AT

29/10/11

Bright sunshine greeted us at 6am, which was not right as normally it's thunderstorms in the morning and sun in the afternoon, never mind I'm not going to complain. I was also feeling a lot better today, nothing was moving but just in case I passed on breakfast until we got back from the dives. Once on the boat seasick tablets were being handed out like smarties as there were other groups on board with us and it was not as flat as it looked, strangely I was feeling fine so I guess my sea legs had finally arrived, while Bex had left hers back in the room and was one of the pill poppers.

Back in my shorts and rashie for the dive down to White Rock and finally I had my buoyancy sorted, good enough to do head spins on the sand anyway and I was pretty much being left alone now while Simon helped out some of the others and that was dive 4 over with. Back on the boat and Bex stayed downstairs on the gear deck as she was now feeling really rough, as did a german girl from the PADI group, in fact she was so bad she failed to do her last dive and must have been gutted. Our last dive was on a little training area set up by Deep Blue so they could practice swimming through coral and caves without damaging the real things, nice idea and it looked pretty good as well. It was only 10am but the weather had closed in and just before I jumped into the choppy waters I saw it, just on the horizon and nowhere near us, but it was there and another big thing on my tick list.... a Tornado!

Of course I've seen them on TV but this was my first ever real life twister, so I was probably sounding like a complete twat as I pointed it out to everyone and now I was torn between watching the twister and completing my last dive and passing the course. Common sense ruled and we all got in the water to complete our final dives, to celebrate Eric and I jumped off the top of the boat, with the captains permission of course but my idea of doing a water entry in full gear from there was black balled, but at least I tried. That night we watched a video of our final dive and got Simon completely hammered as a thank you. Eric was now staying on the island for another few days to complete his advanced and I would have joined him but our time is tight in Thailand and we will be moving on in two days.

30/10/11

We really had nothing planned for today as originally this was going to be our last day diving before flying out tomorrow but since the weather was good I booked in for a couple of dives in the afternoon while Bex sunned herself in the bar. I was diving with Remi, aa german guy who was on his final day of his master diver course, of course had I known this at the beginning I would have made his life harder, but I didn't and to be fair he's a nice guy who just wanted to have a little fun. After our buddy checks we jumped in the water and plan A went out of the window. We were supposed to use the buoy line to desend but the boat cast off leaving a slack line, so a free decent it was. Lucky for me and my heavy legs my first real free decent went off without a hitch and after a few checks Remi seemed more comfortable with me and we swam down to Redrock Drop-off with the hope of seeing the turtles. Alas no turtles but Remi did take me through a little cave system which the advanced divers use on their cave dive course and apart from one minor scratch I came out the other end having spent most of it swimming upside down so I could see the bubbles on the roof.

Our next dive was to be White rock, one that I had already done before so I spent a little time watching the next crop of open water divers go through their paces before joining them for 40 mins swimming around the rocks trying to spot rays and scorpion fish. After our dives Remi actually thanked me saying it was some of the best diving he'd had for weeks, I probably would have been more receptive but I was dropping iodine on my cut leg, which for those that know, tingled a little!

Back on shore and I found Becky in the same place I had left her a few hours before claiming that she had moved and had been in the sea. Eric had appeared along with the german girls, feeling slightly delicate I might add. Oscar and Madde apparently came out of their room around 1600 and went straight to the beach for a swim, so everyone was alive. Mission completed, we had our licences, we had a few dives under our belts and hopefully the next time I get in the water will be turtle island in Borneo.

31/10/11

Happy Halloween! Woke up this morning feeling rough, I think it may have been one dive too many yesterday but hopefully breakfast will settle the stomach before the journey to Phuket begins. I treated myself to pancakes and honey and waited for the free taxi to the ferry, which arrived with the usual Thai efficiency, late! The ride is only 10 mins long, but i started feeling sick almost as soon as we hit the main drag, this was not a good sign and by the time we made it onto the ferry I had given up all hope of keeping my pancakes. I saw breakfast again roughly 20 minutes into the journey and I wasn't the only one on the stern of the ferry, so with that over with I returned back to my seat and enjoyed the rest of the trip, safe in the knowledge it would get no worse for me. Back on Samui we jumped on the airport bus and arrived in very good time for our flight. Samui airport is one of those quirky little ones that pleasantly surprises you once your inside. Actually I use the word" inside" lightly as most of it is open air with only a roof over the top to keep any rain out, but don't think this makes the places cooler, oh no, the fans did very little to stifle the heat and humidity and the milkshake I bought had to be downed like a chaser as the ice cream was melting so fast.

While walking around the shops I found a sunglasses hut, random as it was the first one I'd seen since leaving the USA but it was just what I needed to get my Oakley lenses replaced, or so I thought! After showing her the damage I asked if they sell lenses, yes came the reply, yippee I thought. Do you have the same ones? I asked, no came the reply, ok that's not a problem I thought, which ones do you have? So she showed me a nice blue polarised pair of oakleys, lenses the same so I said I'd take them. It then became a scene out of the twilight zone, she told me it was too hard to do and I can't have them! I explained I was happy to take them away and work it out for myself, no, no sale came the reply. I walked out before I got too frustrated and inserted them where sunlight wasn't a problem!

An hour flight on another twin prop and we were in Phuket and the usual hassle from taxi touts began. After a check on prices we found that 180 baht per person was the going rate to Kata Beach on the west coast and we booked a minibus, which turned out to be a huge mistake as the driver refuses to leave unless he has a full bus, so this means waiting around for flights to arrive and for the company touts to drag people in, if they can! After waiting around for half an hour and roughly 4 flights I put on my best angry face and began demanding to leave, only to be told " 2 more people, 2 more people" but by now the rest of the bus joined in and I think he was feeling a  little concerned. An hour after we arrived we finally left Phuket Airport, only to stop 10 minutes later at the office, when a couple of women came out and told us to show them our tickets and tell them where we were going This is the part we had been warned about by our hotel, here's the deal. You tell them that you are going to a certain hotel, they then try everything in their power to persuade you to stay at a different one, the one that gives them a healthy commission. They actually get quite annoyed when you stick to your guns, but I'd rather go to the hotel and see it's a pile of rubble for myself thank you very much. Anyway after another half an hour of waiting we were on our way again and you've probably guessed already, we were last on the list. The driver must have got lost at least 6 times on the whole journey and actually drove past our hotel before stopping for directions, in total it took us another two hours to get to our hotel. This bunny was not happy!

The lucky Guesthouse in Pata Beach was our choice for this leg, probably because it had not raised it's prices yet for high season (this starts 1st November) and the owner had been very helpful over email. We were shown to our room which again was large and spacious with a separate bathroom/shower and not a cockroach in sight contrary to what our taxi company said. The whole building was wall to wall White tiles on the inside and this gave both Bex and I the feeling we were inside a custody suite at the local police station, but it was spotless and obviously looked after with pride. We walked out onto the road and were instantly transported back to Hanoi or Saigon or any other of the towns we had visited so far, rolex watches here, buy my suit, massage etc it was hard work walking with all the people jumping in front of you, Phuket was not endearing itself to me and this wasn't even high season yet!

We eventually found somewhere to eat and settled only to find the prices were four times that of Samui and Koh Toa, this was the last straw and I was ready to leave that night! Over a barely edible dinner we plotted our next moves, Koh Phi Phi (where Bex had been a few years ago) Koh Lanta then onto Krabi before returning to Phuket and heading to Panang in malaysia. I had also calmed a little, so we decided to give the beach a go tomorrow and book all our ferry tickets for the next few days, I'm also pleased to announce that I didn't punch anyone on the way back to our room!