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Ahh, life in the islands. A very relaxed cat at one of the Tioman kampungs.

A father and son team working the pier at Salang Beach, Tioman.

Tropical Bliss: The Report from Tioman

Will Moss, 7/7/1996

Myths and Legends
.....Somewhere, in a fictional South Seas, there is an imaginary tropical island gifted with the lyrical name of Bali Ha'i. Created by Rodgers and Hammerstein for the musical South Pacific, it is a tropical idyll of cerulean waters, white sandy beaches, where the beach is lined with coconut palms, and a dark, picturesque jungle soars from the edge of the sand into mist shrouded obscurity. Under the gentle waters colorful fish flicker and click around the elkhorn and brain coral, receding only occasionally from a distant shadow in the water that hints at veiled, predatory menace.
.....On an island like Bali Ha'i, you could fritter away your days in satisfied lethargy, browning in the hot sun, and then bathing in the warm seas. You could bathe in cool mountain streams that flow down from the pristine heights of the jungle, and lie on the beach with a cool drink as you watch the full moon glide through the chiaroscuro night, occasionally crossed by the silent span of a giant fruit bat. Finally, exhausted, you might retire to your cabin, bathed in the breeze from your fan as it rustles through the mosquito netting.
.....Fantasy you might say? Well I've seen it. Literally. The West Malaysian island of Pulau Tioman was our destination last weekend, and a tropical paradise it was. Although not as isolated as South Pacific's Bali Ha'i, there is, in fact, a real connection. Parts of South Pacific were filmed on Tioman, and some say that it is the inspiration for Bali Ha'i. Looking at the island from the sea, it's easy to see why. Tioman is a gorgeous, narrow island about thirty kilometers around, three hours fast sail north of Singapore. It's rain forest covered hills rise sharply from sandy beaches to peaks about a thousand meters high, shrouded in semi-perpetual mist. It is a popular tourist destination, but still manages to avoid the feel of being overdeveloped. After many attempts and false starts, the Games Online crew finally stuck it together to spend a weekend on Tioman. Fifteen of us went out, and it was the best weekend many of us have had in a long time.

Preparation
.....We had attempted one previous mass trip to Malaysia, a few weeks before. The plan then had been for ten or twelve of us to drive up through West Malaysia to a remote seaside village where we were planning on staying in a cheap kampung on the beach. As you may recall from Report from Singapore 5, that trip fell through, and we compensated with a day long excursion to the semi-gross Indonesian island of Batam (not to be confused with the tourist paradise of Bintan). That trip ended in the ill-fated ferry terminal nightmare. That experience had made us cautious about trip planning, but we were still determined to mount an expedition.
.....We had contractors doing some work on our office, and the air conditioning was going to be off Monday and Tuesday. Since the office was going to be uninhabitable, we gave everyone those two days off. The four day weekend seemed like a perfect opportunity to try once again to get away from it all. Mike, Leisha and Rob polled people in the office, and did a bunch of legwork, and eventually decided that Tioman would be a good two-day getaway for everyone. Fifteen people in the office decided to go, so Rob collected passport information from everyone and booked tickets on the ferry, and Leisha booked cheap accommodation for us at chalet operations on the beach. It wasn't a holiday weekend, so there was plenty of space available. There was a little suspense while we waited to see if the work would actually be approved and go ahead ( we had been having trouble with the Polytechnic and one of the contractors), but in the end everything worked out and the trip was on.

