Jewel of Dive Sites in Malaysia... or is it? (Part 1)

Mentioned Semporna and the first thing that comes to mind... DIVING! 

Although I did not venture out to Sipadan, my recent trip gave me a taste of how dirty it is.. Maldives of Malaysia? Hmm, I am rather indifferent here because I think it's not fair to brand the islands with a "blanket branding".. 

In fact, the house reefs at Mabul Island, Kapalai islands are rather murky and viz is less than 10m at most places.. I have dived in crystal clear waters with 25-30m viz in Tioman, so this is ughh.. 

The shallow waters look clear, but in deeper waters, it quickly turned murky brown.. 

But it could be me, I went to Semporna with high expectations but I left pretty disappointed, other than the great dive sites, the "Maldives" I was looking forward to.. simply because of the amount of trash! 

As divers, we cringed at the use of single-use plastics like mineral water bottles, but here in Semporna, apparently, mineral water is used for typically anything and everything, from drinking to washing to watering plants, and then just throw the bottles into the sea.. 

First impression of Semporna

In Semporna, we stayed at The Buwan Dive Resort (formerly known as Scuba Tiger), about 10km away outside of Semporna, or rather in Kampung Tampi-Tampi.. It was a chill nice quiet dive resort but with superb staff, food, and of course diving.. 

Reception

Standard Room (can sleep up to 4 pax)

Toilet in standard room. The water is bloody salty so we have to use mineral water to brush teeth and wash face. 

Dive center

Walkway to dive center and restaurant

Walkway to dive center and restaurant

View of the restaurant, sadly it has been destroyed in last week's fire. 

The sea at the resort

Restaurant and kitchen, which were destroyed in last week's fire

Buwan House Reef

A seahorse

A spider shrimp

Electric clams, amongst rubbish

Among the things people throw in the sea... a diaper

They even threw a truck into the sea!

Our extension night, we moved to the Chalet rooms.. Each room has its own veranda with a table and chairs.. 

Chalet rooms

The Chalet Rooms can sleep 3

Toilet

The food they served here are amazing.. I mean, seafood, seafood, seafood.. 3 buffet meals per day, and you get a variety of seafood, cooked variety of styles.. In our 6 days of stay, nothing was repeated, which is great.. 

Mabul/Kapalai Islands

The octopus is an amazing creature, it can mimic the colours and patterns of its surroundings

A seashorse

A pipefish

Another pipefish

A pufferfish

The visibility below Mabul/Kapalai

A baby moray eel

The Lost City

A lionfish - hell no I am not going closer than this
One of the venomous fish in the sea.

And then I went to its front

Or at night...

Trumpet cornet fish.
As you can see, the visibility is so bad, perhaps 3m only. These fish are just right in front of me, yet because the visibility was so bad, you almost can't see it. 

One hell of a stonefish

Baby shark dudu duuu duuuuuu

A mini barracuda tornado

A hypselodoris nudibranch.. or simply purple sea slug