2016-09-05 Bangkok to Koh Tao via Koh Sumai
The blueish water created a gritty scene as I glided back and forth in the wave. I was exploring, looking for some interesting fish. The sandy bottom was dotted with all sorts of structures, from tiny coral reefs to old, abandoned fishing gear. Everything was crawling with some sort of creature. I then found a larger yet barren rock. Nearby sitting there was a cone like shape. Thinking back to when I read about the dangerous marine animals (More info here) of Koh Tao while waiting in the Air Bangkok lounge. I had seen one shellfish called the “Cone snails”. They had a fatally poisonous harpoon at the end. I also learned that this snail ate fish. This snail was probably hunting the hiding fish. And just seeing the shape through the foggy water, I wasn’t sure so I decided to quickly swim away. We had arrived at Koh Tao by a cruise that had came from the nearby larger island of Koh Samui. From Bangkok we had flown to Koh Samui.
Mae Head Pier in Koh Tao Thailand
The island was very different from what I had expected, the population was much larger, and things here were both busy, and relaxing. Since we were far away from other lands, I expected things to be very primitive, but. . . here I am typing away while on a wifi network. The island was full of cool dudes. Literally everywhere you look you would see a surfer looking dude riding a scooter home, or chilling with his buddies, or heading out to sea in a small dive boat.
We found our hotel, and saw that we had our own private hotel beach! We settled in, explored the town, and returned to our hotel for a lovely swim. We found many coral and cuttlefish bones. The cuttlefish bones looked like little surfboards that was made of calcium. The calcium was built in layers, one way you could easily sand off some bone, and the other way it is harder. If you own a bird, you might find in a pet store, cuttlefish bone for your bird to nibble with its beak.
As the rest of the day passed, we eventually had to go out for dinner. We went to a seafood place with live music and a pool table. The day was delightfully closed with a view of the hazy moon. As we returned to our rooms, we had an awesome dessert of freshly made on the spot, pancakes!
2016-09-06 Koh Tao
The hours went by as we stared at the TV, and glanced down at our homework for the video. We learned about the properties of air under certain pressures, about the most important rules about diving, about the diving measurements of our depth, about equipment, and about emergencies. The basics were that the diving measurements were bars or atmospheres (Abbreviation ata). 1 bar or ata would be at sea level, since there is the pressure of one atmosphere on you. At 10 meters or 33 feet below sea level you would be at 2 ata or bars because at 10 meters or 33 feet the pressure above you is the same as the pressure above you at sea level. When air is at 1 ata (I am using ata because I am American) it behaves what we would call properly, it is actually what we are used to, air behaves differently at different ata. The air’s volume and density changes when the pressure changes. As you go from let’s say 1 ata to 2 ata, the air’s volume would be at ½ what it was at sea level, and the density would increase and double the amount that the density was at sea level. At 3 ata, you the volume of air would be ⅓ the number that the volume of air as at sea level, and the density would be 3 times the density air was at the surface (Got tired of writing “Sea level). Are you with me, if not, stop and reread the description.
Also if you fill a balloon at the surface and brought it downward, the balloon would shrink, and if you filled the balloon with 3 liters of air, then at 2 ata, the balloon would have shrunk to 1.5 liters, at 3 ata 1 liter, and so on. If you managed to fill a balloon at 2 ata, and you ascended to right below the surface the air would expand so much that the balloon will pop! This part of the diving video told us that in order to not blow up any air spaces such as our ears, we needed to stop during our ascent to let the air expand and exit, and we needed to do something called “Equalization”.
Equalization is the process of counteracting the ear popping effect you get when the air in your ears starts to push on the tissues near it since it is expanding. To equalize it, you needed to plug your nose and lightly blow, this pushes air through your face and to your ears.
We watched three videos, that we had already studied this morning, but it did have some new info about emergencies, cuts stings how to treat them, how to handle fellow divers that are unresponsive or running short on breath, and we learned some diving language.
My favorite part was that at the end of the the 3 hour long videos (EACH!!), we got our gear fitted, we learned how to work the tanks, how to turn the tanks on and off, where each device should be, how to fit things on, and how to check for error.
When we left that day, the instructor told us that instead of the pool, we were going out to a bay with a sandy bottom and pool like environment, just that we were going to swim with fish.
