We chose Sapi Island only because of recommendations by others at the hotel.  It was very easy to get to.  We were not planning on going for a whole day as we have snorkelled many times, so were really just wanted a lovely day on the islands.  We took beautiful plastic packaged fruit, biscuits, water, sunscreen, swimmers and dry clothes, towles and hats.  Only what we could carry easily.

Ferry voucher from the hotel

At 9:00am, we walked down to Jessleton Pier.  At the pier is a very large modern building.  This is where you buy your tickets.  Don't walk down the pier to the boats as you will only be sent back.  We had a discount voucher for Counter Number 8, so this is who were headed for.


 All the touts were yelling at us.  We booked return tickets to Sapi, snorkel, fins  and mask for each person and  2 large plastic mats.  The man offered us 15RM for the snorkel sets but for some reason I told him it was too expensive and so he immediately dropped it to 10RM each.  (what came over me, I don't know!).  So the moral here, is bargain for everything.  Ha Ha!  We paid 5 RM for the mats. We paid 13RM each for the boat.  We then had to go to another counter and pay marine duty which was 10RM and THEN we had to pay isalnd entry too.  We also bought dried bread for 2RM to feed the fish.  Only buy one bottle as it lasts forever and the marine rangers don't really like you feeding the fish.

Floating village on the way

 We then walked down to the end of the pier to find find our "people" to give us the equipment and send us to the boat. it was a very beautiful 20 minute ride to Sapi.  We even saw floating villages on the way.

Jungle walk to our private beach

Once on the island, we were told by some other tourists, that if you walk to the back of the beach and over to the left there is a little walking track with a sign track F-E that will take you to your own little private beach (hopefully!)  We found it easily and climbed the very steep and rocky track.  Then at the large rock (Yes! they were the instructions) we slid down the hill all the way to the beach.  It was rough and toddleres certainly couldn't do it.  Anyway, we found our little piece of paradise.

Out private hideaway

The water was fairly clear and there was lots of coral and rocks.  Unfortunatley, all of the coral was dead, being so close to the beach.  There was also a lot of rubbish tath had come off boats, but it was clean and sunbleached.  The kids actually found it funny finding old toys, shoes etc. But not very environmentally friendly!!

Flotsum

 We enjoyed about 2 hours of solid snorkeling.  We saw little clown fish (Nemos") living in sea anemones, sea slugs and beautiful blue and orange starfish, parrot fish, zebra fish  and lots of other fish.






We enjoyed a beautiful morning tea of watermelon and fresh fruit and biscuits.

At the main beach of Sapi