DATE : 14 MAY--> 21 MAY 2006
All these took place in Terengganu, a very primitive and transquil state in Malaysia..... basically no entertainment, life is kinda bored if there is no beach and sea.
After a year of neck-breaking long wait, finally came the day...... the trip to CHAGAR HUTANG, an isolated beach on Redang Island, free from nuissance and crowds of other island resorts on the other sides.
And a trip of 8 days 7 nites @ Chagar Hutang began......
From left: Robyn, Shy Jye, OnionHead, PohPing
Happy foursome taking photo on the couch, setting off to Kuala Terengganu @ 10.45pm from Larkin Bus Terminal, Johor Bahru.
Arrived at Kuala Terengganu Bus Terminal in early morning ~~ 6.30am.
Met up with the couple, Yuan We and Phei Leng who set off from Kedah there. And that made up our team of 6.
By taxi, we reached KUSTEM ==> Kolej Universiti Sains dan Teknologi Malaysia, which costs us RM6 each......and took time ard 30minutes.
The SEATRU house in KUSTEM compound, the base of SEATRU program. We were waiting for anybody to come save us....haha.... we reached there too early, what to do? just wait.....
Supposed the time to gather up is 8.00am. But our RA (Research Assistant in short), Mr. Zaini, was late.... he came at 8.30am.
SEATRU ==> Sea Turtle Research Unit, developed to carry out conservation-oriented research on sea turtles in Malaysia.
For more information, plz visit http://www.kustem.edu.my/seatru
The group of 6, from Left, PohPing, YuanWe, PheiLeng, OnionHead, ShyJye, Robyn and bus driver......
After a "short" briefing + "long" waiting + breakfast, we started by uploading backpacs and foods onto our transport, a van. And here we go, heading to Merang Jetty, about 45 minutes from KUSTEM.
The group photo taken in VAN.
Whew, the journey is so bumping, especially for us who sitting at the back...... breakfast almost vomit out d....
The Merang Jetty. We got to "tumpang" Laguna Resort's luxurious huge boat to Laguna Resort.
So many luggages for only 6 persons, look at Zaini's troubled face, haha...^_^
Laguna's boat driver, Pak Mat. Experienced seaman for more than 30 yrs.
Who would ever expect this uncle to be one of the main characters in our 8 days trip? This uncle may look cool but he was the one who offered us a free lunch at Laguna Resort's staff canteen when we were hungry dead. He was also the one who donated a cabbage to us when we ran out of veggie. Great samathan.....haha
Great wind.....
Hey, say BYEBYE to KT, say HI to redang
arrival....
Yeah, welcome to Laguna Redang Island Resort.
The "legendary" More More Tea Inn.... hey, not the 1st time I'm in Redang Island, ok?
After a short stroll on Pasir Panjang, we got back to the jetty, heading to our SEATRU campsite by our own speed boat. Don't worry, we still have chance to come to Pasir Panjang in the days coming.
Our main boat driver of SEATRU trip, MALIKI!!! cool..... "=_= sitting on speed boat like playing roller coaster.... my poor skinny buttock.... the water splashed into boat, most of our things got wet!
Here we are at SEATRU campsite!
Settle down, settle down....
This is where we slept for 7 nites, a wooden hut, they called it "Rumah Bertingkat", muahaha. The green thing in front is our bathroom....kasihan...
By the way, the water source here all flow from mountain, naturally obtained, even more crystal clear than the pipe water in my Serdang house. KL sucks....
The boat may have sped very fast, but we have stopped twice to pick up 2 persons (Gery and Leif )at different spots, took us quite some time b4 reaching at campsite.
By the way, the campsite appeared messy all around since it was under construction. Over 20 workers were there to build up new wooden house after old houses were torn down. We had no choise but to bear with the sudden crowd and nuissance, and also sleep in rumah bertingkat which were supposed to be the staffs' house. We were not lucky enough, as the new house will only be done after we left.......~_~
By the time we arrived at campsite, it was already reaching 3pm. Settling down, cleanning stuffs, a short briefing by Zaini.... then prepare our dinner...... we barely made everything done by 8pm. And then sampailah masa for us to patrol along the beach of about 350m long.
So messy, can u imagine this is gonna be our dining table for the rest of days?!
Cleanning up tables and preparing our dinner. The long-gas nagging Leif was watching us so that we did our job properly, haha.
Short introduction of Leif here :
He told us that he is an American who stayed in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for some years already, but now his parents had moved to ShangHai. And he is now doing some research on marine biology at Redang Island. He has been there for 2 months b4 we got there. And he has been only with us for 2.5 days. Luckily actually, b'cos he has been very talkative.... once he talks, not so easy to stop him, and u must listen to him attendingly or he will stared at u. Muahaha. Maybe there's been few persons to share his experience? So he talked alot, bathing himself in his scientific talks with us. Can hardly fully understand what he said, but we tried, and getting more easier in our communication, and flooded him with many questions, that even he himself started wondering the answers too....hehe. Oh yeah, he likes to blink 1 eye and give ppl a smile when talking to ppl, cute eh?
Salute also to his noble love for sea turtle. Amazing him, working under blasting hot sun without getting sun-tanned, while we the rest tanned shortly under the sun. Whew, we gals were luckier, only guys were towed along by him to move huge tree branches, miehehe.
Hmm, he is very picky in eating regarding healthy food but regardless of taste. All he ate is healthy food such as oats, organic food, soya bean and no MSG. One thing i respect him alot is that he never waste food. He will finish all up. I would think of my dad here....
What we learnt from him: Seafood we ate may have toxin accumulated in their internal organs. That may be caused by the main food source of small fishes and shells which consists of algae that may contain toxins. Toxins may accumulate in fishes that eaten small fishes, prawns, shells and algae. Then the whole food chain polluted, up-reach to human who is at top of the chain. So, be careful in preparing seafood and cleanning internal organs, avoid eating internal organs of any seafood, and especially clams, sea-shells, etc.
Then the nite came.....
Every nite at 8pm, we will start patrolling along the CHAGAR HUTANG beach until 12am. Then we will be divided into 3 shifts-- 12-2am, 2-4am, 4-6am.
Usually, we'd have 1 to 3 sea turtles which got up on the beach. Most laid eggs, some did not.
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