July 7th-9th, 2019
Perhentian Islands…off the hook. Seriously, one of the coolest places we’ve ever been. The nice owner of the Inn picked us up bright and early and drove us to the jetty so we could get the first boat out to the island.
We stayed at the smaller island called Kecil on Long Beach. It was a beautiful boat ride out and we were the last stop. We got to see several of the other beaches where others got off. It was still early in the morning when we arrived, and we had no reservations for accommodation. I had read other bloggers who recommended staying on Long Beach as it was the best place, and I totally agree. We walked along the beach and stopped in a dive shop where they offered free accommodation if you dived with them. Breakdown of the price ended up being about $36 per person for one night stay, breakfast, and 2 boat dives. Sold. They showed us our room and we started our day.
Let me explain what a day on Perhentian is like. You wake up for a beautiful sunrise you can see from your balcony, the beach, or the pier. Or you can sleep in (I did both while on the island).
After that you can have your coffee, eat breakfast and get ready for your first dive. Take a fun boat ride out to the dive site and have an awesome dive. Come back in, rest for a bit, have a snack and then go for your next dive at a different, very cool site.
Come back, head to the beach and lay out in the white sand or float in the incredibly beautiful water.
Go to the shore and have an iced tea or smoothie someplace while gazing at the stunning beach.
Once it’s time for sunset, do the 15-minute walk through the jungle to Coral Beach on the other side of the island. Have some roti from the best roti place on the island and watch the sunset.
After that, take the trail back to Long Beach and get ready for dinner. There are 4-5 restaurants on the beach that set out all their tables with candles and do a BBQ. For about $6 you can choose fresh caught fish and get a full plate of sides and fresh fruit juice to drink.
Have a candle lit dinner on the sand and then walk over for your after-dinner entertainment. Every night they set out all the little tables and beach mats so you can sit on the sand. You can order drinks or hookah and watch a fire dancing show. A REALLY GOOD fire dancing show. You can watch the fire dancers for 2 hours while you smoke hookah under the moon and stars. This is Perhentian… amazing!
We spent three glorious days here and went scuba diving every day. I used my inflatable sleeping mat as a floatie and it worked great to float around in the beautiful water and just relax. The first night there was a big glitter themed party for a girl who just completed her dive master. Most everyone we met on Perhentian had a similar story. They traveled here for holiday and either never left or left and came right back. I definitely understand the draw. The day I described above could feel a bit like Groundhog Day as that is what there is to do. Long Beach (which is the most happening place on the islands) is probably no more than a half mile-stretch of beach with restaurants, dive shops, hotels, and camping. You can walk to the other side of the island which is an even smaller stretch of beach with the same things. You could get more secluded if you wanted to, at other beaches on the islands but you can’t get more activity. The beautiful beach and water activities is what there is to do. The places on the beach are all powered by generators and there is nothing like an ATM machine or something like that. Your boat captain during the day is the same guy giving you a menu and inviting you to look at the selection of fresh fish at night. Our accommodation was extremely basic, but it did have everything you need to unplug and enjoy the beach and the diving.
You had to flush the toilet by filling a pot with water and pour it in the bowl to create enough pressure to push whatever down.
No air conditioning so during the day you wanted to be in the water for sure.
The only thing interfering with my good life here was the infection in my foot/lower leg. It was a pain trying to keep it clean and healing when you can’t walk on anything but sand and in and out of the water all day. The antibiotic I had with me was 6 years expired so I was very concerned that it would still have enough punch to knock out the infection. I basically did everything I would tell a patient not to do. I couldn’t miss this island and the water activities so I just did the best I could with what I had. I had 3 open wounds that I was tending, and THANKFULLY by the 3rd day on the island they were all showing improvement despite sub optimal conditions for wound healing. The antibiotic was still doing its job and my pain from infection and inflammation was much better.
Getting more dives under our belt was great. Really nice diving too. I felt so fortunate because apparently just a couple weeks before, they had bad storms and an attack of invisible jelly fish that left divers covered with stings from head to toe. Dive masters were refusing to dive because of the jellies. We didn’t have any of that and had some wonderful dives. I have a better grasp on the space I take up with my tank, BCD, and fins as we did some small swim-throughs and were in some tight spaces. We learned more about fish species and are getting better with identification. We had some experience with currents and saw our biggest shipwreck yet. We went down to a 20-year-old, sunken Vietnamese cargo ship which was massive. We also did our longest dive at 72 minutes when we were in a shallower spot with really nice coral. It was the warmest water we have been in with the average being 30 degrees Celsius (86 F)!
We thought long and hard about whether we should move forward or stay on the island longer. We wanted to stay but we also have other places we want to see in Malaysia before our flight to Thailand. We decided to move forward knowing that the beauty of this trip is we can do whatever we want. If we get to a place where we are still dreaming of Perhentian we can return. If I were to ever stay on this island for a while, I would definitely learn to fire dance! Rescue diver/nurse practitioner by day, fire dancer by night.
That must be Paradise! What an incredible Find! Who wouldve thought such a place existed. Pictures are beautiful! That life will be hard to beat for sure!