Selingan Island (Turtle Islands)

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The main visitor island of Turtle Islands Park off Sandakan, where green turtles nest on the beach almost every night of the year and hawksbills less frequently. Rangers escort small groups to watch a female nest and lay, then release that night's hatchlings into the sea — one of the most dependable wildlife spectacles in Sabah, reached by a short boat ride from Sandakan. It's worth arriving early: visiting birders have used the daylight hours on the island for some incidental birding, turning up Nicobar pigeon among the more expected seabirds, and flying foxes are often seen streaming over at dusk.