Back from my week long break - Perhentian and Singapore. Well, break from the office that is, since I went to Spore for a course. How was Perhentian? Gorgeous.
I purchased a Groupon for the trip actually. Consisted of return Firefly flight tickets, ground and boat transfer, and 3D/2N accommodation inclusive of meals at Perhentian Island Resort (PIR). At first I was freaked out by the reviews people made on TripAdvisor on the resort. Some were good, some were bad. My opinion - it really depends on your preferences actually. The location is perfect, private, beach is clean and beautiful (although I didn't really spend much time there). The room was small, nothing fancy, but it was clean overall. The bathroom could sure as hell use some improvements. Curtain showers were quite a disgrace and should've been replaced eons ago and the toilet bowl has some funky stains in it. Food wasn't fantastic, but not horrendous either. Considering I just needed an aircond, quiet room (well it was quiet till some tourist from somewhere above.. came along) with hot shower and food, plus, I got at a discounted rate, it was actually quite ok for me. Perhaps, some people had way better expectations and were much more fussy than me that's why they wrote bad reviews about it.
Now to the dives. Coincidentally my cousin Abadam (short for abang Adam) was working at Perhentian Kecil as a divemaster and I managed to contact him just a few days before I went there, so I told him to arrange the trips for us. In return, he asked me to get him a tray of eggs, a USB hub, and two packets of Nescafe. Yes, I actually did hunt for a tray of eggs at the jetty, and held onto it for the 1/2 hr boat ride. There was a another group that was also on our boat ride and they were wondering what's with the tray of eggs. Eventually talked to them and told them it wasn't for me! No, I was not going to camp there!
When we arrived at the jetty, the view was pretty breathtaking. Then again, I'm easily awed so I get excited over almost everything. Photos.... speak for yourself!
Fishies below the jetty
Lovely, isn't it?
Lots and LOTS of fishies
So we checked into the hotel, and the service was not bad. It wasn't the most 5 star service you'd get at a fancy hotel, but they weren't rude either. They didn't make any fuss when we requested to change our room from a double-bed to a twin bed. The room as mentioned earlier was simple, could be improved (change to a more modern looking furniture?) but it didn't reall bother us.
We had lunch (which I would say is almost as normal as any nasi campur stall) and went back to the room to pray and rest before going back to the jetty and wait for my cousin to pick us up. The boat ride to Perhentian Kecil is a short one, prolly less than 10 mins. The view from where we arrived is almost similar (beautiful sea and beach), but slightly crowded to me as there were chalets and restaurants and dive shops next to each other. Waited at the dive shop for half hour or so as Rahim had to complete his refresher course before we went into the sea..... and waited again for Rahim to do practice his skills. Sufia and I (and this other German guy, Rene) joined in at the last skill which was hovering as we didn't really master it when we did our license in Tioman.
The dive site we went to was Batu Nisan, a shore dive, nothing fancy but we did see some stuff like nudibranch, triggerfish (ok, I just saw this thing moving... didn't really see it up close), clownfish (Nemo!), sea urchins... don't recall what else we saw. Most of the time Abadam pointed at us to see things, that we obviously didn't know what they were till we went back on shore and asked him what they were. Haha.
After the dive, we went back, ate dinner and slept.
First dive in the morning was at T3, that had many boulders around. For some reason I felt that I was hyperventilating, and probably played with my BCD too much so I ran out of air quite fast. The current was strong and the visibility wasn't so good but we did manage to see a bit of the marine life. Abadam said there would be turtles. He lied. Didn't see no turtles!! Lots of jellyfish definitely.
When we went back up, as usual the first thing I'd look for was food. Luckily Joe our boatman bought us nasi campur (or well nasi with a small piece of chicken and some curry gravy) so I gobbled it up within seconds. Heheh. Topped up with BinBin rice crackers. We waited for about an hour and a half or so before going on to the second dive. I felt really pampered this trip since I didn't have to carry the heavy-ass tanks to and fro the boat. Technically I told my cousin to do it, but there were other guy divers so they helped us carry the tanks (to prove their machoness?).
Second dive was at Sugar Wreck, a cargo ship that transported sugarcane which sank some 20 years ago. This time, the visibility was good and I managed to control myself from breathing too rapidly and not playing with my BCD. Saw catsharks sleeping (although I thought they were dead), hermit crab, barracudas, boxfish, lionfish, pufferfish and many other fishies! Before ascending I did see a Red Snapper fish. Yumm!
We logged our dives before the third one since we were going to a dive site near PIR so we weren't gonna go back to the dive shop after the dive. Teluk Pauh was the last dive site, better than T3 but not as great as Sugar Wreck, plus my mask kept fogging up on the right side, so I was busy clearing my mask most of the time. We went back to PIR but stopped just before the jetty to look for turtles. Managed to see one (after an adventure of struggling with a useless snorkel and drinking saltwater) it was biiiiggg. Sufia and Rahim got a clearer view and said the turtle was eating or something. For me, after all the saltwater and struggle, seeing the thing (or at least I think what I saw was the turtle) move a bit was good enough.
I was too stingy to rent a camera so no pictures underwater. Besides I once read this article where this guy mentioned he was always busy taking photos that he never took time to appreciate the marine life. Plus, I think I already have enough to manage with trying to control buoyancy, holding onto my regulator when I'm tired of clenching and cleaning my mask, don't really need another object to look after.
After dinner, we hung out on the beach chairs and talked. I kinda dozed off somewhere in between (it was sooo relaxing to just lie down and listen to the waves crashing....). Think we went back to the room almost 11pm (haha, still early huh?).
We actually had a free snorkelling session with the package, but since the snorkelling time was at 10am and we had to catch our boat at 12pm, Sufia and I decided to skip it and just camwhored at the beach for half an hour. When we reached Kuala Besud jetty, while waiting for the ground transfer to the airport I decided to go kampung style and sidai my pants/leggings on the chair under the hot sun. Hahah. It was wet and it was just so sunny I couldn't resist. Plus my flight was like at 9PM. Didn't fancy going back with stinky pants.
We convinced the van driver to send us to Pasar Buluh Kubu where I ended up spending more than I did for the dive package. Bought two kains and one kaftan (to add to my collection of 3 kaftans...). Went back to the airport, ate KFC (sad!) and Sufia and I went for a last minute massage at the 'Rest n Go' massage chairs at the airport lounge. Haha. The flight was ok, except for the baby (very cute one) crying when we were about to land. Reached home about 11 plus, chatted with my parents showed some photos and then zzzzz.... Thank God I took leave on Monday or I'd have prolly been a zombie. Was supposed to do my laundry but ended up just unpacking my Perhentian luggage and packing my luggage for Singapore.
All in all, it was great fun, had great friends who weren't so fussy or banyak songeh and am looking forward to my next trip.... Phuket!!
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