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So here i am writing another blog entry again. First off i would like to thank all of you who are reading this and also all the kind, supporting emails and messages over the past 7 months or so! I know my time away is coming to an end and I'll be back in the Land of Eng before i know it, but i'm kinda looking forward to seeing all of my family again - and also am quite excited of the prospect of sleeping in my own bed - not to mention a nice break from the endless packing!
And the next thing that pops into my head to type about is i got my haircut today. My hair had grown a bit outta style over the past few months and so i figured it's best to get it cut before heading home as there i'd have to pay ten times as much! But, it's short, again! Still, i should just about be able to tie it up and make a paintbrush ponytail out of it!
I am in Kota Kinabalu. Everything stands in the balance right now as i'm really trying to get a place on the mountain - Mount Kinabalu for tomorrow - Thus means i'd be half way up by midnight, and then see sunrise break on my birthday from more than 4000 metres up. Please keep your fingers crossed for me so that i can get permits and such - and also you have to have a place to stay on the mountain - very limited, expensive -but you can't climb without it - unless you wanna camp. And i don't have a tent! But i'm really hoping my amazing hostel staff can sort it for me - i have been whizzing around the city today trying all the different tour operators (i know there's no place on the mountain for Sunday, and very limited Monday + would be pretty awesome to be up there for my birthday!) but haven't had much luck - nowhere's interested because i'm a single traveller and not part of a group.
Anyways, spirits up and all :) I've met many people who have attempted to climb it - and a few who never made it to the top - at least they made it back down though and that's the main thing.
I guess i still need to fill you in on diving... I was very lucky to make it to Semporna by squeezing into a mini-sized car with 2 Swedish guys (one of whom insisted he pay for my share of the taxi) - Semporna is the closest you can really get to Sipadan - one of the top diving locations in the entire world - as now, you cannot stay there - after the tourist hostages taken by Phillipino gunmen back in 2000 the security has been heightened so only locals can reside there. Instead, you stay in Semporna and take dive boats out every day. I dived 3 very amazing dives on Monday... and then 4 dives on the Tuesday. I will get to Tuesday later. However, Monday:
We set off for out first dive of the day to Barracuda point. Amazing Visibility, and after being down for about 10 minutes we'd already seen a load of cool things, not to mention a fair few barracuda! But i was quite excited at the 3-4 metre sharks that we saw at about 25 metres down - much lower than that we'd have been below mid-reef, therefore seen much less... My buoyancy was a bit temperamental - i was of course using different equipment and back to closed-fins that i wasn't that happy with - you get a lot better movement with less effort with open-fins (that you have to wear booties with and have a strap that attaches around your foot.) I was on 5 kilos - my usual weight and yet i was using up more air than normal. I later discovered i had a dodgy valve on my regulator. Basically, it was free-flowing, which means even when you're not inhaling, air is still being used up... This meant my dive was only about 50 minutes when i should have been down about an hour or so. Not good. but we were out on the boat all day, stopping for lunch on Sipadan, so i went onto my alternate which was better but still using more air than it should have been.... The second dive was at Coral Garden... an absolutely amazing reef and i think this was my favourite dive out of all ot the dives i had one so far... We saw sooo many man-sized turtles it was amazing, even people who had been diving years said they had never seen so many massive turtles in all their dives put together! I appreciate i was very lucky... Even managed to witness the turtle-wash - so called because turtles go where cleaner fish are waiting to perform their task of nibbling away the dirt before the turtle moves off happily clean, and the next comes along! One in particluar turtle we saw resting was humongous! - And back on the boat our guide said he must have been around 120 years old! ... The thrid and final dive of the day was back at Barracuda point; at first i was thinking 'there are so many amazing dive sights around here, why go back to the same spot as this morning?' - but when i got there i realised why; literally saw thousads of barracuda and swam up in the funnel they create; - this actually dispelled that little bit of fear i had of them - however, whether it's sharks, barracudas, stonefish or whatever, it's their territory and i think it's healthy to have a little respect for them and their underwater home... Day two...They long and short of this day was i wanted to get my wreck course done, - thus means after 3 more speciality dives, i'd be qualified to penetrate wreks, map them and such - generally be trained to dive them safely and not get lost, tangled or die in one...However, the first dive of the day on the wreck sight didn;t quite happen. My guide was also acting instructor to 3 divers doing their PADI Advanced... and my buddy was a fellow Columbian diver with about 40 dives under his belt and myself were in the water waiting for them... By the time we were all kitted up and in the water, the current had caused us and the boat to drift somewhat - the wreck sight was not marked as all the previuos buoys and lines get cut by locals who want to use them for their fishing! Fair enough, but this meant we'd lost the wreck in bad visibility water. We dived anyway and made it a fun dive. We surfaced, but there was no boat! It had deserted us! Turned out, after it headed back 15 minutes after us bobbing on the surface, that there was an engine problem the driver was trying to fix - still, the boat should NEVER leave the dive sight until all divers are on board!! Had to head back to the dive shop, discuss the issue with the boss and made him let us all give us the non-wreck dive as a freebie - and do 3 more dives that day as fun-dives... We got more fuel and fresh tanks - and set off the second time from the harbor... We headed to Sibuan Island.. beautiful! And this was the first time i'd properly gone exploring under water, just myself and my buddy - while the Advanced divers did their skills and whatnot... Was amazing and even though too many things went wrong that day to mention, i still had an amazing following 3 dives! However on the way back to the harbour in the late afternoon, to get fresh tanks and fuel for our night dive, one of our 2 engines cut out - which meant what should have been a 20 min journey took over 2 hours... At least there was a beautiful sunset we witnessed out at sea! But this was somewhat tainted by an Open water diver we'd picked up with his instructor along the way (- they'd waited on Sibuan beach for our boat) unfortunately had a dodgy tummy, and he approached myself and the other divers and said, "I'm so sorry, i cannot hold it" - SO we all faced the other way whilst he emptied hie bowels off the back of our boat! However, after our night dive, we speedily headed back to our accommodations and back to the dive shop to meet the boss and our guide as they were taking us out for dinner! So it wasn't all that bad - despite myself have a wrong-fitting BCD, a too big wetsuit, a faulty regulator; with a free-flowing valve (so all my dives were done on my regulator), crap fins, the engine cutting out, the losing of the wreck, and of course not actually completing my course... I ended the day with a smile on my face! :)
The following morning i left Semporna for Sandakan. Where i had my own private room! Wih private bathroom! With air conditioning (an absolute treat when it's 39 degrees outside)! And an additional TV! - However, this was still the cheapest accomodation in the whole town... - not really that cut-out for backpackers on a budget! Thus means i only stayed a night, and then a day later i headed for Kota Kinabalu; and here I am!
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