AFTER our day tour at Kinabalu Park and Poring Hot Spring, for our day two adventure, we decided to unwind and soak up ourselves to some sun at Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park which Kota Kinabalu (KK), Malaysia is also known for.
Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park is composed of five islands namely Gaya, Sapi, Manukan, Mamutik and Sulug. The marine park was named after Malaysia’s first Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman.
Getting there
Our day did not quite went as expected because our Uber ride (which we got for free, thanks to the very kind hotel staff) almost left us because we got lost on our way out of the building. We were glad that everything went well and we have safely arrived at KK’s local port, Jesselton Point, to jump off the day’s itinerary.
Upon arrival at Jesselton Point we then went inside the ticketing area where you can find a lot of island hopping tour providers. With our prior research, we headed straight to counter 11 to schedule our island hopping.
The islands are not that quite far from each other, you can choose visiting from one to four islands and schedule different pick up time for island transfer. The most visited islands in the park are Gaya, Sapi and Manukan but since we just want to spend the morning to relax, we ended up choosing only Manukan Island to avoid the hassle of transferring and because it’s cheaper too.
Our tour provider was Island Hop Express (Counter 11) and their rates are: 1 island – RM23 (Malaysian ringgit), two islands – RM33, three islands – RM43 and four islands – RM53. Upon arrival to your chosen island, one must pay an environmental fee of RM3 per island so don’t forget to bring some spare cash. All tour providers also provide snorkeling and diving gears for rent. Island hopping begins at 8 to 8:30 a.m. and ends around 5 p.m. but some islands also offer rooms for those who wish to stay in.
Another funny story on this day: the provider (who is a Filipina) gave us student discount rates because she was impressed and thought we were locals because I spoke to her in Bahasa so instead of paying RM23 we ended up paying only RM20 (yay!).
The tour boat somewhat works like our local jeepney because it makes several stops on every island and we are not complaining about that because we got a glimpse of Gaya and Sapi islands during the stops.
The island experience
When we arrived in the island and after a short chat, we then found out that our tour provider’s agent assigned in the island is a Filipino. It really came up to my research to be wary about them though because some tend to make you pay higher but we were glad that he was very kind to us and even gave us discounts on their parasailing in the island. We gave it a quick thought and did it! We paid RM140 instead of RM150 for it.
We parasailed for about 10 minutes and it was one of my best experiences ever! The view of the islands and the city from above was stunning. It was not that scary at all either and the parasailing staff even offered to take photos and record our entire experience.
After our short but memorable parasailing experience, we then went back to the island. One great thing about the island is that it already has table and benches where you can eat and put your things. It also has lots of trees for shade. There’s also a store which sells food but we decided to bring our own snack and drinks just to be sure.
We spent our time left for swimming and taking some photos. There were also a lot of locals and tourists alike who went island hopping during that time so the bathroom situation was really a disaster so we just quickly changed and took a proper bath in our hotel instead. We then headed back to KK at around 12 noon.
To sum this day up, even though it was not that perfect it was really fun since we got to try parasailing for the first time!
PS: The boat ride going to the island was fun for us too. It was like riding a motorcycle on sea.
More about this trip next week!
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Hi, I’m Kriztja and thanks for reading My Notebook! Check out my blog: rainbow-wishes.blogspot.com for more. Comments? Suggestions? Email me at: kriztja.labrador@gmail.com.