Brunei
Best overall months to dive: Mar–Sep
Brunei Darussalam is a small oil state on the north coast of Borneo, split in two by Malaysian Sarawak and facing the South China Sea. For divers it is a single-purpose destination: a set of wrecks off Muara, two of them wartime losses, worked by a very small number of operators on the Brunei-Muara coast. It is a dry country — alcohol cannot be bought or sold, though non-Muslim adults over 17 may import a declared personal allowance — and the Syariah Penal Code, in full force since April 2019, applies to foreigners and non-Muslims; several governments' travel advisories flag it for LGBT travellers, since same-sex acts carry penalties up to caning and, in the code as written, death. Access is easy: Brunei International (BWN) sits minutes from the capital, and the country is reachable overland from Miri or Kota Kinabalu in Malaysian Borneo.