Above: Jerry’s catamaran.
Flying to Kota Kinabalu
Today I am travelling for pleasure again, to Kota Kinabalu on the way to my dives at Sipadan. Friend Stephen took me out for lunch before dropping me at Kuching airport about 2h before my 1525 departure on Malaysia Airlines.
A friend Elena had commented that this trip, during a pandemic, I had been to more places than some people in their entire lives!
At the airport, there wasn’t a queue at the Malaysia Airlines counter so I dropped in to have my documents checked. I had a mobile boarding pass and wasn’t sure if there would be hassles at boarding if my various documents hadn’t been checked for this interstate flight. They wanted to check my health declaration and vaccination for entry into Sabah. With that done, I was issued a paper boarding pass kinda to show that my documents had been checked. As it turned out, they allowed plenty of time at the gate holding room for checking people who hadn’t presented themselves at the counter.
With an hour spare till boarding, I went to the AirAsia counter to verify my facial recognition (FACES) enrolment with my updated passport. The queue took about 30 mins but I would have been hanging around somewhere otherwise.
Airside, I received notification of a 20 min delay. The flight had been upgauged from a B737 to a A330. There had been a delayed departure on the very first flight this morning and the longer turnaround of a widebody probably contributed to the delay through the day.
We eventually pushed back about 10 min late. As we waited on the taxiway, another A330 landed and trundled to the far end of the runway where it sat for a long time. Then the pilot announced that a runway inspection was needed. It was a 20 min wait before I saw the signs of a vehicle on the runway. Near our end of the runway, it stopped and picked up a few things from the runway.
All-in-all, we took off about an hour late. Inflight, I enjoyed a chicken kurma with a snack of the best peanuts in the sky. Not bad for 1h30 flight. The crew member on my side of the plane did an extra round of drinks after the meal but not on the other side.
Delicious chicken kurma on the flight.
Meeting Jerry
Landing at 1800, I summoned a Grab car to Sutera Harbour where I met Jerry and his daughter Janice. He’s the owner of the dive centre with whom I dived with on previous trips to Sipadan. He lost the business in a marriage break-up and put me in touch with another operator whom I’m using in the coming days.
He had bought the 56 ft catamaran in Australia and sailed it back with his son over 9 months, staying put in Darwin along the way when borders were closed due to Covid-19.
Incidentally, he said in his 20 years in Malaysia, he’s never had to pay a bribe in Malaysia. I thought maybe his visa agent or business agent paid bribes on his behalf. But nope, the fees these agents charged are quite little.
After a nice chat over a beer, they dropped me off at Suria Sabah shopping mall where my hotel Suria 7, was located. I grabbed dinner at the mall before checking in around 2100.
Having a beer on Jerry’s catamaran.