Day 193! After seeing a whale shark… diving can’t get much cooler than that, right?! Wrong. Today was another full on day of diving with new dive sites, amazing wildlife, and fun navigation challenges… all topped off with an intense night of karaoke!

I woke up to my alarm at 6am, and for some reason, I was feeling alert and ready to take on the day.

The morning dive today only had one class, with one student. So it was going to be a very empty boat… but we didn’t know which pier the boat was at. I hopped on my motorbike and rode down to the main pier and found out our boat was not docked there.

I then grabbed some fried chicken from the fried chicken lady (who I’ve been neglecting lately) and made my way back to Taco Shack.

We then hopped in our taxi and made our way to the other pier, Hin Wong.

Here, we waited for AN HOUR for a taxi boat to come pick us up and take us to our boat. Luckily, since there were so few people, it was going to be easy to make up the time.

Today’s dives were actually new sites for Kit and I… But it wasn’t just the Kit and Elie show, please welcome our other DMT into the mix, Sina!

Sina has been sick lately and hasn’t been able to dive much with us yet, so we were excited to have her back in the water.

Our first dive was to Laem Thian Caves, a dive site near the pier we were at. This dive site is known for its swim throughs! I took the lead on this one and guided us through this dive site, which involved a lot of testing out swim throughs.

Most of the time, they were quite wide and led to an amazing new world on the other side… but one time I went through a very small one that was in the shape of an upwards L… and I barely made it through. Thankfully, Kit and Sina were smart enough to not follow me after I bumped into everything and I’m glad I didn’t get stuck.

We had a fun 54 minute dive weaving through these swim throughs. We also spotted a turtle at the beginning of our dive. The turtle then proceeded to swim with us and lead us to the north side of the dive site! We swam with it for around 10-15 minutes, it was so cool!

We wrapped up that dive and made our way to our next dive site, which wasn’t too far away.

This was also another new dive site for us, it was Hin Wong Pinnacle.

This was another fantastic dive site, I’m honestly not sure why we don’t go here more often!

At this dive site, we ALSO saw two more turtles!! It was an exciting morning for us and a special one after such a special day yesterday.

This was another 50+ minute dive and we circled this beautiful pinnacle. Kit took the lead on this one, and on both dives we surfaced right next to our boat!

I honestly had no stress in the water today and was really enjoying myself as we made through our two wonderful morning dives.

Having Sina around was really nice too! It gave Kit and I a chance to lead other people and also added to the dynamic of the group!

We went back to the hostel for lunch because it was time to dive some more! But before I left the hostel, I got a message from Chelsea saying the pictures she took from the other day were ready for me!

These pictures are so freaking cool!! She did such a good job taking and editing them. I can’t wait to have more time diving with her in the water!

We had two more dives in the afternoon that weren’t assisting courses like usual. This afternoon, Kit and I continued working on our navigation skills. Soon, Lydia will be finishing up her dive master training and it’ll be up to Kit and I to guide tours soon!!

Our first dive was at Aow Leuk. Usually this means either skills or diving Hin Ngam. But today, Kit and I decided to dive the opposite side of the bay.

This was a pretty lack luster dive, but we did see a special fish that is a hard one to spot.

This is a juvenile sweet lips! The special thing about them is that they have a different pattern from a baby to an adult AND they do a fun dance in the water to trick predators into thinking they’re poisonous! Don’t ask me how I spotted it from a far, but I’m so glad I did! It was so cute!

I also spotted a blue spotted stingray and there was a group of open water divers nearby, so I let their instructor know to help enhance their dive experience!

We spent 48 minutes diving around and got a little lost… so we swam back a few minutes and then when we couldn’t find our way, we made our way up to the surface… but low and behold, we were right next to our boat!

The fourth dive of the day was much more stimulating. We went to Tanote Bay, where the massive school of fish is!

Chris, our mentor, gave Kit and I the goal to find the sunken catamaran at the dive site. He had never seen it himself so he gave us a general area where it was sunk and we gave it a go!

We started swimming into the deep blue making our way from 8m to around 20m. allegedly the catamaran was around 18m… but where we believed it should be was just some netting… so we didn’t end up finding it.

We then made our way back to the dive site and found the sunken motorbike that was there! We continued on and found the giant school of fish, and then finished off the dive ascending right next to the boat again! This time, it was intentional!

Our navigation skills have already improved so much! I can’t wait to take my first group of fun divers out and lead them through this beautiful world.

It had been a long day of diving, so I wanted to have some comfort food! I went to Mama Tams for a solo dinner and had my favorite, deep fried chicken and a mango smoothie.

I then joined my friends Pauline and Kit at Taco Shack and we enjoyed a couple drinks until karaoke night started. This is when the night got intense.

No one else wanted to sing tonight… so Kit and I ended up singing for almost two hours straight. We eventually convinced one other group of girls to sing maybe 2 or 3 songs, but we essentially put on a performance for the hostel.

My voice was shot by the end of the night, but I had a blast. I will say, I will definitely be taking a break from karaoke for a bit after that. We sang so many songs and I was so tired after hour one. Especially after diving all day!

Finally, Yi called it quits and ended the karaoke night. The hostel is pretty dead right now, mainly because of the half and full moon parties.

Tomorrow, I’ll get to sleep in a bit because I’ll be sitting in the classroom at 9:45am learning how to properly give dive briefings. We will then hit the water for some dives and also the fitness test.

The fitness test consists of a few challenges, so we’ll see how it goes and what it all entails!

– Elie