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Published: March 23rd 2006
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View of the beach from our SWIMMING POOL!!!!!
Spent so many hours in that pool!...a few scuba-ing in it too! Hello again everybody!
This is coming to you from Koh Phangan, where we are now based having moved on from Koh Tao a few days ago... You'll all be happy to know that it has rained here all day and its cold!?!?! (although i couldnt tell you exactly what the weather was like before 2pm because i was tucked up in bed asleep! :-) )
so Koh Tao... well the journey was long and uncomfortable on the overnight bus...cheap though! we arrived about 9am and were met by the Coral Grand Diver people... The resort itself is apparently a 4 star resort, catering to people who in some cases pay more than 100 pounds a night for a room (which in Thailand is loads!!!!!!!!!!) Anyway we had managed to get ourselves a room for the three of us for 200 baht...thats a quid each a night!!!!!!! Awesome! this was beacuse we were going to do the open water padi diving course, as apparently for 9800 baht (140 pounds) its a really cheap place to do it! we also met two swedish girls going to the resort, who in the end didnt end up doing the course for ages because
there were no swedish speaking instructors available!
we bagan the course the first day for a few hours with some academic stuff...dull, and i slept through most of both the videos! thankfully our legend of an instructor, Jonas, went through it all anyway! otherwise io wouldnt have known much! The second day was more academics followed by our first dive in the resort's swimming pool! we did mask exercises, swimming without air, and sharing air using other peoples air sources...all good fun but was a bit painful due to my incredibly burnt back and shoulders which had come from the previous days lack of cream whilst playing around on the most idyllic beach you can imagine!
The third day was more academics followed by 2 open watwer dives down to 12 metres! The first took place at the Twins dive site, where the visibilty was incredible! We went down slowly, having to equalize the pressure in our ears every metre or so...brought back memories of flights from past summer holidays to the Med, where, on take-off or landing, I would just scream for as long as possible as loudly as possible! We had a really nice 24yr old
Sunset Koh Tao style!
Took a lot of photos of this sunset! Swedish couple in our group, and as we went down, the Swedish guy, Andreas, found his ear too painful at about 6 metres and had to surface... turned out he had an ear infection and couldnt do any diving...sucked for him...was so unlucky! At the bottom we swam around marvelling at the colours of the fish and the shape of the coral formations...
Our next dive was at a different sight (whiterock i think?!) and involved doing skills like letting water into your mask and then blowing it out whilst underwater.. i let the water in but then struggled and struggled to manage to get it out...felt so uncomfortable! eventually rescued the situation without too much panic by finally lifting my head up whilst blowing...a lot easier! also saw loads of clownfish (nemo!..i think?!) and angel fish!
The next day we went on the early morning dives to Chumphon Pinnacle and then Twins again... The dives this time were down to 18 metres.. For these dives we had Sarah accompanying us equipped with an underwater video camera! She got video of us rolling backward into the water, going down and then swimming about..as well as capturing all the incredible
Incredible beach we stayed on!
North Sairee looking down towards Mae Head.. fish we saw! On our fourth and final dive we did a flip (or in my case just a flop) into the water and then swam down to the bottom... Jonas then told us to take our masks off, put on sunglasses, and then do a little dance for the videocamera! Was seriously textbook! Next we swam around and saw big barracuda, a trigger fish (safety stop above it wasnt the best idea as it can be really dangerous!) and turtles! Almost landed on one as it was eating!
So having passed the final exam we went out drinking with Jonas, Sarah, and the Swedish couple (Sofia and Andreas) and we all ended up watching and then buying the video of our dives (really well edited with great music!) followed by some chilled out conversations about Swedish culture on the beach! The last few days on the island saw us throw a ball lots, dunk in the pool, drink strawberry shakes, read books and just finally relax!
Having left there by ferry to Ko Phangan we are now meeting loads of people and having a bit of a party...very fun and relaxing place! More of that on the
Sunset in paradise
I did say I took a lot of sunset pictures! next blog i guess!
Miss you all loads and loads, hope all is going well, love Chris xxx
p.s. bro - explain the Frankie thing to me properly?!
dad - must beat west brom on monday cos our run in is tough btw
mum - hope the interview was ok?
als - 1 year today, you're perfect and love you!!!!
rod - lectures? any improvement?! :-p still 2 points behind...
johnny - sounds like you are having a busy time....! ladyboy yet mate?!
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