Is This Southeast Asia’s Last Untouched Paradise?

Is This Southeast Asia’s Last Untouched Paradise?

[Music] There’s an island in Southeast Asia that was 
once said to be the most beautiful in the world. But in 2025, it seemed to have 
been almost forgotten. Though for us, it’s hard to understand why. With dramatic 
rock formations towering out the jungle, abundant marine life, and pictures, 
we couldn’t help but wonder why is no one visiting this island. Welcome to Tioman, 
Malaysia, Southeast Asia’s forgotten paradise. Good morning, guys, from the beautiful tropical 
island of Tioman. We just arrived yesterday and we’re beginning the day by exploring the island. 
We’re currently walking on this path/road that’s just in the middle of the jungle and there 
is literally nothing or no one else around apart from our resort. This island genuinely 
feels like we’re in kind of like a theme park, but it’s like real life. When you see the views 
and the mountains and the rocks this place has, it’s going to blow you away. What is that in the 
tree? Oh my word. Monkeys. Is it a monkey? What else would it be? [Music] We have just entered 
Muk Village and this is actually a traditional Malay fishing village. So a lot of people here 
are obviously fishermen and this is the only traditional village actually on the whole island. 
A lot of other parts are like made for tourism but we’re on the side which is a lot more remote 
which is why our resort is so cool. The palm trees are so tall. It is cool morning. Is this 
what flag is this for tmen? Oh state flag. Okay thank you. Thank you. Obviously, this is the 
Malaysian flag, but apparently this is the state flag of the area. I’m not a football fan, 
but this is the best pitch I’ve ever seen. Look at it. Look at that. Literally freshly cut 
out the jungle. There’s probably mountains back here. You just can’t see them right now 
because it’s a bit bit misty this morning. Waterfall. Yeah. Yeah. This way. Follow this way. 
Not going to strike. Okay. Your rest waterfall 40 minutes. 40 minutes. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Thank 
you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Bye-bye. Nice to meet you. I think he came all 
this way to show us the way to the waterfall so we didn’t get lost. Bless him. He didn’t 
even want anything. He just wanted to say, “Go this way.” 40 minutes. Sometimes when 
you’re in Southeast Asia, you feel like, “All right, what are they going to do? Are they 
trying going to try and guide us?” But everyone in this village, it was so friendly. They’re just 
like, “Hello, good morning. Go this way. Lovely. Everyone’s got the Malaysian flags out because it 
is Independence Day soon. On the 31st, I think. We were actually in Koala Lumpa for it last year, 
weirdly enough. Here we go. Waterfall this way. [Music] I think we might have arrived at the waterfall. This looks really cool. I think we are both 
drenched in sweat, so we’re going to go in this waterfall for a swim to cool off. Looks 
lovely. Oh, yeah. Nice. Yeah, it’s lovely. Oh, that is so refreshing. Also, I can’t 
believe we have it distress. I know. So special. I guess that’s the advantage of 
being on this side of the island. Yeah. Woo! It’s so refreshing. I almost felt a little 
bit chilly in there, but as soon as I get out, I’m warm again. It’s so humid here. The 
worst thing is now is I have to put this sweaty top back on. Back in the village 
now and it’s time to find some food cuz my tummy is rumbling. We’ve done a lot of 
walking this morning. Rumbling like thunder. We’ve just come across the local mosque with 
the incredible view in the background of the mountain. I don’t know the name. I think it’s 
Dragon’s Horn, but we are going to try and go up there tomorrow. Seaside Cafe. Do you reckon 
it’s open? Don’t know, but everything seems so quiet and eerie here. Seaside Cafe. 
Let’s have a look. See what’s in here. Thank you. Thank you. We’ve got ourselves 
some chicken fried rice. I am nasur. I am nasi. The guys just said there’s baby 
sharks here. We’re down here. Oh, wow. Super throwing the chicken. Chicken. I 
am. I am. Whoa. Whoa. Wait. There’s loads. What? Whoa. I’ve never seen so many sharks at one 
time. Oh my. Loads of food. Oh, yes. Prawns and We’ve just found a little path down to the beach. 
This looks insane. It feels like we’ve washed up on a tropical island with no one else here. Wo! 
This has not been cut down any times recently. We just come to this beach just outside the 
village to just sit and relax a little bit. It’s amazing that we’ve got like a private little 
cove like this just to ourselves. We’ve recently been traveling with a Hover X1 Pro Max. It’s a 
pocket-size drone and it shoots in 8K. [Music] On previous trips, I’ve taken a larger drone with 
us, but if you’re going on a short trip or you’re going to the locations where you need a drone 
under 250 g, then this is a great solution. One of the coolest new features on this is spiral mode. 
