| Diving
- Spectacular At The Bottom
 Scuba
diving is well on the way to becoming one of the fastest growing
recreational sports enjoyed by both the young and old. Divers travel
thousands of miles to experience the amazing wonders of the underwater
realm and where better than to the bio-diversity hotspot of Southeast
Asia-Sabah, Malaysian Borneo.
With its sandy beaches, tropical islands, blue waters, coral reefs
and atolls, Sabah has several dive sites rated to be amongst the
top ten in the world and many more yet to be truly explored. Over
the years many prominent marine biologists have visited and dived
Sabah’s waters including ocean’s greatest ambassador, Jacques Costeau.
He commented “I’d seen other places like Sipadan 45 years ago but
now no more. Now we have found again an untouched piece of art..
a jewel”
 In
fact a diver may find many rare or endangered sea creatures such
as green and hawksbill turtles, napoleon wrasse giant clams as well
as countless species of sharks and school of thousands of barracuda
and jacks. Sabah is not only known for its reef’s larger inhabitants
but also as a “Muck Diving” paradise with such rarities as the mimic
octopus, flamboyant cuttlefish, mandarinfish, harlequin ghost pipefish
plus many types of weird and wonderful frogfish and nudibranchs.
These underwater delights are not restricted to the certified diver;
snorkelers and hopefully divers may enroll in one of the many PADI
affiliated dive courses run at any of Sabah’s dive resorts. Whatever
your underwater wish, Sabah’s seas and coral reefs can easily fulfill
and surpass your wildest dream.
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Marine Life
 Beginning life some 450-500 million years
ago, the Earth’s coral reefs are now the largest ecosystem upon the
planet. They sustain and support over 1 million species worldwide
and one coral reef alone may harbour some 3000 species.
The major Indo-Pacific ocean currents cross the seas that surrounds
Sabah’s sandy shores making them amongst the most biodiverse marine
environments in the world. Within a single dive around Pulau Layang
Layang divers may observe many of the 150 species of butterflyfish.
Used by marine biologist as indicators of coral reef health, the greater
number and species diversity of butterfly reflects the abundance and
diversity of corals.
Pulau Layang Layang’s pristine coral reef not only plays landlord
to countless butterfylfish but also other reef dwellers such as, angelfish,
snappers, wrasse, sweet lips, parrotfish as well as the larger pelagics;
barracuda, manta, schools of hammered sharks, dolphins and whales.
Pulau Sipadan is famous for its vast number of Green and Hawksbill
turtles which feed and breed within its waters before the females
climb ashore to lay their eggs above the white sandy beaches.
Diving in Sipadan’s coral reefs the incredible phenomenon of the thousands
of schooling chevron barracuda and big-eye trevally or ‘Jacks’ can
be witnessed. Floating inside such a tornado of fish is a truly breath-taking
experience that’s very hard to beat. Sabah is also becoming a world
famous location for muck-diving – the term used by divers to describe
the search for the rare and exotic small marine animals.
Many rare and newly identified gobies can be found living in corals,
sand, mud and mangroves of Sabah along with the little understood
and rarely seen mimic octopus, neon patterned blue-ringed octopus,
delicate flamboyant cuttlefish, psychedelic mandarinfish and ghost
pipefish. Sabah’s dive guides are specifically trained to find such
rarities and can show divers several of those oddities on a single
dive. Many new islands and reefs are being explored around the coast
of Sabah and with this exploration comes the discovery of new recently
discovered Mantanani Resort rare sightings of dugongs have recorded.
With the yearly occurance of whale sharks along the west coast during
the months of December to February, Sabah really has some spectacular
marine creatures to be discovered by the visiting divers. |
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