Sapi Island South China Sea April 26th 2012

Sapi...In the South China Sea

Just next door, Sapi island is much smaller and just a stones throw away. About 3 minutes on the boat and arrival at another tropical island in the South China Sea. Onto the jetty, which actually extends quite away into the sea here, and looking down onto a marine wonderland. Fish, thousands of them, or so it seems. Reef fish and many other varieties all swimming around the jetty area. Shoals that are so dense its hard to differentiate between individual fish!

Tourists, plenty of them on this Island. It's where they come to snorkel, swim and sit around drinking, relaxing under palms or sunbathing on the white powdery sand. This invariably means garbage and sadly quite a few plastic bottles are strewn around. I'm not here to sit around though, so off to find the jungle path. Yep, it's another hilly island clad with jungle. through the gate, and this time I have to pay the conservation fee of 10 RM, be interesting to find out what's actually being conserved.

A few tourists here are a little excited, kids squealing. There are about a dozen lizards of the giant variety all lazily wallowing in mud, seemingly oblivious to the excited tourists. A piece of food is tossed into the mix, creating a stir every so often. There is a fence separating humans from animals, but it's not a complete enclosure - these lizards are free to come and go at will. It's a good opportunity to get up close, closer than is comfortable at times, to these fascinating creatures.

The jungle trail is actually more of a woodland walk. Ferns mixed into the jungle plant-scape and it's much less dense than most treks I've taken. Being that much smaller means a view of the blue sea is never faraway, making for a pleasant, much less onerous hike. About 1 1/2 hours from start to the finish point, back at the lizards ground where all seems to be quite calm and serene and a few less of them. Less, because 3 of them have made it to the other side of the fence, and are behind me points out a local. These animals have teeth, and can move fast despite their apparent laziness. It's a wise decision to move away slowly, as the lizards search for its bits of food.

About 45 minutes to relax and people watch, whilst waiting for the boat back to KK. Another look at the circus of marine life that the clear blue waters around the jetty seems to attract.