Monday, August 14, 2006

we woke up early today to go on a snorkeling trip to the islands of ko yuan ngan and ko tao. a driver picked us up from our hotel around 730 and drove us to a dock where alot of other people had also signed up...must have been close to 80 people there. they divided us into groups and we went on a speedboat for a ride to the first island.

well, the trip was a little rocky. the weather had turned a bit from the beautiful day before and the boat was rocking. we were ok but some people were either getting seriously wet or seriously seasick. the mood on the boat started jubilant with a bunch of brazilian men chanting and singing songs...at around the hour mark, those songs had stopped to be replaced by relative silence with occasional chatter. amanda and i were among the only ones not to be effected by the choppy waters, most of the others were having some problems.

when we got to the island we started snorkeling almost immediately and it was beautiful. all kinds of fish, coral, and vegetation was around in crystal clear water for us to see. the water was warm and shallow enough to make it comfortable swimming. we went for about an hour until we had to be on the boat again, at which point the rain really started coming down. the tropical downpour lasted until we got to ko tao and had a thai lunch.

when we got to the second snorkeling spot, some people on the boat were so sick and wet that they just wanted the boat to turn around and go home. i was against that...we all were promised snorkeling, so we were going to get some snorkeling. a vote was held and a compromise where wed go snorkeling for only 30 minutes instead of an hour was arranged. again, fantastic stuff lay under the waters for us to see.

we finally got back to the resort around 530, rather exhausted. instead of resting, though, we went for a swim in the rain which cleaned us up. after showers and some pre dinner beers we went for a great dinner on the beach. it was so windy that we were the only ones brave enough to actually stay on the beach and eat instead of flee indoors for more comfortable tables. the waiter was nice enough to set up two patio umbrellas at opposite ends of the table to act as sheilds against the rain and wind blowing off the ocean.

we were rather exhausted from the days events so we decided to hang out around our part of the beach instead of heading into central chaweng. luckily we still had one more day to go on the island paradise.