Island Life on Koh Tao

As it was pouring down rain I opted to take the minivan which stopped at the bus stop looking for passengers rather than waiting for the local bus. I probably paid an extra 40 or 50 baht, but I wanted to get out of the rain. The minivan took me to who knows where in Surat Thani and I walked into a tour agency (for the first time!) to ask about getting the overnight boat to Koh Tao. A couple guys were there doing the same thing. They left to buy a camera and I hung out and used the internet for an hour or so. The lady at the tour agency tried to convince me to take sleeping berth 92 which would be between the two boys. She figured she was helping me get two boyfriends. She kept laughing at her brilliant scheme. The boys and I went to the pier together at about 7:00 and still had 4 hours to kill before the boat left. As we had heard that it could be a nightmare of a journey since it was a cargo boat and not a passenger boat, we thought some beers to ease the pain were in order. Turns out that some turned into quite a few. All the better to sleep we hoped! When we got on the boat we found our allocated spot along the mats that ran the length of the boat. We ended up going to the top deck for awhile as everyone else went straight to sleep. Michael and I went back down to sleep at some point but left Christian up there drinking whiskey with some Thai men. When we got up the next morning as the boat was pulling in to the pier in Koh Tao, Christian was nowhere to be found. After a bit of searching it turns out that he had fallen asleep on the deck above us after copious amounts of Thai whiskey.

The boys were planning on going to Big Blue Diving and so was I, so off we went. I scored a pretty decent bungalow which would only be 200 baht every day that I went diving. As it turned out, that was every day. It had only been 10 days since my last ocean diving and already I was in withdrawal. I went diving the very first afternoon. The visibility wasn't as good as at the dive sites on the Andaman side, but it was so good to be in the ocean again. For me, the next few days consisted of diving in the morning and then somehow the afternoons passed without me really knowing where the time went. Much of it was spent chatting with others, a bit of time swimming, a little reading, and I finally treated myself to a Thai massage one afternoon. One afternoon I even had a Thai cooking lesson from a woman in a restaurant as she cooked up a birthday lunch for a fellow Canadian named Chris. She showed us how to make my favourite dish and then didn't want to take any money for the lunch. A really sweet woman and such amazing food!! In the evenings we went out to eat and ended up back on the beach for beers at some bar. I always headed to bed reasonably early as I had to be up at 6:30 for diving. It turned out to be well worth the sacrifice as one morning at Chumpon Pinnacle there were more bull sharks than I could count! They kept swimming around and circling back. It was amazing!

My final afternoon, the boys and Anna (a Norwegian girl) decided to rent scooters to explore the island. I was reluctant after my accident in Vanuatu. I had also seen tons of people walking around with injuries from their own scooter incidents on Koh Tao. Foolishly I decided to go with them after the boys assured me that they were skilled riders. Anna would ride on the back with Michael and I would go with Christian. We also invited Canadian Chris to come with us. I was a nervous wreck the entire time! The roads are so bad (in many places they are just dirt with steep hills and lots of ruts) that it is a miracle that anyone survives a day of scooter exploration. Quad rentals seem to be gaining in popularity as people are realizing just how dangerous the scooters are. Of course the quads are much more expensive. First we went to a viewpoint of Mango Bay. The hill was so steep that Anna and I had to get off and walk part of the way up. Then we headed over to Tanote Bay on the east side of the island. It's a beautiful little beach with some decent snorkeling. There is also a fairly big rock in the water which you can climb up with the help of a rope and then jump off. Amazingly I decided not to bother. I had jumped off the top of the dive boat that morning and that was enough thrill for me for one day. The rest decided to go for it and I was the designated photographer. Poor Christian scraped up his foot, legs, and arms on the way up. After leaving Tanote Bay we decided to check out Shark Bay as well. The last part of the road was so bad that you had to go really slowly. So slowly, in fact, that when Michael and Anna's scooter slid and fell over they didn't even hurt themselves. Thankfully! We had a quick peek at the beach at Shark Bay and then I think all of us just wanted to get safely back to Big Blue.

Chris and Anna left early on a boat the next morning while I went off to do a couple more dives. I met up with the boys around lunch and borrowed their room key so I could have a shower before heading out myself. Annoyingly, the taxi driver failed to turn up at Big Blue and had to be called three times to come get me! Meanwhile I was roasting in the sun waiting. Fortunately, I had decided to head to the pier early so I didn't miss my boat. A 2 1/2 hour boat ride, then an hour dinner break, followed by 9 hours on the bus and I was back in Bangkok. When I got off the bus I managed to find a guy who was also going to the airport so we shared a taxi. He had been offered a taxi ride for 2000 baht!!! That is about 5 times what it should cost from where we were. It is unbelievable what they will try!! Now I am boarding a plane to Chiang Mai. It is time for some history, culture, and mountains.