missis wrote:(sorry to not answer your question BUT) How is Tioman for diving? We were there a couple of years back. Snorkelled off the beach and was ok, didn't get the chance to dive as weather turned (late October).
I'd rate it highly, but they have a 'closed season' which is roughly November to end Feb when the monsoon is on. Seemingly almost the whole island closes then, and forget about diving...
It is incomparable to the west coast (Penang, Pangkor etc) where the water is... let's be honest brown and muddy. Diving from the shore (or close to it) the vis. might be down to say 10m at times depending on the tide, 20m+ at good times. Go out further and say 30m+ vis. seems pretty standard. I was weaned on the Red Sea so my standards are high!
One of my fav dives is Rengiss island (islet) which is just offshore from the Berjaya hotel. Lovely hard corals, a stack of black-tips seemingly always there (going round and round - so there might only be about 4-5 of them but you see them about 12 times on a dive
)
About half an hour motor offshore are a group of small islands. The main one is called Chebeh I think. A fantastic jumble of huge boulders, swim thoughs, cheeky currents... amazing vis.
Do go, it is fantastic, 35 min flight from Seletar... (I use 'Tioman Dive Centre' (Google it if interested)... and stay at their associated on-site hotel 'Swiss Cottage'... the latter is... er, a divers kinda place, calling it basic is polite [my wife would never put up with it
]).
Considering how close it is to SG... Tioman really is an inexplicably undeveloped and unspoilt gem! No wonder I keep going back.
