Home ATTRACTIONS City/Village Sebatik Island Tawau Part 1-The boat ride

Sebatik Island, boat ride, adventure, backpackers, destination, exploration, jelajah, Transportation, Sabah, Tawau, Malaysia, Tourism, Travel Guide, cross border, Borneo, — The upper deck is always the coolest place with nice view of the scenery

Sebatik Island Tawau Part 1-The boat ride

May 3, 2020

Location : Pulau Sebatik, Tawau Division, Sabah, Malaysia.

Sebatik Island / Pulau Sebatik is an island off the eastern coast of Borneo. The northern part belongs to Sabah, Malaysia while the southern part belongs to North Kalimantan, Indonesia.

Sebatik is an island opposite Tawau shared by Malaysia and Indonesia. No sane tourists would ever come here because nothing much happens except for oil palm plantations and small time fishing.

We came to visit out of curiosity. During our travels in Kalimantan, we came across jokes that said some houses in Sebatik Indonesia had their toilets located in Malaysia! The only online news about Sebatik that I knew of was a video done by an undercover Indonesian journalist exposing the human trafficking story here. Well, this may be the ‘off the beaten path’ thing we were looking for.

My friend Tom from Kota Kinabalu gave me the contact Mr Chong in Sebatik. After a few calls, we made our way to the Tawau port to catch the express boat ride to Wallace Bay.

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Pulau, Island, adventure, backpackers, destination, exploration, jelajah, Transportation, Malaysia, Tourism, Travel Guide, 婆罗洲游踪, 马来西亚沙巴斗湖 — Boat ride with the locals

Island, backpackers, destination, exploration, jelajah, Transportation, Malaysia, Wallace Bay, Tourism, tourist attraction, Travel Guide, cross border, Borneo, 跨境婆罗洲游踪, 马来西亚沙巴斗湖 — The upper deck is always the coolest place with nice view of the scenery

After dropping off a few teachers at the Mentadak jetty, we finally arrived at the last stop which was Wallace Bay.

It was about an hour ride and a local Malay guy offered to drive us to meet Mr. Chong for a fee of RM50.

Island, boat ride, adventure, backpackers, exploration, jelajah, jetty, Transportation, Kampung Melayu, Tourism, tourist attraction, Travel Guide, Trans Borneo, 穿越婆罗洲游踪, 马来西亚沙巴斗湖 — Wallace Bay jetty

Island, exploration, jelajah, jetty, Transportation, Kampung Melayu, malay village, Malaysia, Tourism, Travel Guide, — Cafe at Wallace Bay jetty. Reckon the operator must be at Tidung Dayak if the motif is anything to go by

adventure, backpackers, exploration, jelajah, Kampung Melayu, malay village, Tawau, Malaysia, Bergosong, Mentadak Baru, Tongkang, Wallace Bay, Tourism, Borneo — Local bus

Island, backpackers, destination, exploration, jelajah, Kampung Melayu, malay village, Tourism, tourist attraction, Travel Guide, Trans Border, Borneo, 探索婆罗洲游踪, 马来西亚沙巴斗湖 — The start of our car ride to meet Mr. Chong

Being the only local Chinese man there, everybody knew him. He was like the Jack of all trades. He was the ‘kapitan’, the RELA head, owned oil palm plantations, ferry, homestay, swiflet farms, fish farms, chicken farm and he even reared wild pigs. Despite his financial status, he remained a humble man with a hearty laugh. For the two days we stayed here he would drive us around. Next…..getting to know Mr Chong and his business operations better.