However we did have another double bed at the end of ours and some very loud and annoying Americans on our left but all in all the night ferry was a success and I got quite a bit of sleep.
I did wake up when a drunk French girl stumbled into the room shouting for a friend 'Analay'. She was quickly silenced by chorus of shushes but proceeded to sit on a strangers bed and caused a bit of fuss. Mess.
Our boat pulled in at Koh Tao at about 7am and I even managed to find my shoes in this jumble pile. It's common to take your shoes off here before entering a shop, certain building or a house. I'm suprised I've not lost my shoes yet!
We had booked on to a 4 day PADI diving course with New Way Diving for the weekend which was 9,800 Baht including classroom sessions, dives, equipment, food and drink on the dive boat a long with accommodation and even a lift to the dive centre from the pier.
We saw a man with a sign saying 'New Way Diving, July, Welcome Chloe and Joy' We went over and introduced ourselves as Chloe and Joy and were directed to get into the back of a truck. The guy pointed to the sign and said 2 more as if he had to pick up 2 more people despite it only saying our names. We quickly realised that he thought welcome and July were people. We tried to explain his mistake but in the end we had to wait for the arrival of welcome and July. When they didn't turn up (shock) he apologised and took us on a bumpy ride to the dive centre where we checked in, paid and then carried on to our accommodation at Prik Thai resort just down the road.
We were instructed to go back to the Dive centre at 4pm where we would meet up with the other 2 ETA's who were with us on the dive course, Rebecca and Daniel along with Vicky who was just staying on Koh Tao for the night before heading to Koh Phagnang for the full moon party.
With time to spend we got settled and headed to the beach.
It was a bit cloudy and we were a bit stupid. We explored, chilled and grabbed lunch on the beach. This was the result:
Oops.
At 4pm we were back at the dive centre we me and Joy both radiating with a good bit of sunburn. Due to a delayed ferry Rebecca, Victoria and Daniel had only just arrived. We filled out some paper work and met our German Dive instructor, Tom. We then went upstairs to one of the classrooms to watch some 80's style introductory safety videos and filled out a quiz at the same time. All we could think about was dinner and it didn't help that the TV kept cutting out so we were naughty and missed a few sections here and there. Tom said he'd go through it with us the next morning so we knew we weren't missing too much.
We went back to our rooms to slather ourselves in Aloe Vera and then headed out for dinner.
After some delicious fried rice and a very tense game of Jenga at our table with all of the restaurant staff watching towards the end, we went to Choppers bar for a drink and to meet up with ETA's Laura and Amanda.
It wasn't long until a touch of sun stroke got the better of Joy and she went home. After a few more minutes the Koh Tao bar crawl came in and the bar got a lot more exciting!
We were quite jealous of all the people on the bar crawl but we had are sensible heads on and stuck to just one beer Chang because we had our first dive the next day. We had a good laugh in the bar and sang along with the live band before retiring back to our accommodation.
On Saturday morning we had a classroom session with Tom and Georgie who was training for her dive masters and had to assist on an open water course as a requirement for her course. We learnt about some of the science of diving including things about water pressure and how to avoid uncomfort under the water from this along with lots of other safety measures and then some tests.
We tried on some kit and got our dive bags packed. At 12pm ourselves and other people doing different courses, fun dives or at different stages of the same course as us got packed into trucks and shipped off to the pier. We climbed through a couple of boats to reach our own and off we sailed to 'Japanese Gardens'. The weather was not great. It was raining and the sea was choppy.
Joy noticed a couple of flip flops floating out in the water that we thought was quite funny. We then spotted the tail end of a long tail boat pointing out of the water and several other boats close by. It was aparant that with the strong waves the small wooden boat capsized with people on it and the other boats had come to the rescue. Thankfully no one was hurt but it did put us off those long tail taxi boats!
Tom instructed us to get into our wet suits ready for a swim test. We were told to swim around the boat twice. It wasn't a small boat so we obviously didn't all look that pleased. He then said okay if you jump off the sun deck, the top level of the boat, you only have to do one lap of the boat. Deal. It was a scary jump but well worth it. Soon after we had got completely kitted up with our tanks and scuba gear and jumped into the water. I had a few problems with my weight belt, the clasp kept opening so I had to hold it on! Problem.
We swam to shallow water and practised breathing, staying under and rising and falling in the water powered by filling our air with lungs to go up and letting it out to go down. After not too long we began our first dive to 12 metres. There were little cleaner fish down there, the ones that they have at foot spas to clean dead skin off your feet. They quite enjoyed biting my lips! Fish kiss haha. See my snapchat from later on that day.
