It's been a few days since our last update -- we boarded the MV Pawara liveaboard dive boat out of Khao Lak, Thailand on January 4th. The boat does have WiFi, however, the internet connection was only there for the first 2 hours, before we got further out to the Similan Islands. We just returned from the 4 night diving trip, and it was a blast. Bobby & I both truly had a great time, and made many new friends during our adventure.

First, now that I have internet access, I've uploaded this 3.5 minute video of our time in Vietnam & Thailand: http://vimeo.com/83660080

There were many, many things to share about the dives around the Similan Islands, but the best way for now is to share the videos we produced. One of them is our funny video that many onboard took part in: Click on this link to view: https://vimeo.com/83670422
I think you'll enjoy it ! (it's set to the super-annoying new worldwide dance sensation: What Does the Fox Say) Fredi, our new friend from Switzerland, was awesome with his photography skills -- and I'll hopefully have a link to his video shortly showing what we saw underwater.

The MV Pawara is a 35 meter diving vessel, and is one of the best quality ships in the region. The staff was fantastic -- very nice and helpful staff members and divemasters (13 staff in all, for the 20 passengers). We had representation from just about every continent (just not Antarctica !), with divers & staff from countries including Brazil, Peru, Korea, Switzerland, Andora, Australia, Ireland, South Africa, Russia, Portugal, and of course us 2 Americans. Our cabin was reasonably nice, and it was certainly plenty enough for the 2 of us. Besides, I ended up sleeping 2 of the 4 nights on the top deck under the stars.

We were very lucky to have the virtually perfect weather & sea conditions. While this is considered to be high season and the best time of year to visit the Similan Islands, they had unusually rough weather for the previous 2 trips on this boat days before us -- high winds & rough seas, causing pitching & rolling and some uncomfortable people. The seas laid down just in time for our trip, and were never more than 1 foot seas -- very little rocking, and the visibility underwater was excellent. The skies opened up with lots of sunshine most of the time, and no storms whatsoever -- beautiful ! We were lucky, for sure.

We dove 4 times per day, starting with an early morning dive and continuing on until the early evening sunset dive (we also had one night dive). And everything in between was perfectly designed with snacks, meals, social time, etc. Lots of fun with our new friends. Our first dive in the Similan Islands came on January 5th at 7 AM, after motoring through the night to the remote dive sites. It was a great start to our diving, with a very nice site and many healthy reefs, fish life, & colors. Bobby was with his private divemaster, Marco, for all 4 days, as he was completing his Advanced Open Water certification during this trip. He unfortunately came up from his first dive with a lot of stomach pain, groaning immensely and getting himself to the bed. In addition to this trouble, we also had an unusually high amount of equipment failures, after lugging all of our diving gear half way around the world !
* Dive Computer battery goes dead (I just checked it right before leaving home)
* Weight pouch handle rips off
* New GoPro camera intermittently produces corrupt files for me
* Bobby accidentally loses one weight pouch on a dive
* Bobby's dive computer stops pairing with his transmitter
* My nice $600 Sola light torch goes dead on one of the dives

Despite all of these bumps in the road at the beginning, we had successful outcomes to almost all of these issues. First of all, Bobby's pain in his gut turned out to be, of course, GAS ! So, he came out to the gathering area with a big smile on his face (after all of the groaning earlier from the dive), and told me he let out a bunch of nice *****. Problem solved. When diving to 70 feet, there is a lot of changes that occur within the body when it comes to air compression and expansion, so it's always good to get it out ! My divemaster, Brian, got some medicine out for Bobby, a Gas-X sort of anti-flatulence liquid. And the flatulence continued through the trip, and Bobby was always, shall we say, open about letting them go in the middle of company -- some funny moments that our dive friends all had laughs about. Bobby justified his openly shared flatulence as the necessary "Nitrogen outgassing".

Marco was super helpful to help get my dive computer battery back in order & some other modifications to broken gear as best we could. Couldn't be happier with their level of service & eagerness to help.

My last dive this morning was a wreck dive near Khao Lak, and we had an interesting confrontation with a large grouper. Apparently Fredi took one too many pictures of the Goliath Grouper (he was 3 to 4 feet long and quite thick), or maybe the fish had enough of the paparazzi, as the fish came out of the rocks and started going after him. Brian & I were both laughing as we watched Fredi quickly backing up & swooshing him away as best he could, while flailing his arms & legs. But then the grouper turned to me and began to come after me. Part of me was thinking, "why me ?? After all, Fredi's the one who got you ticked off !" But, even as I backed up & ascended a good 10-15 feet, the fish was still coming after me. While it wasn't a shark or a Moray Eel, I wasn't interested in finding out if the goliath grouper had teeth to take a piece of flesh out, as I wasn't wearing a wetsuit. So, I kept kicking him with my fin, and he kept coming -- and I also had my steel pointer stick in hand ready to stab him if he wanted to get hostile with me ! So, needless to say, we made it past that funny & interesting moment. I subsequently researched the fish, and found that they do indeed have sharp teeth and are considered 2nd to sharks in terms of attacks or threats on divers !

It was the first liveaboard diving trip for both Bobby & I (all other dive trips were always land-based with day boats to the sites), and we truly loved our 4 day adventure. Lots of fun, and many new friends from around the world ! My divemaster, Brian, was a pleasure to be with and did a great job. And Marco was excellent with Bobby -- gave him very good instruction and was patient & encouraging with him. He got experience in deep dives (70 feet depth), currents, a wreck dive and navigation. Congratulations to Bobby for completing his Advanced Open Water Diver certification.

We're staying at a hotel right next to Phuket International Airport, as we have a 6:45 AM flight to Mandalay, Burma (via connection in Bangkok, where we'll switch out luggage in storage) tomorrow. We're excited to make our first visit to this country, and visit the MBOA Boy's Orphanage in Mandalay. We have a suitcase full of great material for the orphanage. We'll be on motorcycle for these 2 days, and won't have any internet access. So, if all goes to plan, we'll be back in Bangkok with an update on Saturday, January 11th. Wish us luck !