Sipadan Island
One of The Most
Amazingly Beautiful Islands in Malaysia

At first glance, this island looks pretty much like any other island found here in Malaysia. With the soft sandy beaches, clear blue skies and crystal clear waters which can be found in all the other islands in Malaysia, you would think this island is just another one of those ordinary islands. well, that's what I thought too!

The only difference between Sipadan Island and all the other islands found here in Malaysia is that, it was formed by an extinct undersea volcanic cone that took thousands of years to develop. This means that the island is a deepwater oceanic island and it is the only one of its kind in Malaysia.

Dropping to a depth of about 600 meters or 2,000 feet to the seabed, this island provides spectacular wall dives to divers who come here from all over the world.

A narrow shelf, lining the island, followed by a sudden drop into darkness is definitely a daunting experience for new divers.

Sipadan Island is located about 35km south of Semporna, on the southeastern side of Sabah in Borneo which, incidentally is the heart of the Indo-Pacific basin.

This geographic position is the richest marine habitat in the world. More than 3,000 species of fish and hundreds of coral species can be found here. Some experts even believe that the Indo-Pacific basin was earth's marine incubator and researchers are still discovering new species as new places and depths are discovered.

Sipadan Island is most famous for its underwater grandeur and was rated as the world's top dive sites.

When you dive here, you will surely be treated to an underwater paradise where you can swim among the fishes and the corals.

The residential schooling Barracuda and Big-Eye Trevally are some of the highlights on every divers wish-list. These schools of thousands of fishes form spectacular tornado-like formations that will definitely awe you.

This island is also well known for its unusually large numbers of green and hawksbill turtles which gather here to mate and nest. So, it is not unusual for a diver to see 70 - 80 turtles on each dive.

One of the unique features to divers who come here to dive is the turtle tomb. This tomb is actually an underwater limestone cave with a labyrinth of tunnels and chambers that contain many skeletal remains of turtles. Some say the turtles choose this particular place as their final resting place. However, a more accurate representation is that the turtles became lost in the cave at night and drowned.

There are quite a number of marked dive sites in Sipadan Island and all of them are wall dives. Among the dive sites found in this island are Drop Off, Turtle Cavern, Barracuda Point, Coral Gardens, White Tip Avenue, Turtle Patch, South Point, Stafhorn Crest, Lobster Lairs, Hanging Gardens, West Ridge and North Point.

The waters in this island are so clear that the visibility is over a hundred feet. You can clearly see coral formations which are 40 - 50 feet deep teeming with fishes. Besides that, this island has such amazing soft sandy beaches and is the perfect place for you to soak up the sun and do some swimming.

What a lot of people do not know is that this island is also a bird sanctuary and when you're here, you'd be able to observe the many frigates, sea eagles and sea-gulls that fly across the clear blue skies. Nicobar pigeons, which pass through this island from China during the colder months have also made this island a stop-over point during their journey to warmer parts of the globe.

You won't be able to stay in this island overnight as there are no resorts here. Well, there used to be...but in 2004, the Malaysian Government ordered all on-site dive and resort operators of the island to move their structures out of the island by the end of 2004. The main reason for this is to conserve a balanced eco-system for Sipadan and its surroundings.

The island is presently opened to only 80 guests per day. Fortunately, diving will continue to be allowed in this island. Divers who wish to dive here are ferried in and out by dive and resort operators from the mainland and the surrounding islands like Pulau Mabul, which is situated about 15 minutes away by boat.

If you're interested to experience the amazing beauty of this island, getting here is quite simple. First, you would need to catch a flight to Kota Kinabalu, the capital city of Sabah. And just for your information, most international flights fly straight into Kota Kinabalu.

Visitors who are on their way to dive at Sipadan Island normally spend their first night in one of Kota Kinabalu's fine hotels before flying off to Tawau early next morning. The flight from Kota Kinabalu to Tawau takes approximately 40 minutes.

From Tawau, you would need to get to the seaside town of Semporna which is located about an hour or an hour and a half from Tawau. You can get there either by minivan or taxi. Then, from Semporna, take a boat ride to Sipadan, which departs every morning. The boat ride would take about an hour or so, depending on weather conditions.

Sipadan Island is definitely a must visit if you love diving, and no other person could describe this paradise better than the late Jacques Cousteau, a French naval officer, explorer, ecologist, film maker, scientist, photographer and researcher who studied the sea and all forms of life in water when he said, "I have seen other places like Sipadan...45 years ago. Now we have found again an untouched piece of art."