We went out, had a dinner recommended by the instructor, and walked back home. We ran across the same store that sold pancakes, so we bought another one for today. But sadly, when we were walking back to the villa, I tripped on a trench and lost everything to gravity, I cleaned up some, but others I couldn’t, so I left them for the stray dogs and cats.
2016-09-07 Koh Tao
After a torturing drive to the spot, we geared up as practiced, and sat down, as nervous as a criminal going to court. The first groups stepped in, one hand covering their face and regulator (The thing that divers put in their mouth while diving) and one hand holding their weight belt. The groups went by quickly and soon it was my turn. I walked slowly for the tank and vest were very heavy and cumbersome. One of the crew members held my tank as I prepared to enter in what is called a giant stride. I looked out, and hesitantly shot my foot in the air and let it take me in. The following moment was unexplainable, I breathed in and out through my regulator, slowly, almost is if I was testing if regulators did give air or didn’t. The bubbles slowly floated to the surface, I followed them, re surfaced, and waited for my mom and dad. We switched to the snorkels to save air, and swam to shallower water. There, we were allowed to feel the amazing feeling of breathing underwater while being able to go deeper without any restraint, such as a snorkel. The first drills we did were fully underwater on our knees on the sandy bottom, we had to take out our regulator, let it go away, then, we used our and in a search pattern to find it. I passed that test quickly and easily. The next one was how to empty a half full mask, we opened our mask, let some water in just above our eyes, we looked up and pushed air through our nose, forcing the water out. I did it once, and the instructor wanted me to do it again (Remember this is underwater), I did and this time, missed it, so I blindly signaled “up” and we stood up in the chest length water to talk. The next drill I did was how to empty a fully flooded mask. I did this one correctly and moved on. The final drill was to take off my mask for 1 minute, and breathe only through my mouth. I did it, and cleared my mask. After a couple hours of practicing these drills, we returned to the boat for a rest.
At the end of our rest, we prepared for our next dive, and instead of just being on our knees in chest level, we were diving at 8 meters deep (26.24 feet). The fish descent down was something very new, we had to actually equalize more than I thought, and we followed a line down, I found it very pleasing to just sink down, but had to go slowly to give me time to equalize. Down at the bottom, we could practice how to control our buoyancy, and how to stay neutrally buoyant. The fish there were very colorful, we even got to get a glimpse of a small barracuda school. There was a kind of snail that looked like Christmas trees (Giving its name: Christmas Tree Worms or Spirobranchus Giganteus) and would retract into its hole if you pushed water at it Down deep it was easier to practice buoyancy because there was a lot of room. We swam and did some more mask clearing drills too. After a while, our air supply reached close to our reserves, so we headed back up. We motored back to our dock, took the longtail boat to shore, and rinsed off our gear. We returned to our hotel, and soon went out to dinner.
2016-09-08 Koh Tao
We circled the small almost disconnected island, the only thing between the land masses were naturally made sandbars, and water. If the sandbars didn’t exist, the islands created a small archipelago. We prepared our complex rig, and set off for our second dive, going to 11 meters max, this was the deepest dive I ever went, almost exceeding my legal limits of 12 meters. We descended cautious as ever and followed the slanted buoy line down. In between breathes, we had to equalize more than ever to counteract the pressure change, almost doubling the pressure that we are used to. Hovered above the bottom, did a couple drills of emptying a fully flooded mask, and sharing air between buddies.
After the drills, we floated over to a small yet impressive reef. As we skimmed over the sandy bottom, frightened gobie fish guarding the prawn dug holes would shoot backward at seeing us approach. There, we did some more drills, attracting a colorful fish the length of your upper arm, the height was about the palm of your hand. They seemed to be baring their teeth, and they circled you, almost as if they were piranhas, but later at the surface, our guide said that they were harmless fish that were just attracted by the silt that we had stirred up. After those drills, we glided over the reef.
There, we saw a variety of marine life, there were different kinds of coral, each coral had some sort of fish designed to camouflage well with it, scattered around the reef in coves, hidden inside were small sea urchins, with over sized spines, growing up to the length of your forearm. As we went along, we witnessed a White Eyed Moray eel slither into its hole. The eel’s movements were snake like, but it would slither up down right and left, creating an almost hypnotic feeling for some viewers. It reached through the crevice, and surprisingly, it went in head first, so it couldn’t poke its head out.
We were starting our ascent when, we saw a triggerfish, it looked very cool with its two triggers open, meaning that it was either relaxed or aggressive. The triggers were on the top and bottom of its body.
