Day 17-18 / Tag 17-18 First days Diving Koh Tao.

DAY 17 Wednesday, March 29
Yesterday evening I had applied for the Specialty course Deep Diving.
I never take a camera when doing educational dives, so no pics, sorry
Read the book, but could not make the e-Learning work. Will have to do it after the dives.
Took the morning boat, meet at the dive center at 7:30, pickup truck to the pier, get everybody on the boat, and off we go.
We are heading for Chumpon Pinnacle, one of my favorites here, but the Captain says the sea is too choppy, and strong currents at the surface and underwater.
The boat Captains communicate via Radio, he heard only bad news from a dive boat already at Chumpon Pinnacle. So, where to go, we are bound for 40 Meters deep

(do the safety stop at 40 m and inflate the BCD ... 🤢 🚀  hahaha, Dan and PJ, hint, hint, elbow, elbow)

We decide for the dive site Satakut Wreck, between Nang Yuan and Koh Tao. This is the next deepest, if you swim to the stern and lie flat on the sand you can reach 31.3, dig a hole and put your computer there to make it 31.5 meters. So we did, without the hole in the sand...
I was shocked by the visibility, after diving in the Similans, but we found the Satakut, I almost banged my head into it. Our instructor seemed pretty interested in the wreck, it felt more like a wreck dive, we played a bit with buoyancy in the turret, penetrated in the bow and some sort of cargo room on the deck. Had to swim back to the boat at the surface some 50 to 70 meters against the current. I can do some surface swimming, ask Dan, but this one exhausted me quite a bit.

Second dive is White Rock, bad visibility in the deep around 24 meters, my instructor decides to go into the shallows around 14 meters after 15 minutes, with much better light and less snow in the water. I see 5 or 6 blue spotted stingrays, some coral bommys look like christmas tree farms, so many of these colorful and fancy worms live there. Average depth after 60 minutes dive is 13.4 meters

Christmastree worms

The blue spotted Stingray

Later on land we do the final exam in the restaurant, both passed with 100% rate.
I am a certified Deep Diver now and may go down to 40 meters.
If I want to and my ear allows. The left ear gets hard to equalize, obviously the Eustachian tube is full of mucus. I drink a lot of water and keep cleaning my nose with selfmade NaCl solution (Freshwater and salt) to dissolve that.



I book a two-tank fun dive for friday and set my name on the list for the courses Navigation and also Buoyancy, clean my nose, hang out at my bungalow, transfer my logged dives from paper to the digital database at mySSI, charge batteries, lubricate O-rings, do some laundry, stuff like that.
Always finishing off the days at Fishbowl Beach Bar for the Live Music.

Leo has started his Open Water Course today, paperwork, introduction video, snorkeling on the house reef. He feels fine after snorkeling, that's good, he is comfortable in the water, the first requirement for learning to dive

DAY 18 Thursday, March 30


Leo has his first scuba dive, shallow confined on the house reef. No pool here, only ocean. I got my certifications here as well, and I have never dived in a pool in three years.

First time with a SCUBA tank

First time with a SCUBA tank

I keep transfering dives to the database, it's 32 all together, this takes some time.

Office work, bookkeeping, ya know

at the office until late

One of the few beautiful sunsets this time

Also transfer photos from the cards to the laptop, the Canon and the GoPro work fine, but some of the iPhone pictures don't show up on the laptop. I e-mail some of the more important ones to myself from iPhone to laptop. Nice user experience, Apple...
I will take the Canon with me more often

Leo comes from his his first regulator breathing experience, happy. now does homework with the two girls in his group, Rebecca and Annika. good boy. I am so happy he likes it

