Derawan, an island in the Berau region of Kalimantan, Borneo

Derawan via an overnight anchorage at Tanjung Sepikat was a journey of light winds, we motor-sailed or just plain motored when the wind failed. Large fish aggregation structures were built in the sea, and straddled across our route. They all have a sheltered structure on the platform area and in this photograph a hammock is just visible suspended in the tepee poles. Most of these are well lit up at night when the fishing below is done, they are the static equivalent of the brightly lit night fishing boats which mostly catch prawns and squid.

Derawan is trying to establish itself as a yacht rally stop especially for the ‘Back Down Under Rally’ which is a new venture. It is surrounded by shallow reef which has a deep drop off, too deep for anchoring hence they have put in 30 swinging moorings in the drop off area. We were lucky to pick up a mooring near the edge of the reef and could snorkel, swim with turtles and explore coral heads straight from the back of the boat – just glorious.

The island is lovely with a large village behind the beach and a small dive resort at one end. The people seem to do well from tourism and fishing. There are good facilities: a solar power station provides electricity, efficient mobile phone and WIFI aerials enable communications and there is an abundance of giant satellite dishes.

The whole place looks very traditional and prosperous with lots of small craft and provision shops, small restaurants and food stalls and one or two tourist type shops. Colourful and very clean, it was a pleasure to walk the long village road where there are no cars, a few motor scooters and lots of bicycles for all ages down to those who looked as though they had only just learnt to walk.

The most wonderful thing, as always in Indonesia is the flowing hospitality and pleasure that the people get from having visitors.

Our welcome dinner was such a happy occasion.

Not sure now what this was all about!

Indonesians just love to sing and dance and they are soon on their feet. Some of our young ‘guides’ from local government’s tourism development section and from the University on the mainland who just love to practise their English, try extremely hard and do very well. Polite, friendly and helpful they are an asset to their country.

Needless to say everyone enjoyed themselves from the oldest to the youngest and we certainly slept well when we eventually got back on board.

The island, like many in Borneo, is doing its best to increase turtle numbers. It collects eggs and optimises hatching potential then nurtures the baby turtles to a suitable size for release. We were invited to be part of a release day which happens at dusk to minimise predators. Seeing so many babies scuttle furiously into the sea was heartening, it would be interesting to know how many will survive but these babies are not tagged. The turtle population on this coast does seen healthy, we see many green and hawksbill when we snorkel and have had several round the boat whilst in Derawan and other islands.

Made it – so far!