Snowdonia, Wales, UK: 11-12 April 2009

Eryri (Snowdonia in Welsh) - Eryr (Eagle) or Highlands

The English name for Snowdonia derives from Snowdon, which is the highest mountain in Wales and England at 1,085 metres (3,560 ft). Many of the hikers in the area concentrate on Snowdon itself. It is regarded as a fine mountain, but can become quite crowded, particularly with the Snowdon Mountain Railway running to the summit. There are many path from easy to difficult, which takes from 5-8 hours return for the hikers to walk up to the summit. Unfortunately, i wasn't well on that day and the railway had too many people, so we did not go to the summit.



We did camping at one of the camp sites at Llanberis. At this time of the year, it is still quite cold and the camp sites had suprisingly many campers. At night, it was very very very cold. We had to bury ourselves in the blanket totally. The camp ground we got was not flat and sleeping on a slope wasn't that comfortable as well. But the views were good.



Snowdon Mountain Railway on the way to the summit. But in fact, at this time of the year, the steam train did not go to the summit, it stopped a few miles below. Some hikers think the rail track and train spoiled the natural views, but i think this is actually a good way for some people who aren't fit to walk up all the way, to enjoy the view and the feelings of "top of the world".



A small walk to some of the smaller hills could provide quite a good views of the surrounding as well.



Snowdonia used to be a mining place for slate. The slate mining closed down due to the running cost. It is said, the slate from this region can last as long as 200 years. The slate museum provides interesting displays of the tools and technologies people used years ago in the mining. The museum staff, an ex-miner, showed the visitor how the miner separates or cut the slate.



People holding advanced diving license can don into the lake to explore the old mining facilities now hidden under the water.



Snowdonia was our last tourist stop before we moved away from Wales. I was a bit disappointed with the views. In my mind, i always imagining trees on the mountain, but for almost all mountains or hills that we had been in England or Wales, there are basically no trees, just grassland for sheep or cows grazing. Even at the cold North East of Canada, there are still many trees on the mountains. So i suspected that, weather is not an issue. All the trees here probably had been chopped down long time ago to support the energy needs of the mining industries.

Nha Trang, Vietnam - 29Apr07

Sorry, Julian ...

This was a diving day. The first dive was sucked! We went to 30meter and i lost my bouyancy and shot up to the surface with my partner (Julian, a French dive master). I event kicked off his regulator because i was too panicked! It was dangerous and i really felt bad for him. i always have some kind of problem when i do my first dive. Next time, i would never do a deep dive in my trip first dive!

The second dive was good then. Shallow dive at around 15 meter. Many hard corals but not as many soft corals. The usual fishes like parrot fish, angel fish, moray... The bouyancy was ok and i dived for 57 minutes! This was considered as long.

The water clearity in Nha Trang is basically so so. Marine life is not as great as in Malaysia too. Diving is not a popular sport in Vietnam, so basically no local divers. However it was nice to have someone who i can speak in English without thinking, how am i supposed to make him/her understand me?

One of the dive instructor, Larry is from New York. It was really interesting to talk with him. He said he left America because he felt disspointed with the country. He has been living in Vietnam for 6 years. According to him, at least living in a foreign country with a kind of culture which he could never understand is easier.

On my way to go back to the guest house after the dive, i met Joy (the Isreali guy) on the street again! He was supposed to leave around 2pm, so i was quite surprised to see him. He basically shouted my name for 2 streets! i thought it was some tout shouting at me, so i just ignored him. Until after 2 streets, i decided that i have never met such a persistant tout and i should really look at him. Then, well, it was him. It was really funny.

So actually the hotel mother and daughter are sleeping in the living room of the hotel! They set up a bed of me and i shared that 'room' with them. Everyone passing by or in out of the hotel could see me sleeping there. i was half a slept when i overheard someone asked a for a room. Basically there were 2 female asking for a room first but they refused to pay for such a simple room at 15 USD. They probably met this guy who was willing to share the room with them. Then 3 of them walked back. The hotel mama refused to let 2 of them to share a room, saying either 2 girls or 2 boys only. Then out of sudden, they guy said, "i am a gay, so this is not a problem!" i don't believe this at all and i was laughing like hell then. Such a night.



The water look blueist and clear but in fact the visibility of water was not as great. Likely to be 10meter.
The boat ride to this dive site took around 45 minutes from Nha Trang town.



Nha Trang beach in the evening.



The town at night. A lot of alcohol.


MONEY MATTER:
1.) Food: 51000 D
2.) Accommodation: USD 7
3.) Others: 39000 D

Tekek, Tioman (Day 3) - 12 Apr 2007

i graduated!
i am now a NAUI Advanced Scuba Diver.