Voyage
.....The ferry to Tioman leaves once a day. It is run by Sembawang Maritime's Auto Batam ferry subsidiary, so we got a substantial discount on the tickets (from $140 sing down to $80). That is one of the few tangible benefits of working for Sembawang, especially since we plan on plenty more ferry trips. The ferry is a sleek, fast gas-turbine job that makes about 30 knots. The trip takes about three and a half hours, leaving at 830 AM and arriving at Tioman at noon. You can fly little twin prop jobs to Tioman, as there is a small airport, but it is considerably more expensive, and the approach to the tiny airstrip, nestled at the base of the mountain, is truly hairy. None of us complained about the boat, so that's the way we went.
.....There was a brief bit of panic the morning of our departure when the cab Koji, Mike and I took us to the wrong ferry terminal. He brought us to Changi Terminal rather than Tana Merah, insisting that they were the same place. I think it was an honest mistake, but they are most certainly not the same place. It was early in the morning, and we were lucky enough to catch another cab to the right terminal, and made it with ten minutes before check in closed. Amazingly enough, every one of our party of fifteen showed up on time, and off we went.
.....The boat trip was fairly uneventful. There ferries are entirely enclosed, which is too bad, but it is a rather nice sail up the Eastern coast of Peninsular Malaysia. The water is very smooth this time of year. The scenery on the way was not bad. We passed an island we thought was a volcano, but it turned out to be simply a sharp peak with a perpetual cloud at the top from wind currents. Leisha explained that there are no volcanoes in Malaysia, only in Indonesia. We also saw a lot of flying fish, which I had never seen before. They would jump out of the ferry's wake. For little, six inch fish it is amazing how far they can fly, often being out of the water for almost ten seconds at a time. It took us a while to realize that they were skipping, bouncing off of the crests of swells and flipping their tails a few times to stay airborne. It was quite cool to watch. Once Rob and I saw some large animal in the water make two huge splashes about three hundred yards off the bow. There were no marine mammals around, so it must have been a large fish, like a marlin or manta ray jumping. I wish we'd had a clearer look.
.....Eventually Tioman came into view. We were all quite impressed with how beautiful it was. The steep, green mountainside, the incredibly clear blue water, and the perpetual mist at the summit made for quite a picturesque tableaux. We pulled up at the main ferry pier, which is by the large, rather glossy Berjaya resort and hotel. This is, to my knowledge, the only big, touristy resort on Tioman. It is quite something, and it has a gorgeous stretch of beach, but we were looking for a slightly more rustic experience. Most of the accommodations on Tioman are "chalet" places. These are operations that rent out beach-side cabins of various quality, ranging from simple shacks to fairly luxurious air-conditioned rooms with full bathrooms. Most of them fall in the middle of the road, with beds, electricity, and bathrooms with cold running water, but no air-conditioning.
.....We had to take a water taxi from Berjaya to the stretch of beach where we were staying. Leisha and her sister, Anne, handled the hardcore bargaining with the Taxi operator, eventually wearing him down from the Gwai Loh special price of fifteen ringgit to the more thrifty eight ringgit per person. We forged our way down some incredibly slick, algae covered stone stairs to the taxi. We managed to get everyone into two water taxis without anyone going into the drink, but Vincent picked up a lovely shiner on his hip when he slipped badly. The open water taxis took about ten minutes to ferry us to our stretch of beach. The strip of beach where we were staying was rocky, but pretty serviceable. There were some nice sandy stretches. The water itself was lovely, but more on that later. Everything was quite picturesque. The jungle began right behind the chalets, which was very nice.
.....Our crew of fifteen was booked into rooms at two adjoining places, ABC Cottages, and Nazri II Accommodations. Mike and I shared a room that was completely typical. It was a small duplex cottage with two bedrooms (Florence and Honi took the other room, and Melvin and Mun Ying stayed in a cabin behind ours), each with a bathroom and a fan. There was a narrow porch with some chairs, and they even supplied toilet paper, which we had been warned to bring. We had also brought mosquito netting, but it turned out to be unnecessary as our room was totally enclosed. The double room Mike and I split was thirty-five ringgit a night, which is equal to about $17 US, or $8.50 per night per person. Pretty damn cheap, considering Berjaya (which is run by Best Western) is over 200 ringgit a night, and to stay anyplace in Hawaii or the Virgins might cost two or three times that.
.....The stretch of beach we were on had five or six operations like this all strung together, each with eight or ten cottages with a couple rooms each. They all have their own outdoor restaurants which double as bars at night. Service tends to run at a crawl, and much of the food is deep fried, but with a little prospecting you can find some good eats, like prawns, or barbecued shark. And it is all dirt cheap. We spent an average of about 7 ringgit per person per meal, or less than $4 US. You could eat cheaper than that if you wanted. I think, when we go back, we might bring a little food of our own, however, as the menu could get tiresome. Of course if you need a slick dinner, you can always take a water taxi to Berjaya and eat at one of the upscale restaurants there.

