them - and a giant trevally was hunting from below - you could see patches of water clearing as they were chased, and the ebb and flow of the school.
- Swimming amoung a few hundred barracuda as they circle in the ocean
- Being close to a grouper that was almost as big as me - he didn't really care for me trying to take his picture, so he retreated into the depths of the artificial reef.
- Hovering less than a meter from massive bumphead parrotfish as cleaner wrass nibble at parasites and such - these guys could do with a nice electric toothbrush on their "beak" - maybe I'll take one down with me sometime and see if they like a clean.
- Wondering whether the reef sharks are going to decide that they'd like a nice piece of Australian meat. They move so smoothly underwater, and you just know that if they want to move fast, they can.
- Last but not least, getting free t-shirts - so now we have our very own dive paraphernalia to wear around!
Looking back at Mataking
What a change from Tawau & Seaventures. This was more of an island getaway, and the first time we have obverved the native Italian on holidays. The diving here was nowhere near as spectacular, but not without its highlights.
It was amazing to see the effects of dynamite fishing first hand - the undulating wasteland of dead coral is a depressing sight, but look close enough and small patches are growing back - in a few decades it may begin to recover, if we haven't ruined the climate by then. The reefs around Mataking must have been spectacular 50 years ago.
The night dive on the house reef was an eye-opener - things that appear dead during the day spring to life at night.
Creatures bloom from what appears to be rock, and juvenile cuttlefish venture out to eat.
Strange crabs duck in and out of holes in the coral, and most peculiar of all a small ball that "flew" through the water on "wings" to bury itself in the sand.
Even the sandy bottom is alive, filter feeders come out to play, small lionfish lurk on the bottom waiting for their prey, and the mantis shrimp sits patiently in its hole..
The jellies were also out, seemingly attracted by the guide light of my strobe, swimming towards me and stinging me and twisting and turning. Arrr me hearties it would be nice if I was wearing a wetsuit at this point.
The downside? Getting an ear infection wasn't fun, and neither was the cold afterwards. Guess it was my turn to miss out on a day's diving.
We're in KK tonight, and who should we meet again - Oliver from the rig. If he turns up in Melbourne in August we will be worried.
Posting this from KLIA... Free WiFi is my friend. Photos are ready to go, just waiting for enough upstream bandwith. Deliver me Internet Lord.
It's hard to think of the highlights of our time at Seaventures, let alone sum it all up.
Here's a few things that come to mind:
- Diving towards a Leopard Shark as it swims by with its remora entourage.
- Seeing giant turtles watching you watch them, as they lie/swim/eat - they're very graceful underwater, and at least at Sipadan don't seem too concerned by your bubbling, flapping presence.
- Seeing Kat being attacked by a Titan Triggerfish. This was VERY funny. It was slightly less funny when it tried to take a chunk out of my bio-fins though...
- Finding a giant, black frogfish - so black, that it was impossible to take a picture of (well for me anyway).
- Watching huge schools of fish congregate around the rig on a couple of nights. There were many hundreds, if not thousands of them - and a giant trevally was hunting from below - you could see patches of water clearing as they were chased, and the ebb and flow of the school.
- Swimming amoung a few hundred barracuda as they circle in the ocean
- Being close to a grouper that was almost as big as me - he didn't really care for me trying to take his picture, so he retreated into the depths of the artificial reef.
- Hovering less than a meter from massive bumphead parrotfish as cleaner wrass nibble at parasites and such - these guys could do with a nice electric toothbrush on their "beak" - maybe I'll take one down with me sometime and see if they like a clean.
- Wondering whether the reef sharks are going to decide that they'd like a nice piece of Australian meat. They move so smoothly underwater, and you just know that if they want to move fast, they can.
- Last but not least, getting free t-shirts - so now we have our very own dive paraphernalia to wear around!
Looking back at Mataking
What a change from Tawau & Seaventures. This was more of an island getaway, and the first time we have obverved the native Italian on holidays. The diving here was nowhere near as spectacular, but not without its highlights.
It was amazing to see the effects of dynamite fishing first hand - the undulating wasteland of dead coral is a depressing sight, but look close enough and small patches are growing back - in a few decades it may begin to recover, if we haven't ruined the climate by then. The reefs around Mataking must have been spectacular 50 years ago.
The night dive on the house reef was an eye-opener - things that appear dead during the day spring to life at night.
Creatures bloom from what appears to be rock, and juvenile cuttlefish venture out to eat.
Strange crabs duck in and out of holes in the coral, and most peculiar of all a small ball that "flew" through the water on "wings" to bury itself in the sand.
Even the sandy bottom is alive, filter feeders come out to play, small lionfish lurk on the bottom waiting for their prey, and the mantis shrimp sits patiently in its hole..
The jellies were also out, seemingly attracted by the guide light of my strobe, swimming towards me and stinging me and twisting and turning. Arrr me hearties it would be nice if I was wearing a wetsuit at this point.
The downside? Getting an ear infection wasn't fun, and neither was the cold afterwards. Guess it was my turn to miss out on a day's diving.
We're in KK tonight, and who should we meet again - Oliver from the rig. If he turns up in Melbourne in August we will be worried.
Posting this from KLIA... Free WiFi is my friend. Photos are ready to go, just waiting for enough upstream bandwith. Deliver me Internet Lord.
Thursday 2 August 2007
Tawau, dirty Tawau
Here we are again. No one should spend more than one night here, ever.
So we're alive, and just back from Mataking Island.
Tonight I'm a bit tired, so more lengthy update next time I can get near the internet....
But for those who care, tomorrow is Tawau to KK. One night in KK, then off to KL.
Again, overnight in KL, and then off to Pulau Redang for some more diving.
Peace.
So we're alive, and just back from Mataking Island.
Tonight I'm a bit tired, so more lengthy update next time I can get near the internet....
But for those who care, tomorrow is Tawau to KK. One night in KK, then off to KL.
Again, overnight in KL, and then off to Pulau Redang for some more diving.
Peace.
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