Sunday 24 August Palau Derawan

The passage from Tarakan to Batu is either 80 miles going the conventional route and coming in through one of the reef passes or 62 miles if you take a cheeky short cut through an inside passage.

A day's motor sail brought us to 02 27.29N 117 58.01E where we anchored off the beach in 6m of water. Not too early next morning, for better light conditions, and prepared with dubious electronic charts and perfect Google Earth images we ventured in to the Great South Passage to Tanjung Batu. Jackster was leading our small flotilla. I sat in the bow with a two way radio link to David on helm, binoculars and a big hat for sun protection. Camomile and Samsara followed. We had expected it to be tricky in places but the reality was a deep and wide channel between clearly visible reefs. Coming closer to the town there were navigation marks to further guide us. Our trip took 2 hours. A second group of boats had left the same anchorage at dawn to go outside the fringing reef and come in from the sea via a passage to the south of Derawan island. Their trip was three times longer.

Our choice of path wasn't a risk to the boat – using a PC with the satellite image and our GPS position overlaid in the dark blue bits kept us safe.

Our arrival at Batu was two days ahead of the planned festivities leaving time to spend a night at Derawan island on the outer reef.

Derawan island

the welding factory

street karaoke

sea cucumbers drying

coral and shells for sale

Derawan is small enough to be able to walk around in 15 minutes. There are a couple of dive resorts, some shops, a mosque and sand roads. There was plenty of marine death as well; tables covered with coral and shells for sale, desiccating sea cucumbers, parrot fish, squid. The coral and shells would have been for tourists, sea cucumbers for the Chinese market and parrot fish probably for the local market. We didn't buy anything.

The best thing I saw on Derawan? Snorkelling along the north side of the island two guitar, or shovel head sharks. This is quite a rare shark for us. The last time we saw one was when we were snorkelling in Fiji searching for a WW2 plane wreck.