Settling In
.....One thing we noticed quite soon was the obvious wildlife. On Tioman, unlike Singapore, the local wildlife has not been paved into oblivion. We saw a two foot monitor lizard as we were walking from the water taxi to check in. In the two days to follow we would see plenty other examples of the local wildlife. We also saw dozens of cats. Every chalet operation seems to have about eight or ten cats, which appear to be doing well off of scraps, lizards, and the like. Most of them look pretty sleek, although there was one extremely shabby, pitiful black kitten lurking around ABC. He may be destined to end up on some monitor's dinner menu some night, but as the matronly, British proprietor of ABC told me, "I though that manky kitten was on his last legs two months ago, but he's still here," so maybe he'll beat the odds. (Manky is Brit slang for nasty.) The little guy was quite affectionate, and I had my cat lover's desire to scoop him up and take him home, but we have our hands full with the Beast From Hell in Rob and Paul's apartment. The cats are strictly left to fend for themselves, and not treated as pets, but I expect they do a good job of vermin control and are not discouraged either. Most of them are very friendly, and will go to great lengths to make your acquaintance, particularly at the outdoor restaurants.
.....We enjoyed a quick, deep fried lunch at the ABC Cottages restaurant, and then decided that it was time for an inaugural snorkeling. Leshia's sister believed that the snorkeling was better at the next beach over, so we set out on a fifteen minute hike. It turned out to be a fifteen minute hike on a rugged trail over a steep hill, but, on the far side, was indeed a nice beach. Unfortunately, it was very rocky and there were lots of sea urchins as soon as the water was over two feet deep. I had bought wetsuit booties along with my new mask and fins, so it wasn't much trouble for me, but some of our less experienced snorkelers had a rough go of it getting out to deeper water. I gave some initial snorkeling tips to everyone, and we were rewarded with some great skin diving. Starting in about six feet of water, and continuing out to about 20 feet there are gorgeous patches of reef dotting the sand. There are lots of parrot fish and wrasse, angelfish, damsel fish, and small moray eel, and other colorful creatures in the water. The water itself ranges from 90 degree bath water at the top layer to only mildly cooler below. It is a pleasure to dive in. After a while, several of our crew hiked back to ABC. A few of us decided to swim back to our beach, which was easier than the hike over the hill. Along the way we encountered a jetty at the end of which was a vast school of small, anchovy like fish. It was quite an experience to hang in the middle of this school, surrounded by a giant cylinder of silvery fish.
.....After the dive, Leshia and Anne lead us to a small spring behind ABC. Apparently this spring runs down from the mountain, and is completely pristine. The water is very cool, and drinkable. Someone had constructed a bamboo pipe that emptied a stream of water onto a rock overlooking a small pool, so we all took turns sitting under the pipe and letting the cool spring water wash over us. It was a perfect way to rinse the salt off after a skin diving session. Near the pool Rob spotted a vine snake crossing the path. He told me about it and I, being the snake appreciator, made him take me back and show me where he had seen it. Sure enough, there was a brilliant, emerald green snake crawling up a bush by the trail. It was over a yard long, but no thicker than a pencil. I was excited, never having seen one outside of a zoo before, and I stuck my face into the bush to get a picture before it vanished into the treetops.
.....Most of the evening was spent in pure relaxation. We enjoyed a nice dinner at the ABC restaurant. Shortly before dusk the, small bats came out. They had learned to pick off the bugs from around the outdoor lights, and they would fly through the restaurant at eye level. It was quite surreal to watch them flit about in the waning daylight. Many cats also took advantage of mealtime to prowl around the restaurant chairs, looking for handouts.
.....Later that evening, the big bats came out. Malaysia is home to the flying fox, the largest bat in the world, and there is a healthy population of them on Tioman. They flew over the treetops while Rob and I watched them from the beach below, enjoying some refreshing, and, by Singaporean standards, fabulously cheap beer. Many of the other crew went back to Honi and Florence's cabin for a game of Pictionary. There was some loose talk about plans for the next day, but I made loud noises about my only plan being to have no plan, and that was the end of that. By the time 11:00 rolled around, we were all crushed, and I don't think any of us had trouble falling asleep. The cottages were very comfortable, and the mosquitoes were far less trouble then we though they would be. Mike and I did burn a mosquito coil in our room just to be sure, and I had to kill a largish cockroach that seemed determined to take up residence over my head, but it was a good night's rest.

