Sipadan Diving Experience II

With no doubt at all, diving in Sipadan was a total eye opener.

As for amateur diver like me, it was something new and adventurous.

There r a total of 13 dive sites in Sipadan Island.

1. Barracuda Point 

Depth: 40+ metres (131+ feet)

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: North East of Sipadan Island.

Regularly ranked top 3 in the world. 

Currently world no.1

This outstanding dive site has more than a thousands of great barracuda shoal
often seen in a tornado-like formation.

You will see dozens of turtles in one dive, schools of whitetip sharks, batfish,
jacks and barracuda. And everything from nudibranchs to hammerhead sharks.

2. Turtle Tomb

Depth: 17-23 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: East of The Jetty.

 Perfect for specialty divers, divemaster level and above.

About 18m deep is the entrance to Turtle Cave. The cave first goes down in a bell shaped descent tunnel and leads to the lower chamber. Following the left side of the cavern will bring you in front of a tunnel. This tunnel is connecting Turtle Cavern with Turtle Tomb a small cave system which contains many turtle skeletons. This is due to the great number of turtles that they simply enter the cave and are unable to find the exit .

3. North Point

Depth: 25-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: Northwest of Sipadan reef.

great for its marine bio-diversity.

This is a wall dive.

4. West Ridge

Depth: 18-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: West of Sipadan.

Good for marine biology, snorkeling, free diving, 

underwater photography, wall dives, sharks.

5. Hanging Garden

Depth: 5-40m (16-131 feet)

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: South of Sipadan island.

 is one of the best dives of sipadan. It's great for snorkeling, free diving, and underwater photography.

The reef wall is very colourful, covered in soft corals, seafans and large barrel sponges.
The coral gives home to a great variety of smaller fish including damselfish, chromis, sweetlips on black coral, clownfish, lobsters in cracks, tiny sea slugs, etc.

In one dive, you can often spot 50+ turtles along with reef sharks, 

whitetips and a big school of Bumphead parrotfishes.

6. Lobster Lairs

Depth: 25-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: Southwest of Sipadan reef. 

Lobster lairs is a very nice dive with lots of lobsters hidding in cracks. 

Reef sharks and mantas are living inhabitants.

7. White Tip Avenue

Depth: 17-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: East side of Sipadan, south of Barracuda Point and Coral Gardens.

Perfect for sharks lover

8. Mid Reef

Depth: 5-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: South of Whitetip Avenue.

some of the best coral formations in Sipadan: black coral, knotted fan corals and gorgonian sea fans.

Ascending you will find cabbage corals, table corals, green tree corals, and all manner of stony corals.
You can admire the many green and hawksbill turtles along with cruising white-tip reef sharks.

9. Turtle Patch

Depth: 5-12 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: Southeast of Sipadan.

great for... turtles, but also whitetips, parrotfish shoals and large table corals. 

10. Jetty/Drop Off Point

Location: Just around the Sipadan Island Jetty, on the North side. 

one of the greatest beach dive of the world.

It is excellent for its marine biology, children dive, first dive, 

free diving, snorkeling, and underwater photography.

11. South Point

Depth: 20-40 metres

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: The Southernmost point of Sipadan.

South Point is famous for its fantastic wall of coral formations and pelagics such as manta rays and hammerhead sharks (early morning).

It's a deep wall dive with the wall dropping at a vertical angle into the depths. The dive ends on the reef where you may spot the blue ringed octopus.

12. Coral Garden

Depth: 10-23 metres (33-75 feet)

Visibility: 30 metres (100 feet)

Location: Northeast of Sipadan reef.

Coral Garden starts with a deep wall dive with a sheer wall into the depths. It's possible to see Manta rays, turtles, reef sharks, etc. It continues on the shallow coral reef.

13. Staghorn Creast

Location: Northwest of South Point.

great coral garden in the shallows followed and a 15m deep plateau. 

Out of 13, I only managed to dive about 3 due to its limitation of permits.

For your information, you need to book in advance in order to get the permits.

You can consult your dive centre regarding the permit issue.

Every dive centre has different type of offer.

Seaventures offer at least one guaranteed permit for a full day dive in Sipadan,

provided you book way earlier and with a minimum stay more than 4 days.

Hereby I attached some random photos of my underwater moments.

Hope you enjoy.