Diving at dawn
Today was our last day diving in Koh Tao, but I was most excited for the 2 remaining dives. We had to be at the dive centre for 6:45am! I didn’t even know this time of day existed. On the way, we had one of the pancakes again, chocolate this time…he’s such a happy chap. Despite the tall order, we managed to make it to the dive centre on time, and so did everyone else. Soon after arriving, we boarded the ship and set off for our first dive. The first diving session we’ll be doing today is the deep dive, quite far off the coast of Koh Tao. We all donned our gear and hopped into the sea, buzzing to be here. All being well, we’d be diving to around 30 metres, which is about twice as deep as our current deepest.
Scuba diving is so awesome, it shows you a world you’d never thought would have existed. When you’re on the surface, you hear the birds and the crashing of the waves, you see the bright sky, the loud chugging boats, and perhaps landmasses. As soon as you pop your head under water above a coral reef, it’s a total 180-degree switch. It’s silent, enshrouded by blue in every direction, all of the fish going about their daily lives, and the schools of fish swimming in unison. What is above the surface, and what is below contrast so much, and I’m humbled to have been able to experience both.
Deep down
When there’s a current or it’s very deep, sometimes you have to use a rope to hold on to whilst you descend. As we approached deeper depths, the visibility became clearer, and we could see a long way. We were able to see all the coral reefs around us, as well as all the fish and other sea life. It was absolutely brilliant; I didn’t imagine it’d be like this. We saw so many different types of fish, and huge schools of fish. We split into 2 groups, and went to around 30 metres deep, it was kind of magical to be honest. Due to the depth, we had less time than normal, around half an hour. I’m definitely not complaining though; I can’t emphasise how amazing it actually was. Once the time was up, we got back up on the boat, and I tried to take it all in.
The boat then went to the next dive site. Once we arrived, the gear was on, and we were in the water. The visibility here was quite shoddy, but we were diving around a ship wreck. This meant that we were pretty close up to it anyway, but it was really cool. We swam on and around the ship, artillery and everything else included. It was cool to see how the fish were interacting with the ship, having made their homes here. This was a really cool dive, and I’m thoroughly impressed with today as a whole. It was kind of sad when we had to end the diving in Koh Tao as it’d been so epic. After we were back on land, we returned to the dive centre to wash our gear and put it away. Then we filled out our log books as proof of our feats.
Crazy golf
After having filled our log books in, we bid everyone goodbye as we left the dive centre. We returned to the hostel after an exhausting day grabbed some food nearby, took a shower, then chilled for a while. Mat and I arranged to go to a crazy golf course not far from our hostel. We asked Mitch, an Aussie from our diving course, if he wanted to tag along, which he did. There were 18 holes in total, and at the beginning of each hole, there was a spinner. Depending on what the spinner landed on would determine what forfeit or bonus you are granted. These included hitting with the opposite end of the golf club, hitting it backwards, and having to putt the ball in an odd number of shots. With enough determination, I managed to win overall, and victory was sweet!
The bar connected to the golf actually did Sunday roast dinners, but after the game none of us were hungry enough for a huge dinner. Instead, we had a few snacks from one of the stalls we went to yesterday. Mitch was actually staying across the road from us, which was really convenient. We returned to our respective hostels, and chilled out for a few hours. It had been a pretty exhausting but amazing day, diving in Koh Tao.
Later in the evening, we met up with Mitch again, and went for dinner in the town. We all had a delicious meal, as well as having plenty of laughs which was well deserved! Randomly, a humungous pig rocked up to the restaurant and just plopped itself on the floor. It was very bizarre, but apparently it’s a bit of a local celebrity. Soon after, we called it quits for the night and returned to our hostel.
