Malaysia: Peninsula and Borneo - July 2006
Dear English-speaking readers, this page is an automatic translation made from a post originally written in French. My apologies for any strange sentences and funny mistakes that may have been generated during the process. If you are reading French, click on the French flag below to access the original and correct text:
Français Here I am in Perhentian Kecil, in the south of Peninsular Malaysia. I explore the island, rather very touristy, but very nice...
Installation on the beach
At the Matahari Chalets, I was unfortunately given the bungalow located right next to the restaurant. This means loud TV from morning to night and being constantly under the eyes of customers coming and going... The guy who distributes the chalets promises me another one for the next day, customers are leaving. Good.
The garden where the wooden bungalows are spread is nice, well maintained, the welcome charming. All the staff can speak a few words of French: Hello, good day, good day, goodbye, see you soon, etc. In general, the Malays who run stores on the island speak perfect English.
I signed up for the next day's dives at Coral Sky Divers and once I put my bag down, I decided to take advantage of the afternoon to explore the island a bit. It's easy, it's very small.
Two beaches and a piece of jungle
There are actually two main beaches, Long Beach and Coral BayThe other beaches and coves are isolated and can only be reached by land. The other beaches and creeks, isolated, are inaccessible by land. It is necessary to take the boat cabs.
My first impression is a bit mixed: certainly, the two beaches are very nice, but it is so tiny, this little piece of island, that I am a bit afraid to feel stuck there and to go in circles, in the long run. In fact, I will realize later that it will be the opposite: as I will dive every day, meeting new people as I go along, I will not see time passing at all.
Returning from Coral Bay by the small junglesque way, renamed by me "the way of the ferocious mosquitoes", I fall on... my Norwegians, Uhle and Teresa! They stopped in the sizzling bush of the trees, which rustle of thousand strange sounds emitted by the insects, to try to take a picture of a varan, which is hidden under a bush.
It amuses me, because I just did exactly the same thing, near the beach. These species of big prehistoric lizards are very familiar here. They roam near the houses, on the beach, in the gardens, rummage in the dustbins... But as soon as we try to approach them, they run away at full speed. Not easy to take a picture of them!
We decide to have dinner together in the evening, and we spend a very pleasant evening at one of the restaurants of the beach, drinking Tiger This is the very first time I managed to drink a beer in Malaysia. Only non-Muslims get the license to sell alcohol. And it's not always easy to find the bar or restaurant that serves it.
On this beach full of young Anglo-Saxon tourists who have come to party, there is beer everywhere, of course. A lot of Asian tourists as well: Malay, Singaporeans, Japanese, Chinese...
