Finding my fins on Lang Tengah

Lang Tengah's biggest draw is probably its exclusivity.

Located about 40 minutes to an hour by boat from Merang, subject to sea conditions, and a twenty minute hop from the more popular (and much larger) Pulau Redang, Lang Tengah is a small slice of paradise.

There are only 3 operating resorts (Summer Bay, Sari Pacifica, and D'Coconut), one warung, and one abandoned resort. Limited accommodation means few crowds. Instead you get long, almost empty beaches of fine white sand. Warm, crystal clear seas. Masses of fish and baby sharks (do do duh do do!) to snorkle and frolic with. Just lovely.

The beach in front of Sari Pacifica

Sari Pacifica's dock

It's not perfect, of course.

Exclusivity has a price. None of the three resorts are within a typical backpacker budget. And I did get a few sandfly bites on the beaches here. Meanwhile the coral off beach is all dead, broken stuff (although there are still some fish, and all those baby reef sharks). Even the famed blue bommie in front of Sari Pacifica seemed MIA (at least, I couldn't find it, nor did I see any snorkle boats in the area, so I'm guessing it probably died).

No one on this beach except you, a small warung, and an abandoned resort

The abandoned resort

But although the off-beach snorkling is fairly poor, there is some amazing snorkling and dive sites within 5-10 minutes by boat.

I've focused on off-beach snorkling in the past, mostly because I've never been a particularly strong swimmer, and got worse after my accident. So I've tended to prefer to snorkle in water that's no more than 10 feet deep, and no more than 20-30m from where you can put your feet down.

On Lang Tengah, I popped my deepwater cherry. The first site they took us to featured enormous chunks of hard corals in 18m deep water. Despite the depth though, it was so clear you could easily see the marine life. I was entranced!

The next site they took us to was maybe 5m (estimating, as I was too busy swimming to ask at the second site). It was absolutely amazing! I saw my first moray eel (mean-looking sonofabitch!).

The snorkle trips aren't cheap - I paid 70RM to join an 80 minute trip, covering two sites. But man, oh man, it was worth it.

Do do duh do do!