When I was taking off my flippers to climb up the ladder back onto the boat, my moaning about my broken weight belt, which always miraculously was fine when someone checked it out, gave up. It slipped off quicker than I could realise what was going on and sank down in the sea. I quickly apologised to Tom while I said what had happened and he had to dive down to get it, oopsie!
Our scuba group minus Daniel looking a bit soggy and burnt.
That evening we went out for dinner to a place that everytime you orderd a drink you got some tapas. Strange but great idea. It ended up that we didn't want anymore drinks despite being thirsty because we couldn't hack anymore food!
We then went to a lovely chill out beach bar and relaxed on some bean bags right by the sea. Good times. Koh Tao had such a nice relaxed and cool feel to it, I could have definitley spent a lot more time there!
On Sunday we had another classroom session and a dive. The dive went swimmingly (har har) as I had a new weight belt and I had started to get the hang of it a bit more. We saw some pretty cool fish and corals, I wish we could have taken photos under the water to prove how amazing it was!
The boat ride on the way back from that dive was rough. I do sometimes get sea sick and I really had to concentrate to keep it together.
Still feeling a bit queasy, on Sunday night myself, Daniel, Joy, Rebecca and Laura went out for some Mexican Food. Despite it being Amanda's birthday, she was ill in the hotel all day so she couldn't come out! We had decided that were in Thailand for so long that it's fine to have some Western food and anything we want really seeing as we eat Thai food all week. Although I have orderd Thai food a lot in restaurants because a. It's delicious and b. it's very cheap! In some places a Thai meal such as noodles, vegetables and meat will be 60 Baht, just over £1 with pizza at 250 Baht. £5!
I had some good fajitas and then we all got an early night because we had a very early dive the next morning. New Way Diving prides itself on being the first diving boat to the dive sites in the morning to beat the crowds. This means getting to the dive centre at 5:40am. Funnily enough when we were walking to the dive centre some people were still out partying because the World Cup final had just finished about an hour before!
The 45 minute boat ride was rough but I was fine with my sickness tablet. Daniel and Joy however were not so great. After two amazing dives and seeing a sting ray along with other incredible fish and corals, we were giggling at our new slogan 'Easy, Breezy, Buoyant. Scuba Girl'.
Sale rock, the location of our sting ray sighting! Sadly we didn't see any tiger sharks or turtles which aren't majorly common but do happen and would have been amazing.
We got back to the dive centre at about 11 with Joy and Daniel still being sick. We soon realised it wasn't sea sickness but instead a bug. Staff from the dive centre and other divers, along with our friend Amanda who was staying on the island all had a similar type of bug which must have been going round.
We had checked out of our accommodation as we were to get the night ferry back that evening which meant we didn't have anywhere to shower or anywhere for the ill to rest. I put Joy to bed upstairs in the dive centre on some cushions in a classroom armed with a bucket. Just as she lay down the dive centre cat joined her for a little cuddle. Aww.
I went downstairs and myself and Becky were talking to Julius (American, looked like Tom Cruises younger brother). We mentioned that our friends were ill and that we had no where to shower as a passing comment. He had planned to leave the night before so had also checked out of his room. That day he decided to do the 12pm dive and the night dive so they had given him the key to another room that he hadn't been to yet and he wouldn't return until 9pm. Very kindly of him he offered us his room key so we could shower and sleep etc just as long as we gave the key back in to the dive centre. It was extremely nice of him to offer and we decided to take him up on it, especially because after the night boat that day we were going straight to school and I didn't fancy that still looking like id been dragged through the sea!
Myself, Becky and Daniel (who decided he felt better) went off for some lunch. Daniel couldn't hack it and fell asleep in his scrambled egg.
We went back to check on our ill friends in the now disgusting smelling classroom and quickly left before we caught their germs for some pizza. We contemplated eating all the food that we love like pizza, ice cream and crepes because we had a feeling that we'd soon be catching the illness and throwing it all up anyway. We decided to just stick to the pizza in the end and had a final walk around.
Soon after, we said our goodbyes to our dive centre friends and hopped aboard the differently laid out night boat.
Luckily the boat wasn't full otherwise it would have been pretty horrific with all the beds right next to each other! Most people managed to have a bed with a spare either side.
This is how happy me and Becky about leaving paradise island and our possible impending illness.
Our second night ferry experience wasn't all that bad either, we didn't have blankets provided though but luckily I had a maxi skirt that was handy to use as bedding. The pillow was leather. Why? I'll never be sure but I used a dress to wrap around it to make myself a nice floral pillow case. Well done me.
After the boat we arrived at around 5am into Ban Don, we waited there until Cham and her husband picked us up at 6am.
What a successful diving trip! We all got our PADI certificates delivered to our homes which mean that we can now dive without the need of an instructor!
This is my hard earned PADI card that my Dad kindly sent me a photo of when it arrived in the post in England!
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