Similan Island SCUBA Divers

Eve of 'Chap Goh Meh' - 14th day of Chinese New Year. What have u been doing for the pass 14 days? Non-stop 'mahjong' session till 5am, and continue with dimsum breakfast, whereby the winner pays the bill? haha...

Whatever you did during CNY, whether it was boring or fun, no worries! cos visiting kampungkai's blog is always refreshing ya? high 5! *piak...

This year, i celebrated my CNY differently. Many friends of mine failed to look for me, because i was having a holiday in Thailand - Scuba Diving!


Andaman Sea

Similan Island is located in the Andaman Sea, which is positioned to the west coast of thailand, somewhere near Phuket. If you a directional inability idiot (of course you're not!), i'll just make it easier for u. It's further up north of Pulau Langkawi, easy enough?

Besides diving in the Similan Islands, we dived in Koh Bon & Koh Tachi too. (it's all around the latitude of 8 & 9 degrees)


Similan Island

Similan Island has 9 small islands in total. Each being seperated by a 10-15 minutes or so boat ride.

Since it is a Live On Board/Live Abroad diving trip, we slept, we ate, we bathed, and we shat (past-tense of SHIT fyi) on the boat. Ya ya, i know what's running through your mind now. You're thinking bout me seeing shit floating on water rite? hahhaaha i'll talk bout that later.


Parinee

This is the boat that the 12 of us were on. Named after the daughter of the diving company boss. She has a sister boat, a bigger one, named Daranee that fits 18 divers.


Parinee Layout

Arrived in HKT (Phuket) around 8pm from KUL, of course with Malaysia Airlines hehehe! Then left straight to the jetty and got on-board Parinee, which lead me into my room. Tadaa!


My lil cosy room. Comes with a 1/2hp a/c!

Approximately at 2200 hrs, a one-foot long firecracker blasted by the side of the boat, followed by two loud honks from the cockpit. Let me simulate the sound for you. It went something like this: PLAK PLAK PLAK PLAK PLAK! BON! BON!


Thai Flag & fresh flowers & fire crackers - to mark Good Luck/Safe Journey thoughout the entire trip

From the very moment i stepped on Parinee, it was swaying left and right, up and down. And i have to admit, i didnt feel that well that night, feeling nausea that i went to bed early. I have no seasick problem though, but i suspect it was because of the heavy dinner with TOMYAMKUNG i had 30 mins before getting on board. So my advice is, eat less before getting on!


A tonnne of beer

Man, that's alot of beer and pepsi, don't you think? There's 6 cartons on every layer. And the local SINGHA beer is freaking cheap and delicious! unlike carlsberg. SINGHA cost only 20 baht (RM2) per can, and Pepsi is 15 baht (RM1.50)


Toilet

Here you go, your favourite part - the toilet and the floating tressure on sea. This is called a marine toilet. In a marine toilet, you are not allowed to flush down toilet paper, because it goes directly into the sea.

Yea, and so it has become an unwritten common agreement between all divers TO NOT SHIT when it is near diving time hahahha! you get what I mean? or else we'll be seeing new species of sea cucumber everyday! hahaha!

Water is limited on board. Therefore care must be taken to not waste fresh water, especially during showers. Or else everyone would have to suffer.


Sunrise

This is how I started my 1st day of diving in Similan Island, it was a great welcome! too bad for the boat positioning that the ball of sun was obscured by the island. But it turned out perfect ya?


Sunrise Flag

Cooling morning breeze sways the Thai flag as i sat on the moist deck to snap this pic. Quiet and peaceful. And as the sun rises, the millions of bright shining stars fades away, and that's when the SCUBA Divers come to life...


Dive Equipment


Scuba Divers


Clear blue water with plenty of fish


Boatman helping divers out of water


Beautiful yachts anchoring


That's what i look at when i'm bored, it's pretty entertaining


Donald Duck Bay! named after his head.


Mat Sallehs and their sunbathing, crazy!


It feels real good to stand on land


I treasure green, brown, and white. I hate blue!


When the night comes, we go fishing!


A huge batfish! dinner...

Let me explain a lil on this fishing thing. It is illegal for fisherman to come to Similan Island or any nearby islands protected under the National Marine Park to fish. However it is legally unwritten that fishing using a fishing line for own consumption is allowable. It's like, how much can u catch using a line compared to using nets?


Front Row L to R:
Adriano - Italian
Rommel - Kajang, Malaysia
Me - Kajang, Malaysia
Hadi - KL, Malaysia (Dive Instructor)
Iu Shen - Kajang, Malaysia

Back Row L to R:
Jeff - KL, Malaysia
Makoto - Tokyo, Japan (Dive Master)
Kazia - Rotterdam, Holland
David - Germany
Simon - England
Shannon - KL, Malaysia
John - KL, Malaysia


A preview to the next post - underwater pics!

Till then... may tonight blast off with firecrackers again!