With four straight days of what seemed like nothing but
eating, drinking, and sweating, it was time for us to leave Koh Samui. For the first time in the history of the
great kingdom of Thailand, a cab actually showed up early. We had become so used to waiting for
everything, that we were actually caught off guard when someone showed up at
the time they said they would.
Thankfully, the hotel also did not charge us for the room card that the
guy working the previous night said we would have to pay for. This was a good thing for the lady working, because
I am sure if she had attempted to charge us Colleen would have ripped her face
off (or at the very least given her a mean titty-twister)!
With our luggage in tow, we headed down to the pier and loaded
up onto the super packed ferry. Because
the Full Moon Party was forthcoming, there were thousands of people making
their way to Koh Phangan. Colleen and I
on the other hand were headed to the diving Mecca of Koh Tao (the third island in
the chain that makes up the big three in the Gulf of Thailand), which was just
a wee bit further by boat.
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| Geography lesson. Free of charge. |
Thankfully, our ferry ride was not as violent as some of the
ones we had been subjected to in the recent past and we were able to make it to
Koh Tao with all of our digested food staying digested. While Koh Tao is billed as the quietest and
smallest of the three islands, the same cannot be said for its fleet of taxi
drivers. The second we got off the ferry
the two of us, and everyone else onboard for that matter, were swarmed by
hundreds of cab drivers. All of them
were shouting and screaming and trying to get your attention, all in the name
of a car ride! We were told the previous
day by our diving school (Roctopus Dive) that they would pick us up, so we
headed to the designated waiting spot.
And waited. And waited. And waited some more. Eventually we gave up and had to catch a ride
from one of the overly zealous cab drivers who scooted us across the island to
the Roctopus Dive Shop.
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| Colleen psyching herself up for the ferry ride. |
There are literally dozens of dive operators and shops on
Koh Tao all offering very similar packages and pricing when it comes to
learning how to dive. Colleen and I had done a bit of research the previous day
and after scouring Trip Advisor reviews, we decided on Roctopus. They were one of the top-ranked (if not the
top-ranked shop) on the island and many of the reviews raved about the small class
sizes and personable instructors.
Shortly after we arrived the guy who was supposed to meet us at the pier
arrived and apologized for the mix-up in picking us up. Mix-ups aside, after filling out some
paperwork, meeting our instructor Amber, and getting our homework assignment(!)
we were informed that due to the Full Moon Party (many people go there before
coming diving) on the next island over, we would be the only two people in our
class commencing the next day! This made Colleen especially happy, as she was
nervous about diving and felt that having a small class would make her feel
more comfortable. Little did we know it would end up being me who just about died. But more on that later!
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| The Thailand you don't read about in the guidebooks. |
With everything sorted at the dive shop for our course beginning
the next day, we were driven over to our bungalow accommodations that were
being included as part of the all-inclusive price with our diving certification
course. We had no TV and had to pay some
guy to come deliver us a code for internet access (not sketchy at all), but hey
we were here to learn to dive. That
evening we went out for dinner and explored the island a bit before heading
back to our room to do our homework which was due the following morning. I must say that Colleen was much more
expedient at finding answers in her books than I was. Must have something to do with my old age. It was clear who was going to be the
teacher's pet in class.
The real fun starts the next day...scuba here we come!
~Brentski~
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