See you under water

Day 16 / Tag 16 Going to Ko Tao

Taxi to airport at 8 am, Leo is late, we have breakfast at Phuket Airport, flight to Samui, minivan to Seatran pier in Bangrak for only 200 Baht for the two of us. We hang out in the shade on the pier with Mango Shakes from a food stall nearby.
Short before embarkation I notice I am missing my wallet with passport, vaccination book, 10 thousand Baht and some 1 thousand Euros! Adrenaline! Not even on Ko Tao, and already without passport!
I rush to the Family Mart and the food stall where I last had it, no wallet. Search the entire pier, no wallet.
Finally go to the ticket counter, where I ask the ladyboy behind the counter. He/she asks me questions to identify me, ask how old I am, and I answer in fluent Thai: Haa Sib Kao.
Grinning all over his face he hands me my wallet, saying I should have come to him/her first, he/she has 60 ladies and only one husband, whatever that is supposed to mean.
My circulation and adrenaline level return to normal...
Now that's time for my favorite Cigarette:

Leo brought them for me from the Duty Free in Zurich

Pretty rough ride in heavy rain on the small ferryboat to Ko Tao directly, no stop in Ko Phangan

Course set to Koh Tao

Rastaman taxi driver brings us to Sairee Beach, drops us close to Phoenix Divers, and we enter the office at Rainbowfish Divers. Pooh comes running out from behind the counter, big hugs and kisses, I introduce my son and Pooh.

We take rooms in Flower Resort, just on the opposite side of the small walking street, drop bags and take to the restaurant. The boy is hungry, and eager to try all dishes during his stay of 12 days here.
He goes for Chicken Satay and No Name with vegetables and eats it all up

Leo having his fiirst real meal at Flowers Restaurant on Ko Tao

Leo goes to bed early, I take a last beer at the Fishbowl Beach Bar, always Live Music, always different.
Finally reached our spot for the next 12 days. Leo's Open Water Diver course starts tomorrow. I will take it a bit easy, my sinusses are not ok, my ears are slightly deaf, and after every boat ride it feels like the world is shaking and moving. Have I got the bends, am I narced?

 Let's see tomorrow, and let's go diving

See you under water

Day 12-15 / Tag 12-15 dive life. Pawara

We are now on the second boat, the MV Pawara, of West Coast Divers.

I will take the entire Pawara trip together in one post, or I won't be able to follow up with the blog.

So much to see, so much to experience. It's hard to document everything if there are so many impressions, intense.

OK, here we go. 

Day 12

It's Friday, March 24th, last night we cruised out of Tap Lamu port to the Similan Islands again. There are so many boats at Anita's Reef, our Tour Leader decides to take another dive site for the first dive on this trip: Hideaway and Monuments. Both very easy and beautiful. Perfect viz and the water is a dream by itself

Nice start into the day at the dive site called "Monument"

My new group is Vicky and Melanie,

Jan Chan from Hong Kong

and of course my trusted guide Dan

"Monuments" looks like this (yes, this IS underwater...)

Next stop: South of Eden, where Camille, another dive guide, spots a black Frogfish, my foto did not come out too well, too many divers, wrong angle, too much light too much backscatter,

The Black Frogfish at South of Eden

and then to Elephant Head Rock

Elephant Head Rock is a big formation of Granite Boulders scattered over one another, offering great swimthroughs and a hole in a wall where many divers take pictures. I saw Yellow Ribbon Eel and beautiful Oriental Sweetlips

Oriental Sweetlips at Elephant Head from Vo Sta on Vimeo.

Beachtime at Donald Duck Bay. Climb the trail again, left it out last year, had been there before. But this year I took my shoes from the boat, so I could do it again.

Night dive at Nam Chai, The Moorings, meet my cute friend the boxfish again

 and a beautiful pink Nudibranch on an orange coral

sleep overnight,

then head for Koh Bon. Probably no signal next two days.

Day 13 / Tag 13, March 25
Starting at Similans North Point with a wake up dive at 7:21
Master Boatboy John now fills my tank to 210 or 220 bar, sawng roi sawng sib, because I am always 10 bars below the others of the group after surfacing. Good man, fabulous crew anyway.
I have caught a bad cold, headache, lots of mucus from my nose after 44 minutes underwater, don't feel too well
Heading for Koh Bon, second dive of the day from the Bay to the West Ridge. This is supposed to be the spot for meeting the Great Mantas, but we had no luck. Went up to the Coral Bommy and returned after 25 minutes to the Ridge. Camille reached the Bommy 15 minutes after us und was lucky to see at least one.