You set it up and it circles around you whilst growing higher and it avoids that annoying look 
of always having a drone controller in the shot, which is obviously never cinematic. Another 
upgrade I’ve been loving is co-pilot. Even when you’re in an automated flying mode, you can 
use the beacon or the HoverAir phone app to change direction. And then it snaps right back into place 
when you let go. It gives you way more control when you want to adjust a shot mid-fly. And the 
beacon can attach to these joysticks. And with the Pro Max can actually fly it like a regular 
drone. So when I want full control, I can steer it wherever I want and get incredible shots like 
these over this incredible landscape. And I just can’t believe that an 8K camera is built into 
this thing when only a few years ago you would have needed a huge setup. They’ve also extended 
the distances for orbit and zoom out. Plus, dolly zoom allows you to get a great perspective of 
where you are. And for photographers, you can now shoot DNG photos, which is great because if you’ve 
seen my Instagram, you know I love adjusting light and color when I’m editing my photos. If you’ve 
ever wanted to capture epic drone footage without carrying a huge setup, then this is the drone for 
you. Check out the link in the description to find out more about this drone. And a big thank 
you to Hover for supporting this adventure. We are nearly back now, but this beach is only 10 
minutes from where we’re staying. So, if you want to come down and pretty much have a beach to 
yourself, you can. And we have finally reached our little Minang Cove, which is the resort we 
are staying in for the next few days. Minang Cove through the jungle. And here we are, Minang 
Cove Resort, private resort where we’re staying. So, this is our resort’s private beach. It’s 
super private right now because there’s no one else on it. It was quite wavy here yesterday 
and this morning, so I’m not sure how clear it’s going to be, but apparently you 
can actually see the baby sharks here, and also Hawksville turtles, blue spotted 
stingrays, I think, and loads of other fish, which is pretty cool. So, saying that, we’re 
going to grab our mask and we’re going to go for a swim and hopefully see something. 
A turtle would be pretty cool. [Music] That was a pretty good swim. Even though 
the clarity wasn’t as good as it usually is, we still saw lots of fish and the coral was really 
nice as well. Obviously, there is some damage, but there was still a lot of really good alive coral, 
which is, you know, a little bit unusual in parts of Southeast Asia. So, I think we’re just going 
to relax here a bit and enjoy the bit of sun that has just come out. We have freshened up now after 
our beach swim and we wanted to show you our room because it is amazing. Can you follow me this way? 
This whole area is like so green and they’ve done such amazing plants everywhere. So it feels like 
you are still in the jungle which is so nice. And our room has the most amazing view. I don’t know 
if you can see that but look at that. Straight out onto the ocean. First off we have a bathroom. 
And all of the water here actually comes from a spring further up in the mountains. So, you’re 
not wasting water when you’re showering here, which is really good. And as we saw yesterday 
at the waterfall, there is so much water on this island. And they actually provided us with 
our own beach bag with towels. Unfortunately, we don’t get to keep it, I don’t think. And they 
have a massage service, which we haven’t done, but I would kind of enjoy that with like 
a beach view in front of me. The bed. Ooh, that has like a lip on it. I wasn’t expecting 
that. And behind me is the AC, which is perfect cuz Joel can’t stand the heat for too long. This 
is the favorite thing in the room. Personally, my favorite thing is the balcony. That’s also 
kind of good, which we will go out onto now. Looks so good. And we actually had a monkey out 
on here earlier, which we had to chase away, but he was coming like right on and like looking 
at our stuff. And as you can see in the horizon, you basically can’t see any other land from here, 
apart from some tiny islands in the distance. But to get here, we actually had to take like an hour 
and a half boat ride, so it is quite remote. How are you finding your luxury resort? I could 
I could probably stay here another week. Oh, same. I bought a new Kindle before this trip, so I 
kind of just want to use it and just sit here and read for a week. It’s quite nice just hearing the 
waves. It’s also cool. This morning we actually saw a baby shark swimming around just in front of 
our room. He was a very small one though. Yeah, he was like maybe that big. Like a baby 
baby. We’ve just come out to the pier to watch the sunset. And look how clear the 
mountain is behind me. We haven’t actually seen it this clear yet. So hopefully it 
remains that clear tomorrow when we do the hike cuz that would be very good. Anyway, 
it seems we are getting a little bit of golden light. So hopefully we get some pink clouds 
or something cuz that would be very very cool. But I can’t complain of the views. We got 
a turtle. There’s a turtle. [Music] Heart. After an amazing day, we are going to head and 
get some cocktails because I’m ready to relax and have a nice evening. Me, too. And some dinner 
afterwards, too. Let’s do it. in a world full of sorrow. Thank you. We’re sat down by the bar and 
we’ve ordered two mojitos. The guy who works here, he’s from Nepal and he seems lovely and he seems 
so excited to make us some drinks. So, we happily ordered. Yeah. And he actually made it with fresh 
mint leaves that he grows here. He was right. He makes a very good mjito so well. And it’s like the 
right sweetness as well. It’s not overdone with sugar. Also, there’s keeps being lightning flashes 
in the distance. Oh, really? Yeah. That’s crazy. Dinner time. We’ve got some tasty 
spring rolls for starter. Vegetable spring rolls. Look at these. M. 