* Sorry to Abect, my dive instructor, though. i put his photo here without consent. But i really wanted to have my graduation photos here!



The seaview looking from the dive centre.



Tekek Jetty. People were busying loading and unloading the goods from the ferry.



This is one of the resort/dive centre/restaurant at ABC village.



Salang Village. The chalets on the hill really looked nice in the picture.



Renggis Island. This was where i did my last dive before i left and saw the sharks. Last time, we saw turtles here.



My dive mate is very kind to send me some underwater photos for the dive at Renggis.
So, this is me with fishes swimming around.
More of the underwater photos can be seen at his blog:
http://sun.ap.teacup.com/alamshah/
http://www.geocities.jp/kuantannih/



We saw this blue spotted sting ray.



You won't miss to see clown fish! This is something 'die-die-sure-can-see" for every dive trips.



i was taking picture for whatever... (i couldn't recall now).
i brought a manual underwater camera.



Mersing street, near to the jetty.



EXTRACTED FROM MY DIARY

Time to leave.
i woke up late at 8.30am due to the late night yesterday. i took a quick breakfast and then started to have my photo sessions with staff in the dive centre.
One last dive before i am off and completed my course. The certification card will be sent to my address later and i guess i need to photocopy my dive certificate for my up coming dive at Vietnam then. (i planned to dive at Nha Trang)
The last dive at Renggis was good. A beautiful closing to my trip with the sighting of 3 blacktip sharks and a giant groupe. The visibility was the best in the past 3 days but no current, too bad. I was looking forward to a drift dive. A Japanese who dived with me offered to send me some underwater photos, so at least i would get other than the 'dried' photos.

i hope i will see more Asian single traveler like me, but it was really unfortunate that, i did not even see one Japanese single traveler. Probably this is why i always end up to hang out with some foreigners, as there are not many crazy Asian woman would do what i am doing.

Initially, i planned to leave at 2pm. But Akemi said, there is no ferry at this time, so i better leave with the ferry at 12.30pm. It was almost 12pm by then, so i took a quick lunch, bid farewell with them and Akemi sent me to the jetty using her motorbike.

As usual, the ferry was delayed. It was there at Tekek Jetty at 1.30pm. Then went here and there to drop and pick up passengers, so by only 3pm then we really headed to Mersing. With this, we got to Mersing at almost 4 hours later by 4.15pm.

It was embarrased that, i somehow put my ferry ticket in my pocket and i couldn't find it later. i almost emptied my pockets and sling bag, but couldn't find it. The ferry staff was waiting for me while everyone were staring at me. Then finally someone saw my ticket on the floor. Phew... Or else i would need to buy another one. Lesson learnt, always keep whatever ticket or receipt properly.

i learnt another lesson from this mini trip. i really should avoid wearing short or small T shirt during my long trip. This small shirt was barely covered my money belt so i had to wear my money belt inside of my pant! It could be really inconvenient if i wanted to ge something like my passport from there.

The whole journey from Tioman to Singapore took me 9 hours! i left for Tekek Jetty at 12.30pm and arrived at home only at 9.30pm. I was very tired, so when i got a call from my friend, i basically just told her that, "we will talk next time!" Sorry to her, but i had really no more energy to talk. Remember, i slept at around 3am last night.

i met two girls on the same bus from Tioman to Johor Bahru. When we alighted from the bus, a tout approached them for trip to Singapore. Out of good will, i told them that i am taking bus to go back to Singapore, so they could follow me if they want to. i think, they were likely to pay much for a trip to take a cab to the town then from there to Singapore. It would be better if they just take bus to Singapore and then take a cab in Singapore to wherever they wanted to go. They followed me to the bus 170 platform, but later decided to take a cab though. i think this is because their bags were really heavy and they did not want the hassle to on/off the bus and custom with their bags.

The encounterment with them made me think about, what will i do if a local girl told me that i could follow her? i think, i am likely to just follow the local despite of the hassle. In a way, this will definitely be cheaper and should be safer to follow to someone who knows. It reminded me also, don't bring more than i am able to carry with ease.



MONEY MATTER AND LOGISTICS:

1.) Food - RM 12

2.) Transport -
* Speed Ferry from Tioman to Mersing: RM 35
* Express bus: S & S International from Mersing to Larkin - RM 8.80
- The last bus is at 5.30pm and they don't go to Singapore directly now.

Tekek, Tioman (Day 2) - 11 Apr 2007

This is the dive centre, Tioman Reef Divers.



Some corners of the dive shops are pasted with many photos of the divers and students. Two of Mei Siang, Brad and my photos are still here.



