I have been in Koh Tao for about 5 days now. Spent three nights in Bangkok, didn't get up to too much apart from seeing some temples.

I had heard some stories about travellers being drugged and robbed while on the bus from Bangkok to the islands in the south so I decided to take the train. It took about 18 hours to get there 12 of which were on the train, then I took a bus to some docks and boarded a boat to Koh Phangan. When I arrived I didn't have anywhere to stay and all the places I went to were booked out. I ended up finding a place which had one small room available for one night. I ended up meeting up with a friend I had met in Cambodia and she let me stay with her until some other places became avilable.

So Koh Phangan pretty much consisted of partying. The Full Moon Party was on while I was there. It was ok, met some Australian (Kiwi) guys and went out with them and the girls I was staying with. Rained most of the night but it wasn't heavy so we dealt with it. Also hired a motorbike for a day and explored some of the island.

Everyone started to leave a few days after the Full Moon Party so I decided to come to Koh Tao. This is what everyone else does as well so all the accomodation was booked when I got here also. I had heard that if you do your open water diving course the company will give you accomodation so I found a dive company that someone had recommended (It's called Big Blue) and started my diving course. Had a really good time, was in a group with some English girls and a girl from Peru. We had to do some theory and an exam along with learning the basic diving skills and practicing them while diving in some different dive sites around Koh Tao. So by the end of the course I was certified to dive to 18 metres with a buddy. There was another group that some of the people in my group were friends with and some of us decided to do the advanced diving course as well. By doing this you can dive to 30 metres and you also learn other skills such as navigation, night diving, and how to use a dive computer. All up I did 9 dives, over 5 days. Saw heaps of fish and coral and when I did the night dive we saw barracuda, stingrays and a sea snake.

So now I have finished diving, might do some more when I am in Phuket, depending on the conditions. I have 5 more days here (might go to Koh Samui for a couple of days) before I am heading to Phuket to meet up with Mum and Dad for the last two weeks of my trip. Not much to do but I think I might hire a motorbike and explore the island, maybe get a kayak and check out some of the remote beaches, work on my tan and drink some beer. Tough decisions ;)