We had booked a bus to Mersing where we would get a ferry to Pulua Tioman, an island off the east coast of Malaysia. It was an early start as we had to get to the bus station outside of town. It took about 4 hours to get to Mersing, we then had to wait around for 4 hours for the ferry. We found a restaurant and set up shop for a few hours. 

We had chosen to go to Salang village on the island, this is the last ferry stop, luckily we made it before it was dark and headed up to the top of the beach to Salang Huts to see if they had a hut. We had found the huts online and the reviews were good, luckily they had a free one. The huts were very basic but had been personally decorated by Louis the owner, from Holland. The huts were painted different colours and had really random things hanging up for decoration such as old flip flops, mini disco balls and a polystyrene ball with mini tenpin bowling pins hanging from it. It was all very old but Louis did explain to Kate that one of his friends brings him some special grass to smoke and it helps his creative juices....explains a lot! 

From reading online and in the guide books it makes Tioman sound like a place that once was the place to be but is now very built up. We're not sure about the other beaches but ours definitely wasn't. The main reason to come here is to dive, but as Pete wasn't very well and we were saving our money for diving in the Philippines we stuck to snorkelling. 

Our first day there was a cloudy one so we spent the day chilling and recovering from a bad nights sleep due to the horrific thunder storm. The next day the sun was back out so we hired some snorkels and headed out. The water was so clear and there were so many fish, it was like being in an aquarium. Many people spot turtles here but we weren't so lucky on our first day. 
Louis told us about another beach, monkey bay, over the headland. This beach is quite isolated so you don't see anyone there and he said the snorkelling was good. We set off and started climbing up a big hill. As we neared the top it started to pour with rain, we were already soaked with sweat but the rain made it very slippery. As we were walking we saw a couple of monitor lizards run across our path, one scared the hell out of Pete, there were about a metre long so only young. Tioman is known for having lots of monitor lizards which you can see in the rivers near the beach, some are huge. Anyway we finally made it, it was a lot of hard work. The beach was deserted, we were both exhausted and over heating so we ran straight in the water to cool off. We found a big log and secured our belongings down with it as the monkeys are known for stealing things. We then went out snorkelling but we really didn't see much. Disappointed we decided to trek back over the hill to the snorkelling spot from the first day. After an hours walk we just floated in the sea not far from the shore and hundreds of fish just swam around us and followed us, there were lots of different types including some big, colourful parrot fish. 
That evening we popped in to the duty free shop and bought a few beers, they even had Kate's favourite cider, Savanna Dry and it was very cheap. We had a few drinks and some dinner before a few games of UNO, Kate has now over taken and is well in the lead. The restaurants here don't sell alcohol so you buy it from the duty free shop and take it with you, it's great!

Our last day consisted of more snorkelling and watching the monitor lizards and other wildlife. 

We were up early to catch the boat back. We had packed and ready to go. As Pete stepped off the last step of the hut he slipped and slid, partially doing the splits and cutting his leg and foot on the rough concrete. We walked down to the shop and bought some water to rinse it with then a man turned up with some cream. He said it would help and stop it bleeding so Pete accepted a few squirts and applied it to the cuts. It stung like hell but seemed to stop the bleeding. It was until the man was putting it away that Kate realised it was insect bite relief gel, no wonder it stung. After the man had gone we washed it off and replaced it with savalon. Pete's feet are rather scared now with the amount of times he scraped and stubbed them on rocks and steps.....can't take him anywhere!