Kota Kinabalu TAR Marine Park

For a spot of diving in a place within reach of civilisation, Kota Kinabalu’s Tunku Abdul Rahman Park is just swell.

Mention scuba diving in Sabah, and people are likely to think of Mabul or Sipadan.

These islands are about nothing but beaches and diving. While this may be great for many, those of us who need something a little more may find them wanting.

This is where Kota Kinabalu, the capital, comes into the picture. Or Tunku Abdul Rahman Marine Park, to be exact.

The park is probably one of the best-kept diving secrets in the country, and it is a mere 20 minutes by speedboat from the town’s marina. TAR Park consists of five islands, Gaya (the biggest), Sapi, Manukan, Sulug and Mamutik.

A gorgeous nudibranch spotted in Agil Reef, Sabah.

At least 10 reputable diving sites are said to be located here, so this, for me, became a trip to verify if the convenience of the park’s location is backed up by quality.

I started off at Gaya Island, where the visibility was about average and the coral quality below average. The glaring damage from dynamite blasting was evident, a scene repeated in varying degrees of severity at other sites.

But as we continued exploring, we came across areas that had largely recovered and were spreading out on their own. Reef fish and nudibranchs abounded. I even spotted a couple of crustaceans and crabs.

After the requisite surface interval, we headed down to Agil Reef nearby. There we came upon another surprise: prowling goatfish covered the sands, while critters like crabs lounged in tubular corals.

I caught two lionfish in one of these hideouts enjoying a spot of, er, intimacy. I wasn’t quick enough with my camera but got the chance to snap one of them looking magnificently flustered.

Aside from a couple of pufferfish nearby, this particular spot was a veritable macro heaven, with more nudibranchs on offer.

The third dive was a simple one at the house reef off Sapi. A shallower site, it bottomed out to a flat bed of sand where visibility was very murky, but not murky enough that we couldn’t spot a harassed eagle ray flapping away from our group.

A defensive lion fish; a knobby nudibranch in Pulau Sapi

Our dive master had reminded us to look out for garden eels, and as we hugged the ground, we soon saw their heads sticking out. Dozens, in fact. But as soon as we were within a foot of them, they disappeared into the ground.

We foraged around for more fish life, mainly around a few old reef balls planted in the area. A lone barracuda scared me enough to avoid it swiftly, and I settled for portrait shots of a more benign goatfish.

It had been a long day, but some of us contemplated a twilight dive. Already feeling cold from previous dives, some decided to opt out. Wanting to take more pictures and knowing it would be a different experience at night, I opted to continue.

Jumping back in just after 6pm, we found the water was pleasantly warm; still heated from the day’s baking.

Bedtime pursuits

Night diving means getting closer to the nocturnal crustaceans. Right after bottoming out at a shallow depth of 9m, we bumped into a hermit crab walking across the sand. It looked sheepish under the glare of our spotlights and sidled off as fast as it could as the flashbulbs worked overtime.

The highlight was an encounter of a rather, urm, libidinal nature when I spotted not two, but three nudibranchs doing the horizontal samba (procreating). It felt nauseatingly voyeuristic but these moments don’t come every day so I snapped away.