Day Two
.....The next day we tried to pack in as much activity as possible, knowing that this was our real chance for a good time before heading home the next day. Rob and I started the day with breakfast at the Nazri restaurant, from which I was lucky enough to notice that a flying lizard had made a home for itself in the nearby palm trees. This little guy has small, flat wings projecting from his ribs, between his front legs and hind legs. Periodically, he will get tired of one tree, climb as high as he can, and fly to the next one over. I saw him cover about forty feet at one jump, with unerring accuracy. He glided gently downward and towards the distant trunk, and then pulled up suddenly at the end, landing smack with all four little claws. He was quite an aerobat, and a lot of fun to watch. He did dawdle, though, sometimes taking ten or fifteen minutes between jumps.
.....Leshia and Anne suggested that we hike a short ways down the coast to a beach that was designated as a nature preserve. On the way down we passed some trees in which the flying foxes were roosting. It was cool to see them all hanging upside down from the palm trees like black, hairy fruit, shrieking loudly at each other. Once we got to the beach we found that it was marvelously wide and sandy, and it was a very easy place to enter the water. I spent some more time dispensing snorkeling tips, and Mike, despite his lack of experience, did a great job coaching people as well (had literally held Florence's hand the previous day when she had snorkeled for the first time). Unfortunately, it was also nothing but sand a considerable ways out. We had to swim a couple of hundred yards around the point before we found any coral. There was a pier there, however, that ended in about twenty feet of water. Around the pier there were lines anchored to sunken oil drums, one of which hosted a cute little moray eel. The highlight, however, was a large school of ten inch long spotted fish that seemed to hang out at the end of the pier. I took Rob's disposable underwater camera down to the limits of it's depth tolerance (4 meters) and managed to get rather a nice shot of the fish.
.....While we were hanging out on the beach, playing around in the shallow water, an astounding lizard pranced out of the underbrush and sat himself square on top of Koji's sand castle. He was emerald green with a blue jaw, red wattle, and a banded tail more than twice as long as the body. This must have been the most vain lizard in the world, knowing it was beautiful, because it posed calmly while about eight of us gathered closely around snapping pictures. It even stood still while Koji and I played with its tail.
.....After that, it was back to the spring for our requisite post swim sit in the cold spring, and lunch. Then, since it was just too damn inviting, back into the water for another snorkeling session. So seven or eight of us suited up again after a short digestion break and trudged back into the ocean off of our own beach. This proved to be a most interesting dive. Right away I found a small moray eel and a lionfish, which are very poisonous if you get spined, but very beautiful. Honi, Paul and I were a good ways around the point in about ten feet of water when Honi suddenly looked up and said, "I've just seen a shark!" Of course, I, the trained marine biology type, was ready to scoff, sure that she had seen some other large species fish. Sharks, particularly the small tropical reef sharks, are quite shy around people. I had never seen a shark from in the water, either while snorkeling or SCUBA diving. So I said, "Are you sure? You probably saw something else." Honi said that she was quite sure, and pointed in the direction it had gone. I stuck my head under the water and looked where she had pointed, and sure enough there was A GIANT BLACK TIP REEF SHARK! And then the brief jolt of adrenaline wore off, and I reassessed its size at a more pedestrian three feet or so (they get up to six). Boy, they look bigger through that face mask, though. This one was clearly nothing to worry about as he was swimming away from us as fast as its little fins would take it. I watched as he faded into the blue, and then I lifted my head up and said, "Whaddaya know, you did see a shark!" Paul had missed the shark, and was disappointed. He started striking out in the direction the shark had gone before he realized that he was following a shark, at which point he reconsidered, and continued with us.
.....We came around the point and rendezvoused with the rest of our gang. "Guess what I saw?" I said.
....."Lemme guess, something really cool," said Rob.
....."A shark!" Reactions ranged from disappointment from Rob to a brief look of horror on Florence's face before I assures her that it was not a dangerous shark. In retrospect, it is really a good thing that the Shark didn't choose to swim underneath the main group of snorkelers. Many of our crowd were doing it for the first time and still had ocean anxiety. I suspect that there would have been a bit of a panic before I could explain that it was a harmless specimen. Heck, I knew that, and it even gave me a jolt.
.....Most of the others were headed in, but Honi wanted to continue down the beach, so I went with her. The sun was creeping down, and the lengthening shadows on the reef made everything look very mysterious. That, along with the shark sighting kept my adrenaline level high. It turned out to be a good stretch of snorkeling, though. Honi has good eyes under water, and, in addition to be the first person to see the shark she also spotted some of the largest giant clams I saw while diving there, as well as two impressive young groupers and a truly spectacular, full grown moray eel a good six feet long. She was lurking in very shallow water for such a large eel, so it was a pleasure to see her. I wish I had a photograph. She was being worked over by a cleaner wrasse, and every minute or so she would twitch, and when she did, every other fish around that chunk of coral would bolt. Honi and I hovered over here for several minutes before continuing on.
.....We had been in the water for two and a half hours when we finally emerged. There was time for another quick dip in the cold spring, and then it was dinner.

