Hello From Koh Tao

---

Hi Everyone!

Hope everyone is just peachy.

Just a quick one to let you know we are well and are having great time. We found our way on to Koh Tao (or crazy dinosaur island as helen likes to call it) via a 6 hour trip by night boat which was just crammed with thai people it was confusing, scary and very surreal for 11 o'clock at night! It was one of the strangest journeys so far we called it the refugee boat because there were just people laying everywhere.

We arrived at 5 in the morning with no clue of where we were or where we were going, the Canadian who befriended me on the boat had left us on our own after telling us he'd show us where to go (I'm not to fond of Canadian people now!). We found our way to the dive shop we had booked on the mainland.

Have to keep it brief but basically, we dived a few times and got our open water qualification which was really good (did you know if your mask is flooded underwater you can blow the water out of it! I was amazed too) .Then went to another part of the island (tanote bay) where Helen got freaked out by large snails, frogs, crabs and a snake (in my zoological opinion not a dangerous one) but it terrified Helen. We have now come back to the main town area, firstly we stayed in a little bungalow by the sea, but according to Helen there was too many holes in the place for things to get in (large gecos and bugs). So we have now moved to a nice little hotelish place up the road which is much cleaner and bug-free!

Should be moving on to Koh Phangnan in the next couple of days but will just see how it goes. By the way the weather has got a lot better so have managed to get a bit burning time in! Hear its pretty bad at home.

Take Care

Ben and Helen xxx

---

Photos

Scuba Helen
We got a DVD of our last dives so you'll be able to see that hopefully.

Helen and Adrian (Nick lookalikey)
One of the divemaster trainees, the picture may not do it justice but he looks a lot like Nicolo (for those of you who know him)

Paul and Louique
Our fellow dive buddies. Louique (ginger frenchy) is making the ok sign.

Ben and Pegguy 2
She was the Easy Divers pet dog, they called her Easy.

Scared/histerical Helen
After our dive course we went to another part of the island via a terrifying drive by pick up truck.

The hammock made it all worth while
Our little bungalow at tanote bay.

Tanote Bay
Our bungalow is up on the right somewhere.

Maurice
Yes Helen brought a monkey with us! "He fitted in the bag"

Sairee Beach
It looks nice now..

this our beach hut
we stayed here for all of one night before the grossness got too much, there was a nice dog that slept in front of the door tho!

the clouds are comin over
the weather was quite bad at times, but you could always see the storms coming in from the sea!

fun times
it didnt matter about the weather as beer was always at hand!

always fun to play minigolf
now ben did win, but it is fair to say i played better than him! no, yes!

always fun to play minigolf
now ben did win, but it is fair to say i played better than him! no, yes!

pretty sunset
we saw lots of sunsets, and they were beautiful, the pictures dont do justice!

pretty sunset
we saw lots of sunsets, and they were beautiful, the pictures dont do justice!

phwoaaa!
'whos that hunk coming out of the sea?' (ben quote)

unusual bathroom tiles
at our nice place on sairee beach our bathroom had some rather odd decor, we could handly the pretty dolphins and fish, but................

unusual bathroom tiles
...........half nudie women was too far!!!!

the 'jetstream' off the ferry as we left!
bye bye koh tao