Alicia & Rich's Roads to Everywhere London to Australia on the route less traveled

Back to Malaysia-Tioman Island

MALAYSIA | Tuesday, 10 August 2010 | Views [1556] | Comments [1]

After a full day of traveling, we still haven't made it to our final destination. So we get up early in the morning to catch the first ferry to the idyllic Pulau Tioman. After 2 hours on a freezing cold (air-conditioned) ferry we finally reach the north coast of the Island.

Hopping off the boat, looking around the bay, we ask, where's the rest of the beach? From the dock you can see the whole of the small cove, with a small sandy beach - not the long stretch of sand as described in the Lonely Planet. This with the addition of a JCB digger on the beach itself means this place isn't exactly what we were expecting.

After an hour of lugging our bags from one horrible and over priced "chalet" (more of a shack) to another, we find ourselves settling for a room near the beach and vowing to spend only 1 day here.

So we don our snorkel gear, jump into the sea and we're instantly very impressed at how crystal clear the warm water is and how many fish we can see. This kinda makes up for the long journey and terrible accommodation. Feeling a little more relaxed we have a lovely, if overpriced, BBQ seafood dinner on the beach and book the ferry to take us down to Paya Beach at the south end of the island tomorrow.

Another early start and we're off to Paya Beach Resort.

Just seeing the place from our small water taxi lifts our spirits, it looks like a proper beach resort! We quickly settle into resort life, our room is amazingly plush (compared to yesterday), there's a pool, good food and the beach is beautiful. Ahhh this is more like it...

paya beach

Comments

1

Cool pix. We've been to Genting and Tekek, but not yet Paya. Next stop :)

Just a quick point of interest to regular Tioman visitors, or those wishing to go there in the future.

Since we go to Tioman quite regularly, we're seeing more and more travellers, especially from overseas, arriving at the Mersing jetty too late to catch their ferry, because it's full.

I think the reasons are:

1) The recent popularity boom Tioman has been enjoying.
2) The recent rule prohibiting passengers from sitting on the ferry sun-deck.
3) All other ferry types have discontinued, including the fast-ferries and the slow ferries, as well as the catamaran from Singapore

All this resulted in a higher chance of passengers left stranded during the busy holiday spells and weekends.

In light of above, my advice to those who've booked a Tioman resort, or want to go to Tioman during the weekend or a public holiday: book your ferry tickets as far in advance as possible, so you won't be stranded at the departure jetty due to the ferry for that day being already full.

You can get tickets from the ferry operators direct, Blue Water, or from http://www.tiomanferry.com/

Bryan Norman Jan 18, 2012 1:50 AM