Koh Tao

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Hello! I'm currently sat on the ferry, crossing over from Koh Tao back to the mainland, to a town called Chumpon. It's a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon, the small ferry is passing lots of beautiful sandy little islands lined with Palm trees and from time to time random limestone rocks standing tall out of the sea. It should take around 3 hours, so a perfect opportunity to update you with what I've been up to this week. I've had a brilliant week in Koh Tao, it's definitely been one of my highlights whilst travelling! We arrived in Koh Tao last Saturday after a short hour and a half ferry, from Koh Phangan. Koh Tao is just north of Koh Phangan, and about half the size, primarily visited by people waiting to complete scuba diving courses. Its by far the cheapest island for beginners to complete open water courses (3/4 day tuition) and it has stunning dive sites around the island, both natural and a few man made wrecks. Mj had had her heart set on doing a dive course since the beginning of our trip, so it was the most logical place to head to, especially as we were visiting Samui and Phangan. I wasn't as keen as her to start with, however once I'd been snorkelling in Koh Phi Phi over the New year period, I was a lot more interested as I'd loved seeing so many colourful fish and coral. I was still debating whether I would join her when we'd arrived on the island, but after speaking to some of the representatives from some of the dive schools on the ferry across and after visiting a few schools on Sunday, I'd made my mind up! So after staying a couple of nights in a much needed AC dorm room and doing a bit of research, we decided to start an open water course on Monday. We chose an SSI course (scuba schools international) with Phoenix diving school as it seemed like one of the friendliest and gave a very good deal, chucking in a large AC room for 4 nights and breakfast as part of the deal! We met our instructor, Al from Reading and a French girl called Carol who was doing the course with us on Monday afternoon for an induction - we were expecting at least 4 others so it was a nice surprise to know we were in a small group - and over the next two days we had a theory manual, homework and an exam we had to complete alongside practical sessions in their private swimming pool, and then out in the sea!! We learned how to put together and use the equipment - the gas cylinders, the regulator (attached to the oxygen cylinder and used to breathe with), the back up regulator (also attached to the cylinder, in case another person runs out of oxygen and has to share yours), flippers, a buoyancy controller (looks like a life jacket which can be blown or pumped up to allow you to either float or sink when needed) and also a weight belt which is used for the latter also. We also had a pressure gauge attached to the cylinder which told us how much air we had left. We had to practise skills both at the bottom of the swimming pool and on the sea bed, e.g. how to find our regulators if they get pushed out of our mouths in a rare circumstance, and also how to clean our goggles under the water, clearing the water without coming to the surface which were useful skills. We also practised how to react in rare situations such as if one of the divers we are with runs out of air - how to share oxygen, how to perform emergency ascents to the surface, how pressure affects your body and how to use this knowledge to both descend and ascend in the safest way possible. My ears had a bit of a hard time getting used to the pressure change, as we were going down from 9-18 metres in the sea depending on the dive we were doing, however Al was really nice and allowed me to go first down the rope (we used ropes attached to anchors to get down to dive sights) so that if I had to stop for my ears to stop hurting I could and we went at my speed. We went out and had 4 dives all together, 2 of them on day 3 where we were tested on the skills we had practised - at the Japanese gardens and mango bay dive sights, and 2 on day 4 when we had shown our competency - it was these dives that we could properly relax and enjoy swimming around and seeing the fish - these were at white rock and the very popular Chumpon pinnacle which is renowned as one of the best dive sites in Thailand and known for whale shark sightings!! Unfortunately we didn't get lucky but it was one of the most incredible experiences I've ever had, being 18m under water in a completely different world with so many varieties of colourful fish and coral. We spent on average 45 mins under the water each time before our oxygen gauge touched red (good practise is to ascend - at a safe rate - to the boat, once the gauge first gets to red, much like the petrol gauge in a car - as even though there would technically be enough oxygen to last another 10-15 mins, it is much safer and is used as a cut off to show divers when they should probably finish their dive.) We all were so tired after the course finished, but we all went out to celebrate our newly qualified diver statuses on Thursday night and splashed out on a lovely Indian meal and a few drinks. As Carol was also staying a few more days after the course finished and we had gotten on so well, we found a nice spacious 3 person bungalow to stay in on Friday and Saturday night. We met two other south African girls she'd met whilst in Laos which were lovely, and we all headed out on motorbikes to Ao Leuk on Saturday, a shallow bay on the south eastern side of Koh Tao which we had been told about due to the baby reef sharks who were swimming around the bay for a few weeks around this period of the year before they get bigger and move further out into the sea. We had finally bought some snorkels on the Friday - we had been talking about buying some for a long time! So we took these out with us yesterday afternoon. It was brilliant, we managed to see quite a few little sharks in extremely shallow water...you could almost reach out and touch them! Along with this very exciting opportunity, there were so many other reef fish to see in the bay which were lovely to swim around with. We spent a good few hours here snorkelling in the water and relaxing on the absolutely gorgeous beach, but also managed to get a little burnt in the process! We returned this mornning to have breakfast overlooking the stunning bay and to get in a little more snorkelling before leaving this gorgeous island. So that brings me to now, Sunday afternoon - we should be arriving in Chumpon early this evening, we then have a little wait before getting the night bus to Bangkok which should take around 12 hours. Carol's joining us for this journey as she's catching her flight back home from Bangkok tomorrow night and returning to her job at the Eiffel tower. As for me and Mj, we'll be staying in Bangkok for one night before catching a bus eastwards to the Cambodian border on Tuesday... again we've decided as we've used up our free 30 day visa, to head to another country instead of hopping over the border to come back again - we'll be back to explore northern Thailand at another point however... So hopefully we'll be able to get some sleep tonight - it's an AC bus which is nice but at night it can get a tad cold... So fingers crossed they'll have blankets!! That's all for now, as promise I'll update again next week!! Xx

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