Similan Dive Trip

As promised, when I was able to get some photos of our dive trip online I’d put a few of them here to share. This is a tiny subset of the 200+ images that we took in four days, so I have some serious iPhoto time coming when I get home.

The trip was on a live-aboard called the Queen Scuba and we did a 4-day/4-night cruise out to the Similan Islands, Richelieu Rock, and the Surin Islands. 14 scheduled dives in all, one at night, two in the sunset, 4 the first three days and two the last. The boat was great, a fantastic value for the money nicely nestled between the cheap-ass bunk style trips and the very high-end pleasure crusies costing more than twice as much. For our journey we got our own cabin, with en-suite bathroom (hot showers!), meals, soft drinks, etc, and were only two of 15 people total on the boat (definitly not crowded at all).

We set out on the night of the first day from a pier just south of Khao Lak, atiny village on the western side of the Thai peninsula; just north of Phuket, if you’re familiar. This place has experienced explosive growth in the past three years, almost completely due to diving-related actvities. There are a slew of very nice new resorts and even more under construction. The market is definitly upscale and quite heavily travelled by German/Swiss/Swedish tourists. It’s a pretty coast, reminiscent of New Zealand to me, but the beach was somewhat dirty and the people working in the restaraunts and what not seemed a little distant, as if the more mid-market European crowd was less interested in the local culture so the local people were less interested in talking. (Compare this to Koh Tao where a number of farangs have been living for a number of years and become quite involved in the local community…everyone is really friendly there). I’m not saying Khao Lak is bad, it’s just quiet.

But that was only our port of call. After a day of wandering, and me experimenting with a cheap Thai haircut (should have just done it myself if I could have found clippers) we hopped on the dive shop’s truck to pick up a few more passengers and then on to the pier. It was like a party that night, with no fewer than five other dive boats heading off into the darkness. We could tell that we’d definitly picked the right boat for our tastes. There were three or four junks alongside and then one high-end boat with candlelit dinner tables and a nautilus gym downstairs…that was a little too much. Boat briefing and gear checkout and then in to bed by 9pm for the 6:30am wake-up and the first dive.

When we woke up in the morning we were greeted by a view of a completely deserted beach in a perfect little bay. Two sailboats had tied up just in front of us and you could see all the way to the bottom of probably 60 feet of perfectly clear water. Schools of fish were already examing our boat’s bilge discharge, we could tell this was going to be a great trip.

First dive was a check-out to get familiar with our equipment (and each other). Alexis just finished up her Openwater certification last week in Koh Tao and she decided to push herself and complete her Advanced Openwater class while on the boat in the Similans (deeper dives, night dives, and a few more adventursome skills). I wasn’t taking any classes but it was the first time I was diving with my digital camera and the new underwater housing that I got for last Christmas, so I had plenty to occupy my attention underwater (other than of course worrying about Alexis…heh).

We did three full dives the first day, saw a wide range of marine life, got some good pictures, and generally had a lot of fun. I noticed that I seemed to be sucking wind though and would burn through most of my air when James (our divemaster) and Alexis would both have 100 bar or more left. A couple of times this meant that I had to head up with some other folks while they continued their dive. On the third dive of the day I ended up missing a leopard shark cruising right by Alexis, which sounded really cool. Made up for it later though.

The next day we went diving at the northern islands and then Koh Ban. (Koh means island, if you hadn’t guessed that by now =). Koh Ban is a pretty dive, but is really known for one thing at this time of year…Manta Rays. We got in the water in great anticipation, only to immediately get sucked into the worst current we’ve ever felt underwater. If you remember in Star Wars when ships were flying through hyperspace and the stars were just zipping by all around, well that’s what it looked like. We flew past the west side of the island and were just able to grab on to some underwater outcroppings to “catch our breath” (something you don’t want to have to worry about 25 meters under water). Seriously, it was difficult to even hold on to those rocks with both hands. By the time we got up the strength to sneak left into the lee of the island to avoid the current I was getting pretty worried about Alexis. I signalled to the dive master that we should probably cut the dive short, but since we were so deep and things had calmed down quite a bit we decided to make a slow ascent up the wall. Just as we were completing our safety stop we saw some fluttering wings in the distance…Manta! Turns out Alexis and I were completely knackered though and cut the chase short to get back on the boat (apparently there were two mantas flying by). After that stress we decided to skip the final dive of the evening and we both passed out in our cabin for about fifteen hours straight.

The next day more than made up for missing the dives though as we ended up doing three trips around Richeliu Rock. This place is amazing; at low tide you can barely see some coral on the surface, at high tide it’s completely obscured. Get underwater though and you’ll find a 100 foot pinnacle covered with the most complex bio-system for miles around (the ocean floor is literally all sand as far as the eye can see out from the bottom). Apparently Jaques Cuesteau found this place many years ago, and he must have been thrilled. Besides the normal masses of hard and soft coral, schools of fish all shapes, sizes, and colors, we saw sea monkeys (“sea monkey has my money”), octopuses, and some amazingly colorful little creatures called harlequin shrimp and ghost pipe fish (I hope my photos can be made to look OK, otherwise I’m gonna have to find something online).

We had a final sunset dive in the Surin Islands (even further north, right next to Burma), and then anchored for the night. Our next morning started with a ritual Manta dance (everyone trekked around the boat in the bed sheets letting them flutter in teh wind). A final dive at Koh Tachai and Koh Bon were scheduled for the day and we were pretty tired but excited for what was to come. Clear seas, clear skies, and no current were all looking really inviting. The water was awesome and the fish were great, but really, all I can talk about were the Mantas. We saw one on each dive, and they kept coming back to check us out. Four meter wide creatures, gracefully flying through the ocean, it was amazing. I think the best I can do is just to show the video clip I was able to capture as one cruised by.

A great trip, all around, I’m very very glad we got a chance to see this now, as who knows what will happen to the site in the future.