August 13, 2019.
After we had fallen asleep for just few hours last night, we woke up at 6.30am to perform Subuh prayer.
We had refused to continue our sleep as the sound of the waves hitting the shore outside of our room were fascinating and I had decided to sit outside at the porch to enjoy the morning view.
As our breakfast will be served on 8.00am, we did took an early shower and got ourselves dressed and also preparing some important stuffs to bring along for snorkeling activities later.
We had a very delicious local breakfast which was my favorite fried bihun (bihun goreng) served with sunny side up egg and of course, a cup of local breakfast tea.
We were sitting in the restaurant facing the sea. It was such a lovely morning with some windy elements.
Mr. Azrol (the chalet’s owner) told us to be at the beach around 9.15am for our snorkeling activities.
SEVEN POINTS SNORKELING TRIP
After finishing our breakfast meal, we then headed to our room to pack some important things such as, small towel, camera, phones, some medication, water bottles, and of course our sunglasses.
I put on a diving suit which I borrowed from my former H&M colleague, Sabrine. I was lucky enough that the diving suit fitted me well. Thanks Sabrine.
Once we were on the boat, we headed to a wharf at another beach. It was at the Perkampungan Nelayan, I guess. We need to fetch a family to complete our snorkeling trip together during that day.
There were a total number of 14 people on the Rizqin Holidays boat, consisting of 2 boys, 7 adult locals, 2 female foreigners, and another 2 snorkeling instructors.
For the first point, we were able to swim with a large turtle.
I was actually expecting that we were going to snorkel at some shallow water by the beach.
As the instructors saw a large turtle swam across the deep blue sea surfaces, he stopped the boat and offered us to swim inside the deep water with the turtle.
We were being provided with snorkeling gears as well as safety jackets.
As I jumped into the deep blue sea, one of the instructor took me closer to the large turtle and he even insisted me to touch the turtle.
I was so excited at first but then I stopped and just watched the huge turtle swam away. I was suddenly too scared to go nearer to the turtle as I was worrying that the turtle might kicked me off as what I have seen on TV.
As for Fara, I had never knew that she was not really prepared to be inside the deep blue sea as she seemed quite panic when she were inside the water.
I felt quite terrible to leave her behind and kept enjoying myself in the water. Somehow, I felt relieved when one of the instructor taught her basic swimming tip and started to motivate her with some “water confident” moved.
After about 20 minutes swimming with turtles, we continued our boat ride to another checkpoint.
I could not actually recalled the names of each checkpoints.
We were able to see beautiful coral reefs and some weird ocean creatures through our snorkeling goggles. The water is very crystal clear and at some point, the temperature of the water changes according to the depth of the waters.
We were also brought to a shark point to see some sharks. Again, I got scared after some time swimming at the shark point. I was quite shocked to see a man “fishing” for some sharks with small fishes bait just to capture a closer picture of them. It was totally scary.
We were also stopped by a very white sandy beach to capture some photos. I saw lots of foreigners taking pictures as well. There were few of them sunbathing for a while.
At about 1.30pm, we headed back to our chalets as we need to prepare ourselves for lunch and for some hiking activities.
HIKING TO THE FAMOUS KINCIR ANGIN HILL
After filling up our tummy with such a heavy lunch meal, we were riding on the boat to the famous Long Beach to hike up to the Kincir Angin.
As I had read online, the Kincir Angin was the best place to have a very perfect view of the whole island.
We were following another group led by an instructor to climb up a hill for a distance of 15km. It took us about 20 to 30 minutes to reach up for the top.
As we reached at the Kincir Angin spot, we had to walk for another new path as the old path will lead us to an old stairs that were too dangerous to step on.
The new path however, allowed us to see the island from the top of the hill and it was extremely fascinating.
We took few pictures there and decided to walk down and went back to our chalets.
PERKAMPUNGAN NELAYAN
On our way back to the chalets, the instructor (well, I would loved to call him the Island Man since he seemed way too expert living on this island). My bad for forgetting to ask for his name actually.
So this Island Man took us to the Perkampungan Nelayan to see the real daily life activities on an island and the places where locals were much more to be found in here.
Indeed, in this village, there were lots of small shops selling foods mostly, and some swimming gears and souvenirs as well. There were also places for backpackers to stay. I did tried the local burger here and it tasted much more tastier than ever especially when I took the last bite while riding on the boat back to our chalets.
BARBECUE FOR TWO
We reached at our chalets during late evening and we had some free time to relax our bodies on the beach before dinner. We took lots of pictures and videos.
I started to think that it would be seriously wonderful to settle down in such a beautiful and tranquil island.
Tonight, our dinner will be included some barbecue for two. So, we had some grilled chickens and squids.
We had some serious talked on that night during dinner and it was actually kinda sad to leave the island tomorrow.
I loved this island so much.
PACKED OUR THINGS FOR TOMORROW
We will be leaving this island by noon and we started to packed our things back. We did have some serious discussion while packing and for some strong reason, we had both agreed to take some traveling pill in order to fall asleep easily. We need to have lots of quality rests to drive back to Melaka.
It was pretty tiring to do lots of activities during the day but thankfully, we felt very happy to be here.
Thanks Fara for being with me.
Yours truly,
Sharifa Mastura S M Shah
Sharifa. 