29th to 3rd October - Perhentian Islands
Our day began still on Koh Phangan with a ferry we were told arrived at 10:00AM, turns out our information was completely wrong and getting down into Malaysia was going to be a lot more difficult that first thought. With a wait near the ferry until 3:00PM, on the mainland of Thailand it didn’t get much better, we waited a few more hours until nearly 8:00PM before catching a night bus for a further 11 hours to the boarder! It was the longest day we had endured yet racking up well over 24hrs. A brisk walk at sunrise got us to the Malaysian boarder and through we went, ready to begin yet more travel to the Perhentian Islands. I don’t know how but i began speaking to a local guy, he was quite possibly the happiest man i’ve ever seen, he had travelled loads himself and went off telling me about his journeys to England, Canada, Italy etc. He gave us loads of tips for our destination and after we failed at bartering a taxi to the right price he actually argued for us and got a price everyone was happy with! His wife wasn’t too happy for waiting around whilst he helped us, i think they were off to Thailand themselves for a little holiday. I felt like i was back to real travelling once more, Thailand sapped that drive i had in other countries, everywhere we visited was built for tourists and you don’t see the real people of the country. After an hours drive there we are again sat on a tiny speed boat shooting towards what could only be described as paradise! The two islands looked beautiful with white sand beaches and crystal clear waters, in comparison to other islands we had visited there was nothing on Kecil, the smaller of the two. We chose this as our home and grabbed somewhere with air conditioning for the first night, mainly to recover after the journey.
What came over the next two days was such a shame as we had high hopes for Perhentian, every meal we had on the island was average at best, as an example, i ordered a spaghetti carbonara one evening, i know that typically Western food is worse but its never horrendous. The cream and butter had split making it look grim but half way through i decided to tilt the plate and sure enough i managed to pour around 100ml of oil straight out of the pasta. I wanted to complain but with the staff being so relaxed they just wouldn’t of cared even if i did. One restaurant actually turned us away because the chef “couldn’t be bothered to make anything”. We were in paradise but angered at the lack of enthusiasm the people there had. Luckily on our third and final day the entire place was redeemed with the smallest of things. We simply booked a snorkelling trip which turned into one of the best activities in Asia so far. Our boat driver and guide topped it off with generally being great! He couldn’t of been better and instantly glued with the whole group, tormenting me with the fear of sharks and even throwing bread at us whilst were in the water so fish swarm at us! It was a great laugh. The coral and array of fish was insane, i’d never seen anything like it and we had so much time there. The fish in a multitude of colours would swim all around you, hundreds of them. Each time we got back into the sea we thought it couldn’t get any better until i scratched a big thing off my bucket list, our guide took us to turtle point and went around gently until he spotted one about 10-12 meters down and in we got. I got the chance to swim literally side by side with this huge turtle, i kept up with it swimming for some time before the turtle began going deeper. It was absolutely amazing and even now i’ve a smile across my face that i got to do it! To top the whole day off i moderately conquered my fear of sharks! After a few moments of panic stood in the boat, our guide threw fish heads into the sea to lure the sharks and shortly after i was in as well. The black tip sharks never got too close thankfully and i’m so glad i did it! At one point i saw three swimming together with the largest being around a meter and a half. Sure they’re not great whites but this will do for now!
I felt like i could now leave the island happy in knowing i’ve got the most out of it. I’d still advise anybody to visit just for that experience, the near no wifi, electricity blackouts for up to six hours and the feeling of being cut off from the outside world was actually really good. It allowed you to remember the fun of exploring and just lounging around. Wifi i’ve found out here is typically just a distraction. If i could access my blogs and photographs just once a week, i’d be happy with that!
Our day began still on Koh Phangan with a ferry we were told arrived at 10:00AM, turns out our information was completely wrong and getting down into Malaysia was going to be a lot more difficult that first thought. With a wait near the ferry until 3:00PM, on the mainland of Thailand it didn’t get much better, we waited a few more hours until nearly 8:00PM before catching a night bus for a further 11 hours to the boarder! It was the longest day we had endured yet racking up well over 24hrs. A brisk walk at sunrise got us to the Malaysian boarder and through we went, ready to begin yet more travel to the Perhentian Islands. I don’t know how but i began speaking to a local guy, he was quite possibly the happiest man i’ve ever seen, he had travelled loads himself and went off telling me about his journeys to England, Canada, Italy etc. He gave us loads of tips for our destination and after we failed at bartering a taxi to the right price he actually argued for us and got a price everyone was happy with! His wife wasn’t too happy for waiting around whilst he helped us, i think they were off to Thailand themselves for a little holiday. I felt like i was back to real travelling once more, Thailand sapped that drive i had in other countries, everywhere we visited was built for tourists and you don’t see the real people of the country. After an hours drive there we are again sat on a tiny speed boat shooting towards what could only be described as paradise! The two islands looked beautiful with white sand beaches and crystal clear waters, in comparison to other islands we had visited there was nothing on Kecil, the smaller of the two. We chose this as our home and grabbed somewhere with air conditioning for the first night, mainly to recover after the journey.
What came over the next two days was such a shame as we had high hopes for Perhentian, every meal we had on the island was average at best, as an example, i ordered a spaghetti carbonara one evening, i know that typically Western food is worse but its never horrendous. The cream and butter had split making it look grim but half way through i decided to tilt the plate and sure enough i managed to pour around 100ml of oil straight out of the pasta. I wanted to complain but with the staff being so relaxed they just wouldn’t of cared even if i did. One restaurant actually turned us away because the chef “couldn’t be bothered to make anything”. We were in paradise but angered at the lack of enthusiasm the people there had. Luckily on our third and final day the entire place was redeemed with the smallest of things. We simply booked a snorkelling trip which turned into one of the best activities in Asia so far. Our boat driver and guide topped it off with generally being great! He couldn’t of been better and instantly glued with the whole group, tormenting me with the fear of sharks and even throwing bread at us whilst were in the water so fish swarm at us! It was a great laugh. The coral and array of fish was insane, i’d never seen anything like it and we had so much time there. The fish in a multitude of colours would swim all around you, hundreds of them. Each time we got back into the sea we thought it couldn’t get any better until i scratched a big thing off my bucket list, our guide took us to turtle point and went around gently until he spotted one about 10-12 meters down and in we got. I got the chance to swim literally side by side with this huge turtle, i kept up with it swimming for some time before the turtle began going deeper. It was absolutely amazing and even now i’ve a smile across my face that i got to do it! To top the whole day off i moderately conquered my fear of sharks! After a few moments of panic stood in the boat, our guide threw fish heads into the sea to lure the sharks and shortly after i was in as well. The black tip sharks never got too close thankfully and i’m so glad i did it! At one point i saw three swimming together with the largest being around a meter and a half. Sure they’re not great whites but this will do for now!
I felt like i could now leave the island happy in knowing i’ve got the most out of it. I’d still advise anybody to visit just for that experience, the near no wifi, electricity blackouts for up to six hours and the feeling of being cut off from the outside world was actually really good. It allowed you to remember the fun of exploring and just lounging around. Wifi i’ve found out here is typically just a distraction. If i could access my blogs and photographs just once a week, i’d be happy with that!
The 'almost' deserted island we planned to stay on for a few days!
And our 30 minute boat journey to the island was on a fairly small boat
This is just to show how crystal clear and blue the water was
We were literally surrounded by thousands of these fish whilst snorkelling
Me after just jumping in!
One of the turtles we swam by throughout the day
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