Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Ko Lipe!

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Happy New Year and a belated Merry Christmas to all our readers. Hope the coming year brings you joy, happiness, and a lot of traveling obviously!



This blog is also to congratulate Tiffany, who has reached her 100th dive on Christmas Day! Well done young lady! And for the divers around, no she did not dive naked...may not be the right idea for a 14 years old young lady! We don't want to run into troubles for the pleasure of it!



Tiffany is on summer holidays since the second of December. Already a year at school in South Africa, and we are pretty happy how well she did there! So Summer holidays for her means...Christmas! She spent first few days at home in Bangkok, than went for few days in Vietnam to see how Leslie online gaming is going on...and back to Bangkok just on time for my birthday...and to help pack the flat....as we are now homeless for nearly two months. She obviously also spent some serious time with her former school buddies in Bangkok.



My first visit to Lipe seems years ago. Was there with Leslie back in May 2011....just over 5 years ago! Leslie is not here this time, but Tiffany is doing her 100th dive! I won't complain! We love to stay few days on the island, relaxing and diving the local dive sites, than to embark on the Forra Liveaboard for amazing dives in Hin Muang and Hin Duang as well as South Racha point. Sadly, none of it would happen as planned this time. A fatal accident happened with a snorkeler on the first morning of the liveaboard...on Christmas Eve. Sad day, and a cancelled trip.



We ended up spending a full 13 nights on Ko Lipe. With the diving we did in 2016, I was only interested by the best the island has to offer when it comes to underwater. So we just dived a total of 6 days, and spent the remaining time enjoying the beach. I found out, that from time to time, it's not a bad thing to over-sleep, and to do simply nothing!



This time, we had all the leisure to go around, and around! So we did eat all the Thai and Indian food we could, plus I have to admit some really nice pizza evenings! We spent a lot of time at the dive center too. By now, I slightly feel part of the family at Forra...well, this is for the more senior staffs who have been there for years...and with who I have nearly done over 100 dives!



We spent 6 days diving either with our friend Mao or Brad...hope they will come to visit us in our new little paradise sometime in the coming years. We spent time diving 8 Mile Rock, Stonehenge, Ko Pung, Ko Sarang and one dive at the wreck. The wreck has nothing special, but let say it can be slightly deep and it was a great experience for Tiffany. Not something we will do everyday, but great to see how she reacts in a challenging setting. I guess after being a regular on Protea Banks in South Africa, not much can be too challenging for the young shark girl!



Forget about getting pictures of big underwater fish life around Lipe. Up on the liveaboard we could have hope to spot mantas or even a whaleshark, but it won't be for this holiday. Hopefully my next diving in just over three weeks and will be more lucky, sadly it won't be with Tiffany. But we are diving South Africa middle of February, and Tiger sharks should be all over the place at the time....to great Tiffany!



So this time, we had to do with nudibranches, fun and curious bat fishes, few sea horses, a hiding frog fish and few shrimps...I know....but spending hours on the beach was not a bad thing either!



Next blog is actually next door in to Malaysia, for some really interesting moments too! Life is about experience after all!



Wishing you all the best for the New Year! For us, this is going to be a big move too....coming soon....not soon enough!

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Comments

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Happy New Year!
I'm looking forward to reading about all your future travels.