Below you will find pages that utilize the taxonomy term “Koh-Tao”
Koh Tao to Bangkok, the Journey's first part
June 23, 2011
The day before my departure was an uneventful one. I did some final travel planing and tidied up my stuff, getting rid of gear I never used in hopes to make my backpack a bit smaller and lighter. It’s the third time I did that in Thailand but every time I end up with a heavy and bursting backpack not much later. No idea how that’s physically possible, must be some special backpacker law of physics.
Koh Tao accompanied my evening beer with a nice sunset. After all that time on the Aussie east coast I saw the sun rising over the ocean countless times but never did I see it set there.
In the morning I have to leave my room at 10:00 which is quite early for Thai standards. I asked them if a later checkout would be possible and was told I’d have to pay 100B per hour. Considering that the bungalow cost me 500B for the whole day that’s a blatant rip-off.
They do offer to store my backpack though and as I trust them I gladly accept. Carrying 20kg of luggage on a 35°C day is something
About to leave
June 21, 2011
For the last couple of days I mostly rested my lazy bum on the beach and when I moved it, it was to go to the restaurant, to the 7-eleven (ice cream and cold drinks) or the massage house. As much as I enjoy doing that it is unfortunately burning my funds much quicker than expected.
For the rest of my time in Asia I have another adventure on my list: Cambodia.
Thoughts on Thais
June 20, 2011
One of my favourite places on Koh Tao is a small food shop on the main road.
It doesn’t look like much but they serve really nice and authentic Thai food. By my experience those places often have the best deals, the food is good and the prices are low. The regular restaurants catering more for westerners usually have mediocre food for two or three times as much money.
Anyway, I don’t just like the place for the food but also for the friendly people.
Slacking around
June 18, 2011
When the diving was finished Hiro and I moved to the southern part of the island to have a couple of relaxed days. We got ourselves a bungalow overlooking Shark Bay. Getting to the beach was a bit of a pain in the lower back but the view from the veranda was very nice (it was one of the huts on the hill).
All in all I’m a bit disappointed by Koh Tao.
Advanced!
June 16, 2011
Day 2 of the diving course started deep. The boat took us out to the diving site and we went down to 28.4m. At a depth like that the colour red almost vanishes, making an object that is red at the surface appear black. The pressure is at 4 bar which means that a plastic bottle full of surface air is flat like the Netherlands. We just stayed for a couple of minutes at this depth and continued the dive in shallower water.
Diving Thai Style
June 13, 2011
The sea around Koh Tao has a temperature of 31°C and the visibility is 10-15m at the moment. Not the worst conditions for diving although the visibility could be a bit better. Compared to the reef in Cairns the dive spots here have one big advantage. The scenery when you get out of the water is simply stunning.
The advanced open water course requires me to do five so called ‘adventure dives’.
Koh Tao
June 11, 2011
The train to Chumphon was scheduled to leave Bangkok at 7:30 in the evening. We were still on the platform 45 minutes later. Thai railway makes the German one look like a clockwork.
In this case a delayed departure wasn’t a bad thing though as it means a later arrival and thus more time to sleep (scheduled arrival was 4:15am). A mere 1.5h late we pulled into Chumphon station and a bus took us to the ferry terminal.