Arrival to serenity at Teluk Dalam

Sunday, 29 July 2012

As part of the daily ritual on Long beach, we went to the world cafe for breakfast. Once again, we all ordered the set breakfast. Anders and I decided to try the beef bacon, which turned out to be a disaster. The whole breakfast was pretty much a disaster. The waitress had our orders wrong. She thought we ordered the special breakfast, which was double the price, but included also yogurt, fruits and cereal. Then she screwed up our drinks. All of this took forever to get right and by the time we received the food, we only had 10mins to stuff it down and check out. Check out was at 11:00 and there were signs all over for late check out and the charges. We didn't want to be victims of additional charges, so we sent Anders to check us out while we collected our things. Everything worked out ok.

We were heading to Flora Bay on Teluk Dalam beach that morning. It's known to be more quiet, but beautiful. It's on the south side of Besar (Big) Island. To get there we needed a taxi boat, which was supposed to cost 20 rm for the whole boat, according to the always-so-wrong lonely planet. we went searching for this 20 rm ride. The first place we stopped, the lady tried to charge us 25 rm per person, saying that's the going rate the boat man charges. We refused, and she quickly dropped it to 20 rm. We thought it was strange how quickly it went from 25 to 20, so we decided to shop around. When we started to talk to the next boat man, that lady started butting in our conversation by saying something in Malay to the boat man. Sketchy. We continued on to the next stand and agreed on 20 rm per person. The ride literally took 5-10 mins. These guys must make a killing on these rides.

Our reservation was for Flora Bay Resort. We had to ask for an extra bed for our room, which was only an extra 25 rm a day. Not too bad. As we were checking in, a couple was complaining about their room. They explained there were ants in the room, so the dude gave them insect spray. The couple refused and further explained that there was a whole family of ants living in their bathroom. Oh my! This definitely didn't make me look forward to our room. The lady escorted us to the room. Actually it looked really nice and clean. Way better than what we slept the last five nights. We were all really satisfied with the upgrade, and it was cheaper than long beach. Only 150rm a night!

We decided to go for a lazy afternoon after organizing the rest of the stay. Anders was convinced by Joe and Luke he should give diving a try, so we wanted to book an intro dive. Also we saw lots of signs to go snorkeling at Rawa island, which is a small island off the coast of Perhentian Island, so we wanted to inquire about it. We didn't want to by chance miss anything spectacular.

It seemed natural for us to inquire these excursion with the front desk, as they were the biggest resort on our beach and it had a dive center. The male receptionist was annoyingly rude. He basically ignored us for a bit and looked at us as we were stupid for asking. Eventually the female receptionist came and directed us kindly to the dive center.

According to the guy we spoke to at the dive center, Rawa is more natural than the other location because it's further out and less popular. It was his favorite spot, but we needed to be four to take the trip. It was 55 rm per person. Luckily a couple signed up for the trip the next day, so we tagged along. We waited to sign up for the intro dive. They gave us a price of 280 rm, but we thought it was best to shop around first.

It proved to be wise. Every 15 meters we walked down the beach, the price came down by 50 rm. Eventually we found a PADI place at awana that did it for 150 rm with a German instructor, Marcus. Anders felt more confortable with Marcus because his English was better than the guys at Flora and that a German won't mess up any mechanics ;) After all that was sorted, we took a nap on the white sand beach.

The beach was utterly relaxing. It was soothing to hear the tide come in and out, with no disturbance from any man made noises like thumping house music from a bar. The water was crystal clear. We could see all the small fish swimming in the shallow water. We could walk out quite far and the water is still only at waste level. This beach was definitely more inhabited than long beach. There were tons of this black territorial fish protecting their coral. One of them totally bit anders an scared the living crap out of him. It was a good laugh to see a grown boy scream like a girl. Teluk Dalam Brach was definitely a nice and appreciated change from Long Beach.

For the evening, we had dinner at the Flora resort. Simple and delicious. I've been non stop drinking fresh juices (watermelon, guava, melon) for every meal. The boys have been non stop hunting for beers. Flora resort did not allow alcohol on their premise. I was extremely tired from the day, maybe it was the sun, or maybe it was the relaxing beach, I had to call it an early night.