Above: Docked at Mataking briefly.
Today is the first day of three days diving with Sipadan Scuba (officially North Borneo Scuba), an operator I’ve used twice before over a period of eight years. They’re very reliable in terms of guaranteeing Sipadan quota slots once booking has been made and paid for online (non-refundable though).
Our dives today are at Mataking. We set off around 0830 from behind the shop (which had moved and backs on to the “waterfront”). Leaving town I could see that the skyline of Semporna had changed to include a few more multi-storey buildings.
The ride out was about an hour. First dive site was House Reef at Mataking. It was a nice enough dive with reef fish plus a turtle in a cave. Kimball dived separately to do a refresher as it had been 2 years since his last dive.
Second dive at Mataking was Postbox or Wreck. We descended in front of a wreck. We circled it anti-clockwise and saw a good selection of marine life in reasonable visibility. From there it was a gentle drift back to House Reef. For this dive, I particularly liked the two lion fish on the wreck, the seven or so turtles (some were HUGE), two gropers and some stingrays (in addition to the usual reef fish).
After lunch, our third dive was at Timba-timba Island. This dive is remarkable and will be memorable in a bad way. Over a large part of the dive, we encountered shiny fish, big and small, on the sea bed. They were all dead from fish bombing. We had experienced an underwater explosion in the region eight years ago but can now see the underwater massacre with our own eyes. On the good side, we did see three turtles and a stingray.
Our dive inn with its guard dogs.