The dive boat. However, i did not use this one as most of the time, i dived with the intructor, Abect, only. So we used a small speed boat.



The newly built Tioman Marina and Katie and Mathew's yatch, El Sea. (Should be, the yatch they are bringing or working in.)

* I don't think it is right for me to put either Katie, Mathew or Chris pictures on the web without their consents.





Mathew was pumping air into the small rubber boat that we later took to see sunset and to ABC Village.



This is the yatch, El Sea.



EXTRACTED FROM MY DIARY:

i woke up at 6.30am, i think i was just get used to my working hour. i slept at 10pm last night, tired from my previous days of late night sleep.

The weather was not good today. It was raining a bit when i walked to the shore. i remember there were this intertidal areas some where near to the dive centre. i wanted to go and see what could i still find there. (Last time, i saw rock sea star and many corals.) i saw many onch (a kind of slug without shell), oyster, limpet (a kind of snail) and abundance of mermaid fans. The tide was not low enough to expose the coral reef. There was another patch of intertidal area, but it started to rain heavier, so i headed back to the dive centre. In the end, it started to rain cats and dogs. So Reeno played a DVD of his friend dived at Coco's Island at Columbia while waiting for the rain to stop so that we could off for boat dive.



Onch



Black Sea Cucumber



Clam



Limpet



Oyster



The weather is strange now. It is supposed to be hot season and yet it just rains most of the time. It looked like it is going to rain for this whole day.

When the rain got not as heavier, we proceed to the deep dive (30 meter). i should practise decompression stop and basically we would explore a wreck and stay longer so that we needed a decompressions stop. The different between training and recreasion dive is, seeing things during training is just a plus as the main objective is to learn the techniques.

i think i am still not as good in my buoyancy. At least sometimes, i need to hold on to something to just stay at certain depth. The dive instructor basicallly didn't baby sit me anymore. It was different to when i was in Scuba Diver Course that the dive instruction will constantly look after me/Mei Siang to make sure that we did not shoot up to the surface. This time, i got a one to one coaching and yet the dive instructor with his 'expectations' on me, did not pay particular attention to me. Later, he said my buoyancy was good enough and i am not likely to have problem to get in control.

Someone from the dive centre asked me about my ring at my left hand. i told them that, it was an engagement ring. But the fact was, someone suggested that, wearing a ring would save me a lot of troubles when i travel to the remote areas in Asia, such as India. People got less interested with you when you said you are married. In my case, i think i looked younger than my actual age, so engaged will do me better. With my previous relationship fresh in my mind, i found it particularly easy and 'fluence' to make up a story of my fiancee and others. So this was my 'practical' before my long trip.

Little did i expect that, my simply kind act of friendliness will bring me such a wonderful evening and to know these wonderful people. i got so bored eating alone that, during my lunch, i simply approach Chris who was eating alone too and asked whether i could join him. Of course, it is unlikely that people will say no to girl, so we started to chat. Chris is from France and his English is not as good. So when i talked to him, i need to speak really slow and choose some simple words and basically forgot all about the grammars (if you are thinking that my English is not great too, then i ensure you that, he is not even achieve 1/10 of my level). He was a nice guy, working as a computer engineer in Franch and will in Malaysia for a month.

i got 3 dives for today and it merely involved different kinds of trainings. After my last dive, i walked from the beach of the resort to the newly built Marina. While eating my ice cream on the way to walk back to the resort, i met Chris again. I called him to just said hello and he said he is going to meet some of his new french friends and invited me. Since i have nothing to do, so i just followed him.

That was how i met Katie and Mathew. I was still wondering whether last night was a dream. Watching sunset in the middle of a sea on a small rubber boat (i am not a romantic person), took a boat ride in the middle of the night to go to a bar (from Tekek to ABC) and i heard the most words of French in my whole life. It was just kind of crazy but yet wonderful.

Katie and Mathew sailed from France to Langkawi, they are skippers. From Langkawi, they went to Singapore and supposed to get the yatch/boat to Hainan, China. Unfortunately, the boat has some serious water leaking problem, so they have to stop here and later get the boat back to Singapore, Raffles Marina for repair. They said they are likely to just leave the boat in Singapore for the owner to decide what he wanted to do and they would off to Cannes, Australia, for another job and to practise their English there.

Katie is a year senior than me and she speaks the better English compares with Mathew and Chris. She is just not that kind of French woman that i watched from TV, wearing heavy make up, high heel and a LV handbag. But you couldn't expect a boat captain to be meeked right? She is cheerful, humourous but tough women. I really like her. Matthew in the other way was shy in the beginning. He is 22 and i think he is very good looking! They both knew from a sailing school in France and since then, enjoying time with each other.

