During the annual ADEX in Singapore held in 2018, Ves and I, along with her cousins were discussing on a trip to the world-famous Sipadan Island / Pulau Sipadan, Malaysia’s only oceanic island. However due to differing schedules with her cousins, we could only agree to go to Sipadan at the start of 2019 and the two of us couldn’t make use of the holiday period at the end of December for some quality diving – so we decided to find an amazing dive location for ourselves to “add on” to the trip…and we are so glad we decided on the “nearby” Sangalaki Archipelago with the dive resort Scuba Junkies Sangalaki.
Where is it?
The Derawan Islands are located at East Kalimantan, Indonesia, in the Borneo region of Southeast Asia. It’s a pretty difficult area to get to, but once you’re there, you can see the results of a lack of human influence in the area – pristine corals, a huge variety of sea life and clean, clear waters.
What can you see?
During our 1 week stay at Scuba Junkies Sangalaki, besides absolutely pristine coral, we managed to see turtles on every dive (and even when not diving – they were just hanging out in the sea near the beach), the many manta rays that Sangalaki is famous for, leopard sharks, flamboyant (and regular) cuttlefish, nudibranchs, moray eels and many other small critters such as bubble coral shrimp and flatworms. On one of our boat rides back to the resort we also managed to attract some playful dolphins! Although we didn’t manage to catch sights of these, others have also reported sightings of whale sharks, dugongs and even one or two thresher sharks. Not to mention the really bizarre jellyfish lake located at Kakaban island, where 4 species of jellyfish have evolved over time to lose their stings due to the growth of the island cutting off access from the rest of the ocean thousands of years ago.
There was also a tour leaving from Derawan island to snorkel with whale sharks at a nearby location but we did not join it as it was similar to the experience we had at Oslob, Cebu.
The diving experience
In short, it was amazing – one of the best dive locations we’ve ever visited, helped very much by the staff and facilities of Scuba Junkie Sangalaki. The dive shop was a pretty well-run operation, and we were always clear on what to expect after the dive briefings. In terms of rental equipment, we can’t really comment because we had our own (almost) full set of gear except for regulators (Mares Rovers) which we rented but based on how the rest of their equipment looked, the condition seemed pretty good. It wasn’t anything fancy, but we are recreational divers – we don’t need anything fancy as long as it works.
The dive boats departed at the same times every morning, with lunch brought along on the boat or eaten back at the resort (which were delicious by the way – the chilli…so good). Since the location is an archipelago, the boat trips could take between 20 minutes to upwards of 1 hour long. That said, it does keep the crowds away which is always nice since big groups tend to scare the pelagics off.
The only negative comments we can really make about the diving was that our dive master was perhaps a bit too excited when interesting creatures like manta rays came into view. While I was struggling to get a good shot of the animals on my GoPro, he swam into the shot multiple times to get a photo along with whatever I was taking, which was a little irritating because I wanted shots of the manta, not the DM (geez, you guys see it every week! I only get to go that so often).
The accommodation
The dive resort, despite its remote location, had pretty great facilities. Of course, you shouldn’t expect a 5-star resort, but it had clean rooms, balconies, a beautiful view, and even AC! This was recently installed but we were so glad for it. In our 1 week stay, we lived in both the dorm rooms (fans only) and the standard rooms with AC, and the difference was huge to us spoilt brats. Although the evening temperatures were bearable with the fans, being next to the sea meant that you also get that slightly sticky sea breeze which is comfortable to relax in, but not sleep in. We will definitely recommend the standard rooms just for the AC…
Unfortunately – and this is in no way Scuba Junkie’s fault – there was an open air Karaoke thing opposite of the resort, which meant that every night we got to experience the “wonderful” sounds of the locals’ singing. At full volume till at least midnight. This is another reason why AC rooms were better – when you closed the doors, the sounds dampened a little, which was not possible with the dorms because you needed the air.
How do you get there?
Planning the logistics and transportation for our trip to the Derawan islands was, to put it mildly, challenging.
There is simply no direct way to get to the islands at all. To get to the islands, there are basically two entry points : Tarakan or Balikpapan.
Tawau / Tarakan
Since we were extending our trip to Sipadan island, our way in was via Tawau airport. Here’s the breakdown of the journey:
- Assuming you’re already at Tawau, either fly or take a ferry to Tarakan from Tawau. The flight is operated by MAS wings, a subsidiary of Malaysia Airlines and costs about 200+SGD for a return trip, or for a more budget option, you can take the Indomaya Express ferry which is about 40SGD per way. However, do take note that the ferry can be unreliable. The operators can decide at the last minute to cancel the ferry due to weather conditions or even holidays. We unfortunately experienced this ourselves with cancellation of a booked ferry due to its proximity to Christmas and New year’s. Lucky we had travel insurance and managed to cover the costs of the replacement flight due to the cancellation.
- After arriving at Tarakan, if you arrive on a Monday (and only on Monday) then the resort would have a weekly ferry arranged for you directly to the resort, which costs 900K IDR per way and takes 3 hours. However, if you don’t arrive on a Monday, it gets complicated. You would have to either:
- Charter your own speedboat, which can be expensive and not really recommended because you’ll be in the open sea, OR
- Take a public speedboat to Tanjung Selor (120K IDR, 1.5hrs), charter a car to Tanjung Batu (1M IDR, 5-6hrs, can be shared), and lastly take a 30min speedboat to Derawan from there for about 300K IDR.
As you can see, NOT taking the weekly ferry there and back (and thus being forced to stay for an entire week from Monday to Monday) isn’t a good idea. This is not a location for a short trip.
Via Balikpapan / Berau
The second option would be to fly in to Balikpapan either from Singapore or Jakarta, and take an ongoing flight to Berau airport. Here you would then either:
- Charter a boat directly to Derawan island, which again can be expensive, OR
- Get a car to Tanjung Batu from there (about 80k IDR pp, 2.5hrs) and then take a speedboat to Derawan island from there, same as above.
So yeah, it’s really not an easy place to get to.
Of course, if you have a big group, maybe the resort would be more flexible to change the schedule of their weekly ferry for you. However if it’s just yourself or with a partner, try your best to visit Monday-Monday.
That said, I do have to give credit to the staff at Scuba Junkies who were very patient with our incessant emails and questions about how to get there.
So is it worth the journey?
Hell yeah. The diving is spectacular and untouched, and so remote only serious divers would want to go there (so you won’t get so many of those divers from country X that destroy corals wherever they go. However, unless I’m planning the trip with a big group, 5/10 would go again. The logistics are really too challenging for a casual trip. That said, if you’ve never been, you really must. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
