Diving Spots: Pulau Tioman - Malaysian Islands - Malaysia

PULAU CHEBEH
LOCATION: Chebeh Island is located to the northwest of Tioman. The island is basically the northernmost island that makes up the Tioman archipelago. Dive boats will take about 30 minutes to get here from Salang, or slightly more if you are departing from Tekek or Air Batang. This particular dive site is on the eastern portion of the small island of Chebeh.

DESCRIPTION: This was truly an amazing and unforgettable dive for me. For the first time since being certified as a PADI scuba diver, Chebeh offers the best visibility that I have encountered thus far in Malaysian waters.

There was barely any noticeable current despite the choppy water surface. I descended to about 20 meters and the whole dive was at about 15-25 meters. The visibility was amazing, I estimated to be about 20-30 meters, which was comparable, if not better, with my recent dive at Nusa Menjangan in Bali.

The main highlight here definitely goes to the infinite garden of gorgonian sea fans, of varying colours of course. Most of the sea fans are of white in colour, but I did see some variations such as light pink, blue, milky green and rusty red. I barely could concentrate on one photography spot because the next cluster of gorgonian sea fans seemed to be better than the other. Indeed, I had a field day with my camera.

There were other types of soft coral too, though somewhat less spectacular, but still worth mentioning. I saw various colours of dendronephthya soft corals, yellow pore coral (Porites lutea), green staghorn (Acropora sp), whip corals (that looks like dead branches, but dont get fooled, they are still corals), sea anemone, etc.

Among the fish that I encountered were various damselfish, a "friendly" teira batfish (Platax teira), a rare  and elusive six-banded angelfish (Pomacanthus sexstriatus), and a one-metre long great barracuda at some height above me, as if it was patrolling the area.

SALANG WRECK
LOCATION: Located somewhere in the middle of the bay in Salang. It is hard to tell the exact location (most people will go with a dive master anyway), but it is somewhere between Salang Reef North and Salang Reef South. The entry point is usually right behind Dive Asias landing dock, from which you need to swim for about 100 metres to a buoy before descending.

DESCRIPTION: I had initial reservation before diving at this site. First, because I havent done any wreck-diving before, and second, I wasnt sure if the RM70 dive fee would worth my time considering the poor visibility often associated with wreck diving.

My worry wasnt entirely unfounded because during the early descent, the visibility was extremely poor that I could barely see the divers in front of me. We descended to a sandy bottom at about 20 metres, and slowly crawled our way forward, haphazardly I must say, until the dive master signaled us to slow down.

When I looked up, the wreck was standing before me. It was a rather huge ship, or rather, a fishing trawler intentionally sunk to create the diving spot. I started to circle the bottom with delicate movement to avoid stirring the sands. The dive master instructed us to circle from the ship bottom in an ascending movement to fully enjoy what the wreck has to offer.

The bottom portion was nothing that interesting. There were a number of isolated white sea fans, brown and red sea whips, white dendronephthya, leaf oyster (Lopha cristagalli, very sharp edges, so please exercise caution), and a bottom-dwelling lionfish.

I ascended to the main deck of the wreck. The dive just got more interesting. I saw hundreds, if not thousands, of yellowtails. Their numbers created a magical underwater scene of some sort, especially when you swim through them. There were also Behns damselfish (silvery-yellow body, neoglyphidodon nigroris), an elusive but large blue-ringed angelfish (pornacanthus annularis) and common Indo-Pacific sergeant. I also saw a unique type of white algae that I could not name, surrounded by hundreds, if not thousands of glassfish (Ambassis macracanthus).

The scenery at the ships tower mast also was spectacular, especially with the much-improved visibility of about 10 metres. The dominant species here was brown hydroid, not the stinging one I suppose, and other unique-shaped corals that compete for sunlight to grow.

MALANG ROCK
LOCATION: Malang Rock (or locally known as Batu Malang) is located to the south of Tulai Island. In fact, from the Pasir Panjang Beach on Tulai, you can spot to your left the huge collection of boulder rocks that constitutes this diving and snorkeling area. Access is by boats from Tulai (5 minutes) or Salang village (30 minutes).