3 of them were chatting in French, but in time, Katie or Mathew would translate. They were really thoughtful to me. They knew i am a vegetarian and i won't take alcoholic drinks, so they would check to make sure that, i got something to eat/drink. With such a great language barrier, i amazingly had a great time with them. We talked about animals, women in different careers, some French and English jokes.... Katie said, English called French frog because they eat frog and Frech called English pale beef because they are very fair and they eat a lot of beef! I found this particularly funny as to Asian, they just look kind of equally fair! We talked until the bar was closed and then again, took the rubber boat to return to Tekek at around 2am. i gave Katie my contact in Singapore and asked them to contact me if possible. She gave me her email and said she and Mathew are very sincerely invited me to visit them in Australia. She would cook me French meals! In fact, she repeated this "sincerely inviting me" for a few times during our conversation. Normally, i won't take any invitation from people i met during my trip seriously. But somehow i really believed that, she meant it.

When i parted with Chris at the resort (coincidentally, we were just staying next door), he hold me at my arms and looked straight into my eyes. We bid fare well , as he will leave to Kapas tomorrow and said good night. At that time, i was really thinking that, whether he is going to kiss me?? Then how would i react? I have never know any French in my life and i seriously do not know how to react if he does so as a kind of French courtesy. Well, i am glad that he didn't do anything and i suspected that this is because i got a 'fiancee'!

It was such a wonderful night with them that i started to believe that, i would have some kind of wonderful trip for the rest of my journey. The other reasons that i think we had such a nice chat was because we are all around the same age group, at least they are not some kind of party animals. i enjoyed the time with them so much that i even could ignore the second had smoke from Katie and Mathew, which i normally won't tolerate. :)



MONEY MATTER & LOGISTICS

1.) Food, including non-alcoholic drinks at bar - RM 29

2.) Others:
Peladang Mini Mart near to the Marina recylcle the 1.5 little mineral water bottle to use for selling petrol to motorcycle. If you don't want to just through away your plastic bottle, then it is good to give to them.

Tekek, Tioman (Day 1) - 10 Apr 2007

The Bluewave Speed Ferry docking at Mersing Ferry Terminal to Tioman.



i like the sky. It was hot and the sky was blue. Little did i expect that, it would be 3 rainy days when i was in Tioman. i thought it was supposed to be hot weather now! The people in Tioman said, it was hot during mosoon though. So the world weather is really unpredictable now.
You will notice the sea water changed from the murky greenish (at Mersing) to the blueish deep blue and eventually crystal clear greenish from Mersing to Tioman.



This is Malaysia and there is a mosque everywhere. This one in Mersing is newly built and right on the top of a hill. Doesn't it looks like some almighty God is observing every of your deeds?
(i am a buddhist who believe in my own conscious and Karma.)



This is me on the ferry. The ferry was approaching the island and it was raining.



All villages in Tioman have some kind of accommodation right facing to the sea. It was really nice to hear the sound of the wave while taking your meal or even before you sleep.



The sunset. It stopped raining at around evening. But did not get to see the sun.



EXTRACTED FROM MY DIARY:

This is my trial 'trial' trip before i go off for my months of great trip. The fact is now i am in Tioman and i feel bored! i have been to many trips alone and never have i feel this bored. i guess part of the reasons is there are good memories here, every where around this dive centre and resort, even the island.

Reeno, Akemi and the other staff are actually remembered Mei Siang, Brad and me. They asked about both of them and i saw our pictures were still on the wall.

When the lesson started, how i hope that Mei Siang is here with me and we could take the lesson together. A lot of things that we did together last time was now appeared in my mind and i recalled that, at least i don't have to eat my dinner alone!

Like usual, wherever i go, i was mistaken as Japanese until i started to talk in Malay. Tekek is not a place for backpacker, accommodation is usually more expensive than what you can get at Salang or Kampung Air Batang (ABC). I saw only tourists in group, mostly with family and almost all are foreigners. i don't see even one Asian tourist and not even mention a single Asian male or female traveling alone like me. I saw one Caucasian teenager on the speed ferry only, not to mention any other single traveler at the resort/dive centre. There was none!

The local here are keen to talk to me though. Been able to speak the same language and been friendly with all of them at least do me a favor in getting my vegetarian meal prepared in the way exactly i wanted it to be. i think i am not likely to have this kind of luxury for my long trip later.

