Days 161 – 163: Pulau Derawan

Photos: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2061189&l=57bec&id=1101094

After my punishing bus ride to Berau, all I wanted to do was find a nice stretch of sand where I could plant myself for a few days and not come within 100 yards of a bus. Luckily, Pulau Derawan, a quiet island with only a couple hundred inhabitants, fantastic snorkeling, and pristine white sand beaches, was only a few hours away. I set off for the island as fast as my share-taxi would take me.

Which, as it turned out, was unreasonably fast. The driver of the car took the curves and bumps of the mediocre road to Tanjung Batu as if he was some sort of race car driver, only without the talent, and left his passengers-- seven Indonesians and myself-- clutching for the safety handles and trying to keep their breakfasts in their stomachs. But in that last regard, some of us were more successful than others-- only fifteen minutes into the ride the little girl sitting in front of my vomited into a black plastic bag, and the headscarved woman sitting next to me followed suit a few minutes later. I turned up my iPod, stared out the window, and pretended like I didn't see or hear any of it.

But what I saw out the window wasn't particularly appealing, either. All along the sides of the road I saw evidence of the environmental gutting of Kalimantan, from the numerous coal mines polluting the landscape, to the palm oil plantations that inhabit land formerly reserved for tropical rainforest, to the trucks and river barges that carry the coal and the logs from the formerly-pristine interior of Borneo to the large coastal cities like Samarinda and Balikpapan. I'd always read about the destruction of rainforests in Borneo, but it's quite another thing to see it up close.

We arrived in Tanjung Batu around midday, and from there it was only a half hour's speedboat ride out to Pulau Derawan. There weren't, however, any scheduled boat trips out to the island, so I would have to charter a boat if I wished to reach the much-hyped paradise. I considered waiting to see if anyone else arrived who would want to split the boat with me, but I decided that given the number of tourists I had seen so far in Kalimantan, the chances of that happening were slim. As it turned out, I was one of three foreigners on the island, and no one new arrived while I was there, so it's a good thing I didn't try to wait around for reinforcements.

By the time I found a speedboat driver who would take me to Derawan, the wind had picked up and the ocean swells had grown quite large. Luckily, the speedboat was prepared to handle the waves-- it was just over seven feet long, sat two people (and only one comfortably), and looked as if it could be controlled by a remote control. Every wave tossed the boat into the air, and seconds later we would hit the water with a resounding "Crack!" that led me to believe that the hull of the boat was seconds from splitting in two. It was with relief and quite a bit of amazement that I climbed out of the boat and onto the white sand of Derawan, thanked the driver, and wished him the best of luck for the return voyage.

Derawan is indeed the paradise that it claims to be, but one which seems to be about fifty years behind modern times. The island has only one "road," but given that there are no cars on the island and only a few motorbikes, the road is mostly used by pedestrians, which is a good thing because it's made entirely out of sand. Electricity is very limited-- my guesthouse had none at all, and even the fanciest houses only had it for a few hours each evening. That means no television, at least not during the day, so the residents, and especially the children, have to find other activities to occupy their time. The main options seem to be playing volleyball or badminton (nightly games near the mosque), shooting marbles (I watched countless games being played on the sandy road), or swimming in the crystal-clear water that surrounds the island. It's actually quite refreshing to see people spending their days this way, especially after watching town after town in Southeast Asia waste away its days in front of the TV set.

I spent three glorious days on Derawan, and all of them consisted of the same basic activities: snorkeling over technicolor coral reefs teeming with even brighter fish, reading in the sun on the deserted beach, retreating into the shade of the palm trees when my skin had grown just a little too red, and eating fresh fish three meals a day. One morning I walked around the island and found that it was even smaller than I had thought-- it took me only half an hour to make it around. Along the way I ran into a pack of kids, all of whom wanted their photo taken over and over and over again. I hadn't seen kids so excited about a camera since India.

The weather changed particularly quickly here-- one minute the sky would be blue and cloudless, the next I'd be caught in a torrential downpour (which, given the heat, was not entirely unwelcome), and a few minutes later the sky would be clear again and one would never know that it had just rained. The rain never occupied more than an hour or two of each day, which is not bad considering this is Borneo's rainy season.

The snorkeling here was probably the best I'd ever done-- better than in Honduras, better than in Egypt, and even better than in Sumatra. I saw every species of fish I'd seen elsewhere in Southeast Asia, plus at least ten or fifteen new ones, most of which I couldn't identify. Perhaps the most interesting was the crocodile fish, which lies on the ocean floor and blends in with the sand. It's called a crocodile fish because of its long snout (click this link for a stock photo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Papilloculiceps_longiceps_by_Jacek_Madejski.jpg).

But the real highlight of snorkeling Derawan was not a fish at all, but a reptile: the giant green sea turtle, which glided through the shallow waters just off the beach. This species of turtle is endangered, but you wouldn't know it from spending time on Derawan-- I saw at least thirty of them in my three days on the island. Surprisingly, the turtles don't seem at all afraid of humans (perhaps that's why they're endangered); I swam right up to several of them and even touched their shells, and they just glided right past me without the slightest inkling of fear. They're one of the most beautiful creatures to observe in the water, right up there with manta rays; they swim gracefully with their paddle-like arms, and they're huge-- most of the ones I saw were over three feet long and probably weighed upwards of 300 pounds.

As I whiled the days away swimming with the fishes, I realized that I had now snorkeled in quite a few different locations throughout Southeast Asia. Accordingly, I feel it's time to impart some of the wisdom I've gained in the time I've spent underwater. It all really comes down to two facts:

1) There are two kinds of reef fish: the ones that swim by flapping their fins, and the ones that swim by wiggling their butts.

2) The ones that swim by wiggling their butts are way cuter.

Any questions?