Thailand Part 2: Diving the Similian Islands

The next stage in our Thai adventure took us to the Similan Islands via a liveaboard dive boat for 4 nights. We completed 13 dives over the course of the trip and saw some amazing vistas both above and below the water.


The weather was fair and the seas calm allowing for great visibility of the abundant and diverse sea life.

The areas we dove in ranged from soft and hard coral bottoms to huge granite boulders that provided many swim throughs and caves to explore.dodging the pirates by ducking through an underwater cave

The Similan Islands provide a fertile ground for the huge abundance of live. We saw many species of animals that we had never seen before such as lionfish, harlequin shrimp, nudibranch, seahorse, blue spotted-stingrays, a sea snake and many more.Lionfish or alien creature?

We found Nemo!

Chris hiding in the school of fish

Most significantly, on the second morning, we looked up after frantic pointing by our guide to see a WHALE SHARK!!!!!

WHALE SHARK - WHALE SHARK - we saw a WHALE SHARK!!!

If Amy has spoken you to about diving at any point over the last several years she will no doubt have informed you that it was her mission to see one of these. All the anticipation, hoping, and wishing could not have prepared us for this, the thing was huge, dwarfing anything else we have seen. Imagine swimming along and then seeing something the size of a small school bus come past you.

Amy at her happiest moment - that's the whale shark she's pointing at

Whale sharks are the largest fish in the ocean (whales are bigger but they are mammals). The one we saw was between 15 and 20 feet long. It swam over us then turned around and came back twice. They are extremely rare and everyone was freaking out with excitement. When we got to the surface, there were high fives all around.One of our dive group to give you an idea of the size - he's around 6ft tall without fins

We also encountered some large manta rays on two dives, they were beautiful and graceful as they flew through the water.

Is that manta about to attack Chris?!

Of the 13 dives we completed, one of these was a night dive. This is difficult to describe as it is both terrifying and awesome at the same time. In fact, it is mostly the terror that makes it awesome. We saw some different species at night and carefully tried to avoid the poisonous critters such as the lionfish, scorpionfish, and stonefish. No casualties to report. Some excitement at the end of the dive though as the current picked up and one of our divers was swept past the mooring line of the boat. We ended up forming a human chain to save her from disappearing onto the blackness. Good times.


Overall, the dive trip was the highlight of our tour in Thailand and the diving was among the best we have had. I would recommend it to anyone who dives and is keen to see some breathtaking scenery.

Thailand Part 1: Bangkok

Wat Arun, across the river from our hotel

We are back safe and sound from our adventures in Thailand and we had an awesome time.

Our trip started off in the capitol of Bangkok where we arrived in the final day of the Thai New Years celebration. While this probably involves some religious and more formal aspects, the element that we noticed most was that the entire city turned into a gigantic water fight. We first noticed this in the cab from the airport while at a stop light. There were these two 7-9 year old kids on the corner with buckets of water and huge smiles on their faces. Whenever someone would drive by on a scooter, or an open taxi called a, Tuk-Tuk, the kids would douse them with the buckets.

We saw this repeated over the course of the entire drive. Many people had adjusted to this by riding around in their bathing suits.

Hooligans, spraying passersby

Additionally, there was a lot of foot traffic on the main roads and a large percentage of the pedestrians were armed with all shapes and sizes of waterguns and buckets. Everyone was involved from 5 year old kids holding guns that were bigger than they were to seniors, sitting on folding chairs, spraying passersby.

Gotcha!

All of this led to a jovial atmosphere, everyone was soaked and smiling including Amy and I.

Superior firepower

We eventually armed ourselves and returned fire but probably should have brought a firehose.


We also attended to nights of Muay Thai Fights at the major venue in Bangkok, Lumpini Stadium. The first night was adult men fighting and the quality of the fights was the highest we had seen after attending similar events in the US and Australia.

Knockout!

The second night was bouts between teenagers from 14 on up. The fights were as good as the night before and although it was odd to see kids fighting without any special protective gear this made no difference to the competitors. There were a number of knockouts both nights.


We also took some time to visit some of the major historical sites in the city, going to the Grand Palace and the temples in the surrounding complex as well as an older style temple in Wat Arun.


The craftsmanship and architecture of these sites was amazing and unlike anything we had seen before. They had an extremely high level of detail in the ornamentation of the buildings with many intricate patterns repeated over a large scale.

At the Grand Palace

At Wat Arun

FEED MEEEEE!!!!

Off to Thailand!!!

Tomorrow Amy and I depart for 10 days in Thailand. We have heard nothing but good things about the southeast asian nation and are greatly looking forward to it.


View Larger Map

While there we will be diving in the Similian Islands and plan on watching the national sport of Muay Thai.


We will post pictures and video when we return, woo hoo!!!