I checked my air, and my instructor, knowing my air supply, told me to use the spare on his tank, just like a real emergency, we resurfaced, and not wanting to use my reserves, I had to manually blow up my BCD. We returned to our ship and headed home. The morning dive was much shallower at 3 meters, and was mostly drills on the sand. We returned home, had a dinner, and returned home to rest and study up for tomorrow’s final exam!!
2016-09-09 Koh Tao
The flat stingray waved its sides gently as it rested under the natural coral cove. The fish around it swam happily, not knowing that above, were the rough seas. Nearby, a pufferfish worked hard to stay neutrally buoyant with its giant body and its tiny fins. Small reef, was just one of the secrets hidden in this bay, dotted around were more, and even an old longtail boat wreck!
This morning, we had taken the final exam for diving. It was close to the final step to becoming a certified diver. The first dive we did this afternoon, completed our last confined water dive. We were left with two more open water dives. We did one today, and planned to do one tomorrow, and mix it in with a fun dive.
The second dive we did this afternoon was very exciting, we saw a stingray, a pufferfish, fish, coral, different weird looking sea cucumbers, and a wreck. The ray was hidden inside a small cave and I could see the body waving like a wave. The pufferfish was already very large compared to its fins, and even then, it wasn’t puffed up. Sadly, my dad said that when he was looking at the pufferfish for some more time, he noticed an eel nearby, hanging out with the pufferfish.
The fish and coral all were very different. Some coral grew as if they were creating a platform, others, like the sea whip grew like a rope in the air. Others grew like a thin wall, some created a forest of trees, but one thing in common was that every coral did some sort of photosynthesis. The fish came in all different shapes, colors and sizes, from tall and skinny, to round and fat. From hexagons to stripes to spots to solid color. The fish all had different hangouts and jobs, for example. The goby fish, guards the blind prawns while the blind prawns digs out the home for both. As we glided above the bottom, we could see the goby fish poking their heads out as lookout. Smaller fish survived by eating algae off larger fish, taking those smaller fish off the larger fish’s menu.
We followed our guide through the maze of coral and rocks, and found ourselves at a small shipwreck. There was a wire cage like thing that had spelled on it, “GOLDEN DIVERS”. The boat was made of wood, and looked like it mad a great shelter for larger prey fish. Sure enough, in the cage, were larger meatier fish, they saw us, and quickly swam through gaps between the planks formed from the rotting.
We ascended and as our computers said, stopped and waited for three minutes to let the excess nitrogen be released out of our body. We then went to the surface, got onto the boat, and drove home.
2016-09-10 Koh Tao
Out in the coral forest, it felt like the opening scene of Nemo. There were almost a thousand fish, some hidden in the orange forest, others, crossing the reef with as many fish as far as the eye can see. In the anemones popped in and out of the anemones. I read that I could only go as deep as I went on the dive, if it was shallower than 18 meters, but in my case, 12. I got to a deep spot, and dipped down to the point, just to have proof recorded on my computer.
This afternoon, we did one more class open water mini dive, then went to White Rock for a fun dive. At White Rock, we spotted the largest triggerfish I had ever seen. It was about 2 feet long, and 6 inch tall. It was very timid and soon, swam away. My dad was lagging behind. Later he told me that he saw a stingray, but we were just too far away.
After the dive at White Rock, we motored over to the dive center. There, we were happy to receive confirmation that we are officially open water divers. We filled in our final forms, and thanked our coach for the awesome teaching that he gave us.
When we were walking in the direction of home, it started to downpour. We took shelter, and hopped from dry space to dry space, until we reached our hotel restaurant. We decided to eat there instead of getting soaked going to other places.
2016-09-11 Koh Tao
As we walked along the beach, we realized, how much junk there was. It looked like the water line was marked with the trash, it varied from watermelon peels to rice bags. It was very sad to see how much garbage was put into the ocean. Some places, a pipe went into the ocean, and the water around it was black! It was a sad sight, as we walked to a small bay was saw on the map.
We were going to go the islands connected by the sand bar, but it was too windy. Being on a boat would be miserable. So we decided to check out a beach on the south of the island. We had a long and dreary hike towards the bay.
We passed through a resort, and at the very end, it said that we had to pay to get onto the beach. So we walked back to a nearby beach that was free, and swam there. The main highlight was seeing a goby fish and prawn work together to dig a hole.
2016-09-12 Koh Tao
Sail Rock diving trip – coming soon
