Trip report - Layang Layang & Sipadan

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VK - 14 Jun 2007 12:22 GMT

Just got back from Malaysia - trip report & photos here:
http://www.photosafariindia.com/articles/Borneo/borneo_may07_1.html

Cheers,
Vandit

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ben bradlee - 16 Jun 2007 13:09 GMT

> Just got back from Malaysia - trip report & photos here:
> http://www.photosafariindia.com/articles/Borneo/borneo_may07_1.html

Wow. Very good.

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chilly - 16 Jun 2007 22:58 GMT

> Just got back from Malaysia - trip report & photos here:
> http://www.photosafariindia.com/articles/Borneo/borneo_may07_1.html
>
> Cheers,
> Vandit

Your conclusions on the diving at Mabul and Sipadan mirror my own. Though,
I prefer to stay on Mabul.

Thanks for posting such a wonderful report.

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VK - 17 Jun 2007 09:24 GMT

Thanks for the kind words, Ben & S.

And yeah, in future, we are going to skip that hotbed of culture and
excitement that is Semporna and stay in Mabul. It is against my
religion to pay the amount of money that SWV charges when there are
more reasonable alternatives, so I think we'll stay at either Borneo
Divers or the Seaventures oil rig.

Where did you stay and did they do dawn/sunrise dives to Sipadan?

Vandit

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chilly - 18 Jun 2007 02:29 GMT

> Thanks for the kind words, Ben & S.
>
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> more reasonable alternatives, so I think we'll stay at either Borneo
> Divers or the Seaventures oil rig.

I stayed at Borneo Divers on Mabul and was very pleased. That said, it was
brand new at the time.

> Where did you stay and did they do dawn/sunrise dives to Sipadan?

Can't say. When I was there, I stayed at Borneo Divers *on* Sipadan. A
mere couple of months later, the island was closed to overnight guests.

There is another place on Mabul called SMART or something like that. It
seems to have received some good press from time to time. I can only speak
to Borneo Divers and their level of service of me from the time they picked
me up at the airport at Kota Kinabulu and until they dropped me back off,
was superb.

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Steve Kramer - 18 Jun 2007 03:56 GMT

>> Thanks for the kind words, Ben & S.
>>
[quoted text clipped - 17 lines]
> me up at the airport at Kota Kinabulu and until they dropped me back off,
> was superb.

We stayed at 'SMART' (Sipadan-Mabul-Resort) and loved everything about
it. Large comfortable rooms, well prepared dive masters, good briefings,
fabulous foods, nice pool/bar and jacuzzi, for after dive relaxing, sand
and palm trees for ambiance, 4-6 dives daily, and at the time most of
them to Sipadan with lunch breaks in a little cove around the side of
Sip (I believe this is not permitted any longer.) There were muck dives
under the oil rig and to Kappalai, with new nudibranchs to see on every
dive and lots of Mandarin Fish to see at Kappalai, and of course
several dives a day to Sipadan. Never more than 6-8 divers in a boat
team. There were always plenty of filled tanks on the beach for anyone
who wanted to make some early morning or latter evening dives, a cave
diving instructor to take you into the Turtle Cave if you wanted to go
beyond the cable, and beach luaus once or twice a week under the palms.

Pickup in Kota Kinabalu and hand held all the way to Mabul and back,
with a day off to spend sight seeing around KK. We go back...

Steve Kramer
"PhotoEnvisions" Photography
Chiang Mai, Thailand
http://www.photoenvisions.com

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-hh - 18 Jun 2007 11:48 GMT

> Thanks for the kind words, Ben & S.

You can add mine too it as well - - nicely presented. I also
appreciated your words on camera gear selection.

-hh

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VK - 18 Jun 2007 13:13 GMT

Thanks as well, hh.

We got lucky with North Borneo - of the 4 days we dived, we had 3
people on the boat on 1 day (including us), 4 people on the 2nd day
and just us on the last 2 days. That was nice, as we were able to do
the dives at my slow, falling-asleep pace.

Steve - they stil allow people to get off at Sipadan for lunch.
SMART sounds pretty good, I think we'll check it out as well.

Vandit

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