Happy Camille after meeting Mr. Manta

Surfaced after 44 minutes, lots of mucus from my nose, this cold seems to be just getting started...

Here are some scenes from the Dive Deck, to give you an impression of Liveaboard Diving:

Dan rehearsing the extended high five

PJ:"Why don't you follow Me?"

PJ and John

Scenes from the Dive Deck from Vo Sta on Vimeo.


Two more Dives at Tachai Pinnacle, this time with dive times of 55 and 46 minutes. Slowly getting into the groove..

Day 14 / Tag 14, Sunday March 26
Starting at Richelieu Rock for the first two dives of this day. First dive without camera.

Bernadete from Germany, and Luca from Slovenia, now both live in Singapore

Famous chinese traditional singer

I love Blue

underwater forests

Black Marbled Ray at Tachai Pinnacle

Black Marbled Ray at Tachai Pinnacle

Jan from Hong Kong, in perfect trim as always

Feathered Stars. These Crinoids have been around some billion years....

Wart Slug

 Sunset Dive at Tachai Reef. Last dive is limited to 40 minutes. We were 35 minutes into the dive, looking for critters and staring at sand, when Dan and I turned face up and spotted this huge cloud of Chevron Barracudas

Barracudas anyone?

Chevron Barracudas

Barracudas at Tachai Reef from Vo Sta on Vimeo.


Thunderstorms on our night cruis way back to the mainland, but I had so much fun with the wild bunch of dive guides Camille, Oliver, PJ and Dan. Everybody had a great time.
BTW: Camille looks ten times more beautiful than on the pictures (I promised her to write that. And it's true)

Day 15 / Tag 15, Monday March 27
On our way back to the mainland we visited the Boonsung for the last two dives of this trip.
After the first dive my son messaged me that he had arrived safe and sound at the Hotel in Nai Yang. It was his first long haul flight and his first time in SE Asia. I am happy he made it without any problems.

Me and PJ. Man, did we have some fun together. My facial muscles are still aching from laughing that much

Sad to no longer dive with this funny bunch, especially Dan with PJ were more than hilarious...
"Next dive we go to 40 meters, do a safety stop, take a deep breath and inflate the BCD..."
"I tell the customer to give me a minute so I can go behind the rock and take a shit. Biiig shit, man..."
🤢💩🦈
'Nuff said

I will miss you guys!

Back on land the minivan brings me to Nai Yang, check in, find my son on the beach.
Fernando and Patricia Molina come by for a beer. We chat about two hours at the restaurant on the beach, together with my son Leo. We agree to get together on Phuket after my trip on the Junk, when I have 3 days in Kata Beach

Patricia, Fernando, Volker, and Leo

See you under water

 Isn't this what it's all about?
The Blue from Vo Sta on Vimeo.

Day 11 / Tag 11 Dive Life. Sawasdee Fasai trip ends, Pawara starts

This post will be updated later
all photos straight from the iPhone camera, no editing

Disembarkation from Sawasdee Fasai, every body sad the trip ends, we had so much fun together.
Ya os estoy echando de menos, Vasilis, Pilar y Monica ❤️

Spent some time at the port, hung out with the locals and had a beer or two. Luckily I could store my bags on the Pawara already, so no bulky luggage to drag around on a super hot day.

This trip is not sold out, we are 21 passengers. I was booked for a spare budget cabin, which I like a lot, it's in the Captains wheelhouse, far away from engine and generators, but I got upgraded to Deluxe cabin! Share it with Jan, a young man from Hongkong. Later, when I was already on the Pawara, I chatted with Edu, boat to boat, who does this trip on the Sawasdee Fasai together with some customers. 

And right when our boat briefing started, Monica showed up on the Sawasdee one more time to say goodbye. To the guys who travel with Edu. 

See you under water