Borneo Divers Mabul Resort - would love your thoughts

[Sib]

We are planning to go to dive Sipadan in April/May 2010 and are trying to work out the best way of maximising our chances of getting to Sipadan at least every second day. From other posts it looks like Borneo Divers gives a good permit to beds ratio, but this was from information posted in 2008.

Has anyone been to Borneo Divers recently? Are you able to report on how many permits it is getting?

Also, are the dire reports of the state of the resort posted on Trip Advisor to be believed? Though to be honest, the diving will ALWAYS come before the accomodation.

Thanks for any comments,
Sib

 

[pazz]

I stayed at Borneo Divers in March 2009. My trip report is posted on page 5 of this forum. The title is Borneo; better late than never?.

Or, you can try this link.

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/malaysia-singapore/279853-borneo-better-late-than-never.html

 

[tstormdiver]

I was there in April. The resort is very well kept up. The staff was very attentive. The food was so-so. Of course it wasn't what we were used to in the US (what can I say, we Americans are spoiled), but the cooks tried very hard to fix us near US quality food. You have to give them an "A" for effort. They biggest Kudos I will give, is the staff at the pier. They were very helpful getting your gear back & forth to the boats. They always had tanks set up for you if you wanted to make any shore dives, but you had to have your name on the diving board. I also must commend them on their efforts to try to help me recover my camera when I lost it on a night shore dive. It was never found, but they sent out 3 Divemasters, & 2- 3 boats to search for it. There were 15 divers in our group, we all got to make 4 visits (total of 16 dives) at Sipadan in the 10 days of diving we did, which were were told was very unusual to get that many trips to the island. It was very memorable.

 

[Sib]

pazz, tstormdiver

Thanks for the posts - much appreciated...

Other option for me is to dive with one of the Semorna based operators, but stay in Mabul. It all a bit angsty for me! I'm going to also do a side trip to Derawan so I can chill out!