Diving in Koh Tao

---

(We don't have any dive pictures unfortunately due to underwater photography being part of an advanced diving course and for safety reasons we apparantly couldn't bring our normal cameras with us. We're still debating whether to order the DVD that a videographer did of us from the website, but it was very expensive. At least we get the certificate!)

Our last day in Koh Phangan was going to be a short one as our boat was booked for 12:30. We paid our bill at the hotel and left on the taxi which we got to sit on the back of (it was more a pick up truck) and caught some sun rays. It was nice and we were brimming with optimism as we headed to the pier to have our tickets confirmed.

Things don't really go to plan a lot of the time when you're backpacking. As we approached we were informed it was too windy for our boat to go and that we would have to catch a different boat for 150 Baht extra per person. We came back down to earth with a crash. Arguing got us nowhere and although there were no waves nearby, we begrudgingly paid the money. There were a lot of other angry people who were given the same story and we pretty much unanimously agreed it was a scam as there were no winds at all and Koh Tao was only about an hour and a half boat trip away. The apparant 3 metres waves had to be a myth. We were soon to find out it wasn't a scam of any sort though.

We boarded the boat and sat downstairs where the Adam Sandler film Click was showing. It was far more luxurious than our previous voyage at sea so we were pretty pleased. More so when we left the harbour into the sea pretty promptly.

The waves seemed to come out of nowhere. Every time we went over one, we lost our stomach so it felt like a rollercoaster, and it was great! Pretty much from the off though, some passengers began looking green and it wasn't long before the surround sound of vomiting began. It wasn't pleasent listening. There were points the boat looked dangerously close to tipping. The health and safety wasn't exactly as strict in Thailand so that was playing on my mind a bit but Emma seemed fine and was just concentrating on blocking out the sounds from those suffering around her.

After about 45 minutes, the dips had become less enjoyable, much like being on the same rollercoaster about 20 times in a row and both Emma and myself began to feel a bit queezy. I thought about how bad it would be to be on this boat hungover, although this would later come back to haunt me (more on that in the next blog). The sounds of wretching and the awful smell did nothing to alleviate this so Emma recommended trying to sleep. And it worked! It didn't seem long before we were pulling into Koh Tao harbour feeling very refreshed.

There was a pick up here to our dive resort, which was a nice courtesy even though the place was only about 30 metres away. Our bungalow was pretty basic (we had got it really cheap as part of our course) and it was a manual flusher toilet. Still, it wasn't the amenities we had gotten the room for. We explored the local area in the evening and the town was a very relaxed place and practically free of the commercialism that's hit a lot of the other islands. We found a free pool table so played that for a bit before retiring to our quarters.

Koh Tao is a nice chilled out and relaxed island. Mostly functioning as a dive resort, it hadn't really had the had the tourist influx. Due to its small size, it was easy to get about and we were centrally located to a lot of different restaurants, bars and shops. Our dive company (Crystal Dive) was right on the beach so that was quite nice too.

Our diving course started at 1:30 pm the next day. It was the PADI Open Water Course which was to last 4 days and give us the basic introduction to Scuba diving and would entitle us to dive at any PADI resort in the world to a depth of 18 metres. Emma had been a bit unsure of doing it originally but had been swayed with some persuasion as we felt it would be a great thing to have and to sample something new. Koh Tao was one of the cheapest places to do it in the world (after Honduras) but had a ridiculous number of great diving sites with a wide range of aquatic life as well as many corals. The only downside was that it was November which is the worst time of year for it at Koh Tao (weather wise), but nothing could be done about that and visibility still averaged almost 10 metres.

It was raining on our first day and didn't really let up until we left, but it wasn't too bad for the diving. The first day was purely classroom work as we watched DVDs and learned about equipment, safety etc. It was pretty boring, but had to be done. Our diving group was a good mix which consisted of us, a Canadian couple called Stew and Megan and another Canadian called Stefan. They were all first timers too which helped put as at ease and they were entusiastic about the experience to come.

The second day though involved us going into the swimming pool for a confined dive and practice all the skills necessary for safety such as taking the mask off underwater, losing the air supply etc. It was quite fun, but we found it a bit limiting with space in the pool. Breathing underwater was a pretty unique experience and the weighlessness thing felt great. Some parts and equipment took a while getting used to but it was a fun learning experience. We ended up combining the PADI standard 5 confined dives into 1 which made a bit more sense.

The next day was where the real action started though with 2 of our 4 open water dives. In the morning, we did our final paper exam regarding safety and diving in general which we passed pretty easily although I did the worst in the class (I should have revised!). In the afternoon we saddled up to get on the boat and we started to feel a mix of excitement, apprehension and nerves. We were surprised when we found out how cramped the boat was and how many other dive groups were out with us so it was a bit unsettling when trying to set up, both due to space and how quickly and confidently they were strapping their BCD's (aqualung inflator) and other equipment on.

