1 July 2008 - our dives and lazy days

21st June

We got up at 9am and headed off to the place next door for breakfast. Here in Malaysia they have a sort of pancake for breakfast with a small bowl of curry to dip in. It's really tasty although i tend to have honey with mine as i cant quite stomach curry at breakfast yet!!

At 11am we got to the dive shop, we had an hour to go through the book to learn all the necessaries about deep diving. By 12pm we were ready to dive. The place we were going was know as the best dive sight in the area. It is an old volcanic rock that reaches the surface of the ocean. Because of all the minerals in the rock there is a huge array of marine life.

The dive was the best yet. Again the visibility was amazing and we saw so much. This time there were lots of bamboo sharks, they are very small and hide under rocks. We also swam through a huge school of yellow bass.

We decided that we wanted to do 4 dives in total but we also wanted to go snorkeling so we book the snorkeling for the next day.

22nd June.

After breakfast we pick out our fins and masks ready to go snorkeling. The first place we went too was turtle point, we had been guarantied to see turtles or our money back!! As promised we saw 3 turtle, 2 huge ones and one which was a fair bit smaller.

Next we saw eagle rays and lots of other fish. The guide got in the water with us at this point and told us to follow him, he took us round to some shallower waters which had lots of corals and fish. Out the corner of my eye i saw a shark, i shouted to the others but by the time they were looking it was gone! It was a little nerve racking at that point as i hadn't expected to see it there, also the water was only a few meters deep so i didn't really want to see it face to face (although they are only reef sharks o they are not aggressive).

We all got back on the boat and headed to shark point, this time we saw at least 5 or 6, it was great watching them swim by and it wasn't scary at all. Most of the time they swam away from you so you had to be quite quick to keep up!

The rest of the day snorkeling was great, here it is just as good as the diving as the water is so clear.

23rd June

Today we were doing a wreck dive, the water was a little bit rougher than usual so we were warned the visibility may not be great. Unfortunately i was having trouble equalizing my ears so it took a little while getting down to the wreck. After about 10Min's Ben our instructor suddenly tuned back toward us, Dan though he had seen something dangerous at first, then we noticed the bubbles shotting up from his tank. His o ring had broken meaning he could get any air. He went to use the other guys spare regulator (air) but it broke in his hands. Luckily Dan and i were close by so he was able to take my spare. The poor guy had a scare but he was OK, we slowly we back up to the surface.

Ben's tank was now empty so he wouldn't be able to dive again. My ears had still been hurting me so he took my tank and went back down with the others whilst i sat it out on the boat. Thankfully Ben saw to it that i wouldn't have to pay for my dive so no money was wasted. It just goes to show how important it is to stay close together when diving, at least if something goes wrong your buddy is nearby with back up air!! I always make Dan hold my hand when we are diving so we are always close by.

24th and 25th June

As my ears were still sore we decided against doing anymore diving, so our last few days on the island were spent relaxing, reading our books and dipping in and out of the water.

This island has been by far the best one yet. It is not too touristy and has a bit of everything here. We were certainly sad to leave but excited to be going somewhere new again.

Our last night we sat outside for a while to watch the storm, most nights on the island there has been a storm, which is great as it cools the air and gives us a show to watch.