becoming certfied Advanced Open water Divers...

Iaki and I were reunited and after getting up at 04:30 along the infamous Koh San Road, and by 05:00 were on a bus trying to get those last few hours of sleep in. The sleep story was cut short against our will... this is due to the caring bus hostess slotting the Prince and me into the DVD player and cranking up the volume. Cranking it up so loud that ipod headphones were no match. Iaki and I had no choice but to watch the horrid movie. Once that was over they had yet another keeper... The time did go fast though and we were soon on a monster of a catamaran cruising to the island of Ko Tao!

Iaki was having some trouble as to what he should do... The thing is that he was ready to go home, but also really wanted to go to New Zealand to meet up with the israelis one last time. The decision that he had to make was a difficult one to make. Both with their ups and downs, and the fact that he hadnt eaten for 12 hours and that the sea was rough enough to make the mamoth catamaran rock up, down left and right didnt help much! But we made it over clean, no need for plastic packets like so many people all around us!

Once on Ko Tao we got various diving offers, we discussed things over a well deserved lunch and found a diving class that would offer accomodationa nd that we could do, so that Iaki could get back to bangkok to catch his flight home in time. Easy Divers was the dive shop of choice, we signed up, got issued our homework and were told to meet the following morning. We did! Iaki still not sure what he should do.

The morning session was chilled, when we arrived in the classroom we were introduced to team Sweden! 9 Sweeds! Now I understood what people mean when they say there are a lot of sweeds in Thailand! They are everywhere! The morning got us through the basics of diving by the veteran instructor Jo. The afternoon we were kitted out, and taken aboard the ship. Our first dive!

Awesome, in a really chilled out blue watered bay kneeling down on white sand 2 meters deep we did our basic diving training. Chris, our other instructor, and Jo did their thing. Really chilled out. That is how our days passed... Lectures in the morning and diving in the afternoons. Awesome! Slowly getting addicted to the sport, iaki and I were seriously considering going all the way and going on to become advanced divers! But for now, iaki was planning his trip back to London instead.

We finsihed our 4th official dive, wrote the exam and were now official PADI certified open water divers! reason to celebrate, so after watching our diving video in the irish pub Nelly's we got festive! Team sweden was one party bunch, so the drinks kept pooring and a trip to the popular sairee beach was inevitable! Things got crazy to say the least and Iaki ended the night with some memorabilia...

team Sweden!

Injury Man, now a certified Open water diver getting ready to Party!!

Oh, This was actually a big day as iaki had also changed his ticket once again to stay on to April 10th! So all the more reason for the party night1 It also meant that i would have a diving buddy for the advanced course! Things were good!

early morning... Diving is hard work

team Diver

The next day was a chilled one, a recovery day if you will. getting ready for the advanced course! Dived at night, with sharks and at a depth of 30 meters! Awesome! iaki and I were addicted... although also kinda glad when we finished our 11th dive in a week as our ears were killing us! Got our cards and content and tired made our way to the party island of Koh Pangang... where the full moon was looming!

written by

ourindochina on February 18, 2008 from Ko Tao, Thailand

from the travel blog: The Indo China Adventure (incl Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia)

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