Location: Koh Tao, Thailand

I scooted down first thing this morning to Roctopus, the dive shop I booked in with for this week! Since I haven’t dived (dove??) in a couple years I signed up for a recertification where they’ll give me the low down on everything again and then I can get right back into it! It was just me, a German guy named Toby and our dive master Harry, a Brit who showed up seven months ago with the intent to stay for like three days and then just never left. He’s the third person I’ve met who has said that about Koh Tao and I can see why…

There were tons of people at Roctopus all getting certified because apparently Koh Tao is one of the best places in the world to do it, and this shop is among the top on the island.

After a quick once over of our gear we jumped into a boat and sped off. Some of the best sites in the area are all just a few minutes away so by the time we had checked our tanks and set up our breathing regulators, we were ready to hop in!

I learned to dive in 8 degree Canadian water so every time I get to do tropical dives it feels like such a treat. I feel so free and comfortable not shivering my butt off in a thick wetsuit at the bottom of the North Pacific ocean!

We started by doing our skill checks right near the boats in a sandy little area on the bottom, and once we had that out of the way just a short swim away was a dive spot called Japanese Gardens. We saw sea urchins galore, wrasse fish, angel fish, sail fish and fusiliers – to name a few! I forgot that you can hear parrot fish munching away on the coral under water! The corals were mostly pinks, oranges and browns but with the odd bright flash of royal blue. My favourite was the big black and white sea slugs because they don’t look like they should be actual living animals. It’s just like… goo. We only went down about 15 meters for this dive but I was struggling to equalize my ears already, so wish me luck for the rest of the dives I have booked!

We jumped on the boat and headed off to Twins dive site, which I was looking forward to as it’s basically two huge rocks side by side just teeming with fish and you can go around and in between them! There’s even a section where we went through a tunnel that required a little manoeuvring but was really neat as the sides were covered in sea slugs and corals. We saw tiny neon blue fish swimming around in the hundreds, and a decent number of trigger fish. Harry had to herd us away from the trigger fish because both me and Toby were like ‘ooooh big fish!’ but it turns out if you get too close while they have eggs (as they do now) they will bite you, and the only warning you get is a little flag they stick up on top of their heads like a trigger.

Somehow that fact makes them cuter not scarier but fine I will stay away from those ones. This dive went down to 20 meters, and once we had thoroughly checked out the site we played for a long time on the ocean floor making bubble rings and little tornados with our air.

I forgot how exhausting diving can be! We barely did anything and I was just so zonked all I had energy for afterwards was dinner and a little sit on the beach. I did go to Duck 995 for dinner because I’d heard people raving about it earlier on the boat. I just told the waiter to bring me the most popular thing on the menu which turned out to be roasted duck on rice with soy bean paste and fried morning glory greens. It was stellar. I’m not usually a fan of duck but wow.

Eat. Here.

I can’t even pass the time with a good massage because the nitrogen bubbles in my joints are naturally working themselves out, and a Thai massage can push them all together and give me the bends apparently. Cool. Cool. I guess it’s not such a bad thing if I crash early tonight though because I’ve booked myself in for a sunrise dive tomorrow…

At 6 AM.

Ick. Why do I do this to myself?!

Sav