Sweet chili, which is the best. The dinner is buffet style and we had two main 
options today which is honey lemon chicken and then this is a beef dish. Maybe like black bean 
beef or something. That looks very good. Okay, there’s food. I can’t wait to dig in. So, let’s 
put the camera down and eat. Good morning, guys. After a little bit of a cloudy day 
yesterday, I think we’re going to get a beautiful clear day. There is no clouds whatsoever 
on the mountain this morning on Dragon’s Horn. I’m excited. You you do know we’re going up that 
today. Yes. I’m trying not to think about it. I don’t even know how tall it is, but looks 
pretty tall. We have just walked about 2 km and we are nearly at the start point of the track 
this morning. I’m already sweating and we have a long way to go. We’ll probably be ascending 
5600 m to the top. The start of the dragon’s horn. But I think first we need to sign in. We 
saw a man down here yesterday. Hello. Hello. Okay. Please. Okay. Yeah. Name. Name. Name. Okay. Don’t go here. Okay. Don’t go here. 
Only straight. Larus. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Okay. Nine and 10. Nine and 10. and 
then come back. Okay. Take a photo of this because apparently we’ll need it. Is 
it the root? It is the root. Here I go. We are literally in the thick of the jungle. Oh, it’s not super clear path. No, you can see 
where we’re going, but it is very overgrown. This is super cool, though. Here we are. 
Checkpoint one. Not much of an achievement cuz we’re actually going to checkpoint 10. 
So, we got a long way to go. But this also seems like fairly well signed. You’ve got 
some signs up and there’s like this tape which you can kind of follow as well. I 
know you can probably see my face is just full of sweat. It’s like I’ve been in the 
shower. It’s not pleasant. That’s not one. Trying not to bang my head on that. There’s so 
many of these impressive rocks here. Absolutely incredible. Oh, look. We might be able 
to refill our water. It’s actually dried, so we can’t fill up our bottles, 
unfortunately. What? Termite mound. Turnite mound. Wa. It’s huge. That is huge. 
What? That’s like almost as tall as you. Guys, this is getting actually crazy. We’re 
just walking along a lock cuz it’s the only way along the path. I hope this is 
the right way. Yeah, me too. Yeah, there’s a red tape thing. So, it must be I 
guess it’s through here then. It’s getting a lot slippier now. The ropes they’ve put up 
are definitely useful, aren’t they? Yeah. It’s so steep. You got to be really careful 
here. Okay, we’ve slightly we’ve we’ve gone the wrong way slightly. I think we took a left 
when we should have gone straight. It wasn’t super well marked. So, yeah, there you go. Now, 
we got to climb back down. We are back on route now and we literally just missed a big sign cuz we 
were filming. Um, but this way is so much easier and there’s ropes everywhere. So, yeah, just 
follow the signs and you’ll be fine. Unlike us, this sign says to the peak up, although I definitely think it’s this way 
and not just up that rock face. Surely not. Oh my gosh. We have finally reached the 
viewpoint after a very, very sweaty, sweaty hike. Yay! We made it. We 
made it. Even though we went half an hour in the wrong direction. Don’t 
remind me my legs hurt from that. We made it. Eventually. Although we’re both 
sweaty, so Yeah. Don’t touch me. I’m not going to give you a hug. This is stunning. It is, isn’t 
it? Look at the cloud coming through. It’s proper rainforest. distance. Have that fun. We did it. 
We’re going to just head up here cuz we think there might be another little viewpoint just to 
see if it’s a little bit different perspective. Oh, look at these little iron rods to help us get 
up. Here we are. We have reached well the summit I guess. 73 m the neck sumukot. And I think 
the neck actually means grandma or granddad. So maybe that’s what the mountain’s called. 
Look at this slab of rock. is huge, isn’t it? [Music] It is time we head 
back down this crazy crazy mountain and head back to the resort 
to chill. [Music] We made it. [Music] [Music] [Music] I have to be honest, the clarity of the water, 
well, and the clarity of the mountains up there is so much better today. We have just been 
snorkeling, relaxing after the hike earlier, and it is beautiful. I could probably stay here 
another week. It’s not going to get that old, is it? Look at this water. It looks amazing. 
We actually saw parrot fish, clown fish, swordfish, and we’ve actually seen two turtles 
at two different times in that bit of water. Unfortunately, we didn’t have like the camera 
ready to film it and we were above the water, but we saw them like poking their heads out, 
which is cool. After just a few days on TMAN, we already knew one thing. We’ll be 
coming back. This island feels truly unique. A world away from the typical 
tourist trails of Southeast Asia, it offers the sense of remote paradise 
we’re always searching for, yet still has the comforts and luxuries that makes it the 
perfect escape for any kind of traveler. [Music]

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We want we think might be one of Southeast Asia’s most beautiful islands which hasn’t been overrun by tourism with few places to stay, with incredible mountains, pristine rainforest and beautiful coral reeds, this island is definitely worth the visit!

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