The Therapeutic Value of Giant Hairy Bats
.....After dinner, Rob and I bought a few beers and retired down to the water's edge for some peaceful reflection. It had been a great trip, but we were still part of a party of fifteen people, and we needed some peace and quiet. We sat on some rocks by the water's edge and relaxed. One of the local cats climbed up onto Rob's rock and snuggled itself into the small of his back.
.....Honi and Koji talked the ABC staff into building a bonfire for us on the beach, and once that got going, Rob and I moved up there. Arthur played his Ukulele, and we all sat around and drank beers and traded stories on the beach. A full moon was crossing the zenith, so Rob and I lay back and watched the giant bats glide across the treetops. It really made the stress and frustration of Sembawang and Singapore seem a long, long way away. We reflected that we were really lucky to be kicked back on this beach, under the tropical moon, nursing a nice cold one and watching giant hairy bats glide overhead. The bats, in particular, offered just the right, exotic, tropical touch to the whole atmosphere. Rob and I reflected that we would always be at peace as long as we could watch giant hairy bats flying around. Since returning from Tioman, we have used the mantra "giant hairy bats" to calm ourselves during our regular moments of crisis.

Back to Singapore
.....And so the following morning we gathered together our things and struck out for home. We caught a water taxi back to the Berjaya resort. We had to check in a couple of hours before the ferry departed, so most of us went to lunch at one of the Berjaya resorts. Honi decided to get one last dive in. There was a small island about 200 yards offshore at Berjaya. Honi found a local dive guide who took her on a lap of the island, where she saw two large sea turtles and another shark. She clearly attracts sharks, so we have reservations about diving with her in the future. Eventually the boat boarded, and we headed back to Singapore.
.....We all pretty much agreed that we were leaving much too soon, and we could comfortably spend another week. Rob, Mike and I regretted not having the time to hike the trail that goes over the mountain at the center of the island to the opposite coast. It is supposed to be about a three or four hour hike, and we are planning on it for our next visit. We also plan on going as a much smaller group next time, perhaps five or six. It was good to take the gang this time, but I think for our next visit we would like to manage a smaller group. On the other hand it is remarkable that, during the whole trip, everything worked out perfectly. Considering some of the luck that usually dogs the Games Online crowd, that is something of a minor miracle.
.....Mike and Joe caught the SCUBA bug while we were skin diving out there, so they are beginning classes along with Hardie to get certified next week. Then we are all going up to Pulau Aur in Malaysia for their certification dives. (Since I am already certified, I am going along as a recreational diver just to hang out.) Rob may be joining them as well. Then, after GenCon, we intend to go back and dive Tioman. There is a dive shop near where we stayed, and Mike has read that there is a sunken Japanese warship that you can dive on off of the other side of the island.
.....One thing is certain. We will go back. If for nothing other than the relaxing sight of giant hairy bats winging through the moonlight.

Will Moss
7/9/96