DESCRIPTION: The afternoon dive was regarded as rather shallow, only to maximum depth of about 15 metres. The visibility was quite good at about 10 metres.

I descended down to an area filled with plate/column corals (Pavona clavus). It was quite a sight because its colony covers a vast expanse of the area. Drifting right above it was rather fun, while looking at other coral varieties that grow in-between its gaps, such as cabbage-like coral (Montipora hispida), sea anemones, various acropora sp corals, etc.

There were plenty of fish specie here, mostly consisted of various damselfish types, titan triggerfish (my dive master was ready with his knife, just in case), clownfish, etc.

Just like in Chebeh, my dive master brought us on another few swim-throughs. The scariest one was under a big boulder rock that had only about one metre opening. Most of us found ourselves bumping onto the boulder wall. Lurking in the distance was actually a lone sweetlip, if I was not mistaken. The fish was huge though, and I could actually see its sharp teeth. Anyway, nothing happened and we gladly continued our dive.

Malang Rock, or Batu Malang, actually means "unfortunate rock" in Malay. While many would offer their own version on how the rock derived such name, I had my own experience to relate to this diving spot. It was here that my old faithful Canon A70 died when it could no longer tolerate the amount of seawater that got into my underwater casing. The photos you see from Malang Rock were the last few shots that I took prior to its malfunction.

SALANG REEF NORTH
LOCATION: The reef is located in the northern portion of the bay in Salang. The dive is best accessed from the shore behind Dive Asias scuba shop.

DESCRIPTION: Considered an easy dive, the water depth ranges from 5 to 10 metres deep only. Due to the shallow depth, the site is made up mainly of hard corals.

The variety of hard corals here is not as good as many diving and snorkeling spots in Tioman. The corals also seemed to be slightly damaged due to the busy water channel.

The types of hard coral that I saw here were branching staghorn coral (Acropora multicuta), porites sp. coral (something like boulder coral), stony coral (Acropora elegans), sea anemones of stichodactyla variety, table corals, etc.

There werent that many fish specie here. The highlight was a crown-of-thorns sea star (Acanthaster planci) that seemed to be feeding on the sea bottom.

Overall, it was an OK dive, nothing particularly great here, and dive reminded me a little bit of snorkeling which probably offers the same type of scenery.

LABAS ROCK
LOCATION: Located some 40 minutes from Salang. On the map, Labas Rock is located to the west of Tioman. It is actually the westernmost island that makes up the archipelago of Tioman. Basically this diving spot is made up by a number of huge boulder rocks without sandy beach or any vegetation on top.

DESCRIPTION: Visibility was poor when the dive was started in the morning. I estimate the visibility was no more than 8 metres, with a lot of suspended particles, perhaps due to the weather.

After meandering through some coral rubbles, I ran into a purplish-yellow pufferfish, which is deemed as a juvenile despite its humongous size. There was also a sighting of the ever-belligerent titan triggerfish. There were also orange-spine unicorn fish and plenty of anemones. Soft corals were not abundant, I saw one or two sea-fans and thats about it.

Note: Due to some technicalities, I was not able to take underwater photographs. I may revisit this dive spot, hopefully with better visibility, and have myself equipped with a camera.

SOYAK ISLAND
LOCATION: The small island is visible from the village in Salang but can only be accessed by dive boats. A boat ride will take you about 5 minutes to Soyak Island. The dive commenced on the north side of the rocky island and drifted west.

DESCRIPTION: Visibility was poor during my morning dive. A lot of suspended particles and even stronger current. Soyak is well-known for its unpredictable current which can pose a nightmare if you are swimming against the current flow, or an excellent opportunity for drift-diving.

Dive depth was about 12 meters only. I saw a leatherjacket here, perhaps the same one I spotted when snorkeling at Salang Reef South. My dive master spotted a pair of Moorish Idols, which I missed (but then Ive seen them almost everywhere else).

There were also gold spotted trevally, a lot of bandit fusiliers and a few sweet lips. The soft corals here were much better than Labas Rock, which I dived earlier. A lot more gorgonian sea fans, although it was hard to admire them with the strong currents.

The information on Malaysian Islands is provided by:

ISLANDS OF MALAYSIA The Independent Travel Guides to Malaysian Islands