Wet on Jong

Wednesday morning, we headed out just before sunrise to catch Pulau Jong at low tide. Jong is a tiny tiny outcrop of an island situated somewhere between Semakau and Bukom. It is so small, you only see a tuft of green foliage exposed in the middle of nowhere, with swooping sea eagles gracefully circling the island. But at low tide, a reef flat is exposed, and we attempted our amphibious landing at this time, just when day broke.

As we fumbled across the intertidal towards the cliff, we noticed a scary storm in the distance. Sheets of rain partially cloaked the brown haze in the distance.

Knowing the storm might just be making its way over to where we were, we hurriedly carried on. Here you can see Sebarok in the distance, from which an odour of petroleum extruded. Meh.


The reef is abundant with soft corals and funny little hairy crabs. Sadly, this cute hiding red eye reef crab was the only crab I got a picture of.

Nearby, a large flatworm went about its business.

This strange tiny eel (?) caught my eye. It was very busy poking around the sand, rather violently tearing at the undersides of rocks.


As usual, gobies were in abundance. I find them very adorable.

A marine spider tried to run away from me! Understandble, of course.



Another flatworm -- these guys were fairly common on Jong!

How many gobies are there in this picture?

Alas, less than an hour from landing and the stupid storm reached us. Cold, windy, wet, miserable. We mucked around the high shore while the rain pelted down, waiting for some reprieve (that did not come). The tide was about to turn so we decided to just call for our ride and FLEE!

Back on the boat, everyone looked suitably ridiculous. Soggy, cold, and flourescent.

Ivan picked something off his bootie that turned out to be a tiny hitchhiking spider crab!


Well. Shivering and damp, we bade farewell to Jong. That's our little dinghy the White Bunny. Aww.

Back at the marina, we eyeballed the ostentatious over-consumption of the privileged class.

...that are very creative at naming their rides.

This was my favourite: the Sea Duction. *chortle*

That's our little boat...

... next to the huge thing called the White Rabbit.