This was my first trip meeting up with a buddy and also my first time visiting Kota Kinabalu. It only took 15 minutes from the airport by taxi to reach this small town.. I was surprised to see so many local Chinese, the highest percentage compared to Malays and there were few Indians. More surprisingly, the local Chinese speaks Malay without their original accent unlike those we meet in Kuala Lumpur. Not much variety of Chinese food but at least get to taste their Bak Kut Teh (Herbal Pork Rib Soup), one of my favorites. We met at Best Western Hotel where the wi-fi never worked. We have to get to nearby restaurants for the connection to book another hotel.
We book 3 dives online with Downbelow Dive Centre and dove Tungku Abdul Rahman Park (TARP) at RM350 each (not cheap ha!). It was utter disappointment when we realized the visibility was so bad. There was nothing much to shoot except to ourselves. We went for 3 dives and that was all. The next day we decided to go to Pulau Tiga and stayed for 2 nights. The beach was quiet and a beautiful sunset. Lots of hammocks but there were lots of mozies and sandflies too! We did our very first shore dive together without the dive guide and felt the ocean belong to just the two of us. During our stay, we were the only divers and the rest of the guests mainly did snorkelling. There was schooling yellow snappers and baby barracudas, some common nudibranch, sea slugs and lionfish. The corals are nothing much to comment about yet we had a great time shooting each other.
The hike uphill to soak in the volcano mud was an experience. It took 30 minutes to reach for 10 minutes bath. Since it was reputated to be able to heal skin problems and improve complexion, I think it did for my leg ulcers but not the rash from the wetsuit though. In the evenings, we enjoyed Karaoke and pool in a room without aircon. Now I hear the way Garry sings! lol but we had a great time.
Towards my departure, I felt some pain on my right wrist again. It did not bother me until a few days later when it seriously swell with unrelenting pain. This has been written in detail on my post Tendinitis again on my other blog.