By the time we got in the water, the nerves were building as we prepared to descend at Twins, our first dive site. It was great though when we actually got under and got used to buoyancy, the breathing and movement. It just felt like a different world and the water on this first dive was pretty clear and we had good visibility. Emma and I were buddied up together which meant we had to pretty much swim beside each other the whole time and make sure each other was coping alright. This proved to be a bit tricky as we were both getting used to it and a lot of times I turned around to find us in completely different parts and sometimes depths.

We saw Nemo in his anemone home as well as a whole host of different fish and schools of fish swimming about. The coral was beautiful too and we got to see a completely new world. It became very tempting to use your arms to swim down there as well as the fins, but it helped deplete your air supply a lot faster so there was a lot to get used to.

The second dive was at Sairee Coral which was probably a bit more fun as we were a wee bit more accustomed to the process. Visibility was a lot worse though, but once we were deep enough we were pretty much only a metre away from the corals and the sea life anyway, so it was still really good. After another 40 minutes swimming we were up at the surface having swum about exploring, but a bit more in a group formation.

The next day were dives 3 and 4. These were to be morning dives so we were up and ready to leave at 7am. We were a lot more confident for these dives and it didn't seem long until we were floating and ready to descend. We had a videographer today recording our movements for a DVD, although that turned out to be expensive. We headed down and waited a bit to get into our agreed formation and while waiting, I noticed a small blue fish nibbling at my knee. It felt like a wee pinch and we had been told about these guys already. They were basically "cleaning" fish, who survive on dead skin, so the motorbike cut on my knee probably looked quite appealing. It was quite cool anyway. As Emma was waiting for me to descend to her depth she was surrounded by numerous, very friendly fish, swimming around her and weaving their way through her legs and under her arms. She was quite impressed.

This dive was at White Rock this time and again we got to see a lot of coral on the rocks and different fish including the Trigger Fish, which could bite if it felt threatened. We obviously weren't threatening enough though. We also saw a water snake, albeit a baby one, which was poisonous but didn't really bother with us. I think it was fairly rare to see though as the videographer and our instructor was fascinated with it.

The last dive took us back to Twins although we were going to a depth of 18 metres this time so saw a bit more. I had problems with my descent in equalising the pressure in my ears for some reason, so had to swim up again. I ended up having to hold my nose and blow a lot harder than normal until I felt the pop. It was fine after though and we both really enjoyed this dive. We all settled at the seabed and our instructer informed us to form a pyramid formation which was quite fun and looked really impressive on the video.

It was quite disappointing to surface again as this was us finished with our course. We had had to perform a lot of "dive skills" on our various dives that we had learned in the pool but we also had to do some swimming and floating on the surface to complete our course. Due to the waves, the swimming was a lot harder than the diving, even though it was only 200 metres which we had to swim. After climbing back on the boat, we headed back to the dive centre to complete our dive logs and have our certificates issued.

We were now PADI Open Water Divers and we all felt very exhausted. It meant we can now dive to 18 metres unsupervisod as long as we have a buddy. Roll on Australia and The Great Barrier Reef. We could have done it over there, but it's at least twice as expensive to do the course. South-East Asia is amazingly cheap!

In the times we weren't diving, we usually went out at night to restaurants and bars with the rest of our diving group so we had quite a lot of fun. The meals tended to be quite expensive as we usually drunk a fair few large Chang beers following the mains. One of the evenings we ended up walking to Sairee Village, the next town over about a mile and a half away. It was fun, although the road was a bit dark. And we finally ended up seeing our first genuine Thailand ladyboys!! Sadly, we never got any pictures as we were too busy overcoming the shock at their authenticity, only the voices really gave it away.

One sour note came in the Canadian couple having their bungalow robbed one night after we got back from the bar. They stayed in the bungalow next to us as well so it was quite scary. They didn't lock their door though when they went to bed and when they woke up their clothes were on their balcony and the money gone from the pockets. It's quite weird considering someone had gone into their room while they were sleeping. Luckily we had locked our doors, although Emma did wake up at 3am and heard people outside, but assumed it was drunken revellers post-club.

The last night was probably the biggest night after we had completed our diving course. We headed to Dirty Nelly's, a local Irish pub and had a few drinks and a few cocktail buckets. Mary and Brid had come over that day to do a diving course too so we had been quite surprised to meet them and find out they were staying in the bungalow opposite us. So they ended up coming to the pub as well and we had a great night. As the Sangsom buckets came out, memories began to fade and people became a bit less steady on their feet. I assume a great night was had by all. Judging by how I felt the next day, I know I did...

---

Photos

Ceritfied Open Water Divers
From left to right: Stew, Megan, Stefan, Gary, Emma, Tash and Nath. Tash and Nath were the divemasters helping us out.

Crystal Dive
The Crystal Dive Mascot.

Dive Buddies
Celbratory meal at the Mexican after surviving the first two dives

OK!!!
We had finally mastered our OK underwater hand signals.

Group Photo
One with Mary and Brid. Poor bartender must have been sick of us.

Frog 1
We saw loads of frogs on the way home from Sairee Village.

Frog 2
They sounded like cows too. Weird. Stefan thought there was a herd of cows outside his room