Brunei - Under the Sea

Have you ever thought of setting up your scuba gear in Brunei? It took me by surprise too when my fellow diver friends suggested we go diving in Brunei. Huh? My mind thought, isn't the only sea venture of the country oil exploration? Apparently not.

Back in 2012, when at a dive expo, CM chanced upon a booth by a dive operator, Oceanic Quest, based in Brunei and promptly booked  for three of us to the country for an underwater adventure. Oceanic Quest was promoting the what Brunei can offer in its waters. Our dive package was an all-inclusive package ex-Bandar Seri Bagawan airport, from transportation to/fro airport, accommodation, food and boat dives. Optional add-on were dive equipment rental, nitrox air and day-tours.

Without batting an eyelid, we booked our flight tickets too as soon as our group agreed on the dive dates with OQ. Being "optimised divers", we booked the earliest flight departing from home and arrive just after breakfast time in Brunei. We were itchy to get wet. Although the dive centre owner, Steven Tan, did not plan for us to dive on arrival, but in the end, accommodated to our request of an afternoon check out dive at a shallow reef, Abana Pole

Pipe Fish

Lizardfish

But what is actually the attraction of diving in Brunei waters?
WRECKS! Not just ship wrecks but also sunken oil rigs-turn-reef. The waters of Brunei are teeming with shipwrecks deep in the sea. The BIG 4 wrecks are Australian Wreck, US Wreck, Cement Wreck and the Blue Water Wreck.

courtesy from Oceanic Quest FB
Clockwise from top left : Cement Wreck, Blue Water Wreck, US Wreck, Australian Wreck

Divemaster Aaron said he preferred wreck diving as each wreck has its own character. My personal favourite is the Aussie wreck. It has an interesting WWII history, being told that it was ferrying a few hundreds POWs when a bomb sunk the ship with all prisoners died on board. The story is that the bodies were still buried in the ship.  (more of the story Australian Wreck)What I liked about the wreck is the swim though, swimming in between the bars of the ship's frame. The average depth of the wreck dive is 29m.

Swim-though in Australian Wreck

Lionfish at the Australian Wreck

Swim-through the Australian Wreck (photo by CM)

US Wreck is a US warship that also sunk during the WWII time. The ammunition can still be seen, although we were warn not to touch any as those were live ammunition. (more of the story US Wreck). The average depth of the wreck dive is 26m.

Ammunition on board the US Wreck

Coral on board US Wreck

US Wreck

US Wreck

US Wreck

A few of the other  notable shipwreck dive sites are  Bolkiah Wreck, Youlee Wreck,.....
The one oil rig-reef we dived at was actually a dismantle oil rig, simply know as Rig Reef.

Bluewater Wreck

Looking though the hole in Blue Water Wrek

Cutttlefish at Blue Water Wreck

Part of Cement Wreck

Other than wrecks, there were the usual reef dives. Abana Pole, Barrack Reef, Icebox, Icebox 2.

Cuttlefish 

Boxer Shrimp 

Corallimorphs 

Pipe Fish

Whip Coral

Scorpionfish - can you spot it?

As diving in Brunei was mainly for wrecks, where the depth were more than the recreational dive limit of 20m. So as to optimise our dive time, we took up the PADI course on Enriched Air Nitrox (EAN), where the air in the tank has a higher oxygen level of more than 21% (more info EAN). Diving with EAN is to give a longer dive time with by extending the no decompression time in deeper waters. Most of our dives were in the regions of 30 minutes (depending on the depth).

Tanks of EAN

Although the there were not many big fishes we could see (not that there were none, just less), the reef dive sites were teeming with macro and small marine life. I salute our divemasters eyes, able to spot a perfectly camouflaged sea-horse, crabs, and nudibranchs. Even a seemingly boring sandy bottom is teeming with life like the goby and its shrimp. The trip was a nudibranchs and slugs galore for us. Although they were of the common types, it was no less a fascination.

Nudi at Abanapol

Nudi at Bolkiah Wreck

Seahorse

Commensal Crab

Mantis Shrimp (photo by CM)

Our dusk-cum-night dive yielded a treasure trove in Abana Pole. The corals were teeming with commensal crabs, sticking out their pincers, as if waving hello to us. A first time sighting for me of flutemouth and frogfish. There were also some lobsters lurking amongst the corals.

Commensal crab - night dive (photo by CM)

Hermit crab - night dive (photo by TG)

Oceanic Quest has fantastic divemasters. Our first trip, we were guided by Aaron, who is from Australia. Matt, from Malaysia, who was our first trip boat-master, was our divemaster throughout our second dive trip. Matt has superman eyes, able to spot the smallest of macro life.

With Matt, our DM

Admin team of OQ (photo by CM)

As the centre is not located by the beach but near a harbour, it was a daily ritual to get the dive boat out to the sea from the centre. Thus to optimise time, where day dives were planned such a way that we would be out for 3 day dives.  While we were having our breakfast, the boatman and divemaster were hard at work already, loading up our gear on to the boat. We suited up after a hearty breakfast and off we went by 8:30am. We were ferried to the harboar sandy water edge in a passenger van while another vehicle move off 15 minutes earlier, towing the boat there, having in just nice bobbing in the water as we arrived. Surface intervals, morning tea break and lunch would be on board the boat. Lunch was usually a simple fried rice/mihun/noodle that came with a sambal-with-a-kick. We even had hot water for hot tea/coffee and ice cordial too.

Getting the boat out and ready for a day of diving

Surface interval on board the boat

Accommodation with Oceanic Quest is like home away from home. The place has a comfortable lounge area equipped with Wi-Fi, 24hr statelite television, and even boardgames and mahjong. Evening while waiting for dinner or after dinner, we would sit and do our "homework", that was going through the photos of the dives and trying to identify what marine life we saw. Another plus point of OQ is that there were ample reference books and field guides for us to flip through.

Boardgame - aptly "Dive Dive Dive"

Dining area

Our meal, laid out self-service buffet style

Lounge, where we lazed after a day of diving

One of the many books available for reference

Food is another plus point. The owner of OQ has brought in great chefs and he himself has imparted his knowledge of some good recipes as well. We always had a balance meal of at least 2 meat dishes,  1 or 2 vegetable dishes and a must have soup, a very cantonese style thing. The soup would be a simple cooling-the-fire soup, which was perfect as we were out in the hot sun all day.

Simple meal of meat, vegetable, and soup (not in picture)

Simple meal of meat, vegetable, and cooling soup 

Lunch on board is simple fried noodles (or rice or mihun) serve with best sambal-with-the-kick
(photo by CM)

Our rooms were simple and clean. OQ has choices of room for 2 or 3 or 4 people. All rooms are air-conditioned. Only thing is there is no attached bathrooms. We all used the common bathrooms, which some were equipped with water heater and shower foam. Most of the time, I opted to have cold showers as the piped water was already warm enough from the blazing hot sun. OQ also provided each guest with a clean towel.

Room for 3

The dive centre is also catered to divers who do not have own equipment, such as fins, mask, BCD, octopus. We rented the BCD and octopus from the centre and suffice to say, we were happy with the condition of the equipment.

Equipment room

We ended our first trip to Brunei with a drive through the city centre on the way to airport, courtesy of OQ owner, Steven. We were so in awe of memorable trip that it had us in for a second dive trip there... and a third.

With Steven, owner of OQ

So, who say Brunei is boring? Not if your plans is EAT, SLEEP and DIVE!!!



Some links to and reviews of Oceanic Quest if you decide your next dive trip is to Brunei.
Oceanic Quest
Trip Advisor - my review
World Diving Review
Oceanic Quest Facebook