Another thing that reminded me of my coming trip to India was the delayed of the speed ferry. It was supposed to depart at 11.30am, but it was waiting and waiting for one passenger after another. So it had only managed to leave the jetty at 12.10pm, which was a delayed for 40 minutes. i think this is something very likely to happen in India too. So i told myself that, instead of feeling annoyed, i should treat it with amusement. There is no reason to spoil my good holiday mood because of some other person's action or whatever i couldn't control. So, better to just treat it as a joke!

The first dive training was a revision of all open water techiniques, such as mask clearing, retrieving lost regulator, wearing and unwearing regulator in the water, lost buddy and rescue. i was panicked when i have to clear my mask while not having my regulator in my mouth. However, somehow, with some 'miracle', i still managed to do it in a clumsy and panicking way. The rescue was done in the same pathetic manner too. (The person would die of drowning if this was a real case.) After those revisions, we had a short leisure dive. To my greatest annoyance ( i don't think i can see this as something amusing at all), Abect (my dive instructor), actually plucked a sponge to rub his slate! So he had just killed an animals that he should in fact conserve. However i did not say anything. I didn't want to spoil our relationship just in the first training. i was also scared that, he will just left me in lurge if i needed help in the subsequent trainings.

Then we got a night dive for training of navigation. i repeated 4 or 5 times then only managed to read the compass correctly - finding my direction. i decided that, i don't like night dive. Probably things are more active, but you barely see your surrounding. i don't like this part of uncertainty. Abect again, to add to my annoyance, he was touching this animals and that. As a volunteer nature guide, this is reeally beyond my limits. First, he removed the sponge of a potter crab, then he touched a big shrimp (not sure what kind of shrimp) and refusing to let it go and the wrost thing is, he picked up a thorny sea cucumber and used it to touch an electric ray! As someone who relies on the sea, i think he should learn to conserve and should know that, all divers are just observers (or intruders) and should touch nothing (or at least keep it to minimum)! So when we ascent, i told him that, he shouldn't touch anything at all! Especially not to mention that using the sea cucumber to touch the electric ray so that the electric ray couldn't burrow into the sand bottom. He kept quiet and may be got annoyed by me too. I then suggested him to have a pair of wood choptsticks so that if he really need to touch an electric ray in the coming time, then at least he got an insulaor with him!



MONEY MATTER AND LOGISTIC:

1.) Accommodation:
Babura Sea View Resorts - attached bath room (no hot shower), aircon, complimentary breakfast, transport to and from jetty to the resort
RM 150 for 2 nights , check out time 2pm (discounted rate, 15%)

http://www.virtualmalaysia.com/directory/accommodation/view.cfm?ID=F64DDED0-5A24-44D0-B1E1E8E1D8661672

2.) Naui Advanced Scuba Diver course with Tioman Reef Diver
- RM 600 (discounted rate for previous student , -RM 50) - including six dives with all equipments

http://www.tiomanreefdivers.com/

3.) Transport:
- Kranji, Singapore to Larkin, Johor: Causeway Link (SGD 1.30)
* Remember to check the price on the ticket. My ticket was printed SGD 0.80 eventhough i paid for the full fare. i thought i need to pay again when they checked the ticket, but they did not even bother to see the ticket properly. So i got a pass.
* Arrived at Larkin in one hour time, may be because it i was a weekday, so no traffic jam at the causeway. (7.30am - 8.30am)

- Larkin to Mersing: S&S International Express at Counter 11 in Larkin Bus Terminal (RM 8.80)
* Bus 8.30am, but departed 20 minutes later and got a 30 minutes stop at Kota Tinggi
* 8.30am - 11.30am, arrived at Mersing 3 hours later.

- Speed Ferry: Bluewave (RM 35 single trip, can buy a return ticket if you want to)
* 11.30am - 2.30pm, 3 hours of journey including stops at different villages and the delayed.
* It will be better to take a speed boat but it has became not as frequent now. But speed boat takes only 1.5 hrs including the stop over, so it is still worth to consider. RM 10 more expensive than speed ferry.
* Mersing has one local bus station and express bus station. The express bus will stop at the bus stop near to the Jetty to tioman, which is the last bus stop. The tout at the bus stop can be helpful if you don't know your way. (You can just walk straight in/out of a few buildings beside of the bus stop to reach the jetty.) The touts are from certain boat company and they will lead you to the boat counter by the jetty and the price that you pay at the counter is the same as what you pay if you get there yourself. But they might try to convince you to take certain guest house. (You can choose your guest house when you are in the island or choose to take their recommendation. Normally, there is no inflated rate from them, so no worry.)

4.) Food: RM 20
* The cheapest food in Tekek is the hawker centre near to the airport or jetty. Every meal costs you around RM 5. Meal at the resort is greatly overpriced with each meal inflated to 3 times more expensive than normal rate.