14th November 2009 - 19th November 2009:

We headed to Koh Tao with the sole purpose of learning to scuba dive, however little did we know that it was also a very beautiful island. We decided to wait until we arrived on the island to pick a dive school for a number of reasons - mainly because there were so many to choose from and also that despite hours of research on the internet (where we read horror stories of dive boats reversing and almost killing their students) we didn't have a favourite!!

However unbeknown to us November is monsoon season in Thailand so a number of the dive schools were closed when we arrived and meant our options were somewhat limited. We eventually signed up with one company but within a couple of hours we were not happy with the accommodation they offered us (no free wi-fi or air-con - basic requirements for flashpackers, ha, ha!!) but decided to give it a night and see how we felt in the morning.

Well if we could have checked out at midnight we would have as we hardly got a wink of sleep given the fact that it must have been about ninety degrees in the room and all we had to cool us down was this stupid ceiling fan - pretty standard you would say for any non air-con Thailand accommodation. However what isn't standard for Thailand accommodation is ceilings that are almost double height and meaning that the fan is useless. We got less breeze than we would have from one of those battery powered hand fans or just blowing on each other - trust us we tried everything. As a result Liza spent the night lying under a wet towel whilst Sean resorted to sleeping on the ceramic tiled floor to try and cool himself down!!

The morning after the night from hell we quickly checked out and were back to square one - in Koh Tao with no dive school and nowhere to sleep. We subsequently spent most of the day in sweltering heat traipsing up and down the island and, Murphy's Law, after talking with almost ten different schools we ended up going with the first school we visited - Simple Life. Good name - exactly what we are living at the moment!!

We spent the rest of that day chilling out by their swimming pool, well that was until Sean had the bright idea of swimming underwater - with his eyes closed to stop his contact lenses from falling out (not recommended!!) - and swam straight into the pool wall, resulting in a big bruised nose. Liza, quick into action and without the benefit of the usual bag of frozen peas used her initiative and grabbed two drink cans from the mini-bar to sooth Seanie's face before he had time to cry like a big baby!!!

Seeing as one of Liza's biggest fears is the ocean and she has this unusual theory that the sea is an actual person with a personality - I know, CRAZY! - she was understandably apprehensive to try Scuba. However after speaking with the instructors she agreed to try a Discovery Scuba Dive, which is basically a taster lesson to see if you are comfortable with breathing and doing some of the skills required to Scuba such as removing/replacing your mask and using the air regulator under the water. Alas Liza spent more time putting on the gear than she did in the actual water as she kept panicking every time she went under and felt as though she wasn't going to be able to breathe.

Following Liza's experience in the water she felt the need to tell Sean in great detail - and with exaggerated hand actions to make it even more scary - about the "not being able to breathe" part. This in turn put the fear of God into him and not just because he had not even thought of being sensible and trying the Discovery Scuba to see if he could actually do it and instead had signed up for the non-refundable Open Water Course.

Nevertheless he did start the theory part of the course and whilst he was off studying in the classroom for two days Liza enjoyed the beautiful resort we had checked into and spent her days chilling out by the pool.

After passing the theory element it was time for Sean's first experience of under water breathing and so his group were taken to a confined swimming pool and taught all of the skills required in order to earn your PADI Scuba licence. Unfortunately given it was monsoon season they were hit with a massive rain storm which put Sean on edge. This combined with the words of Liza "its horrible, I couldn't breathe" going through his head and still hindered by his heavily bruised nose meant he struggled and had to come up out of the water a couple of times to catch his breath.

After this he decided that he probably wasn't going to go ahead with the actual ocean dives, mainly due to the fact it was easy to come up if you were in trouble from the bottom of a 5 foot swimming pool but not quite so easy from 60 feet down on the ocean bed where he was due to dive!!!

Poor Seanie spent most of the night wide awake going back and forth as to whether or not to go ahead with the dive but Liza finally convinced him to give it a go - pretty brave words for someone who didn't venture into the deep end of a swimming pool!!

After further reassurances the following morning from Luke, his diving instructor (and fellow Buckhurst Hill boy!!!) Sean geared up and jumped into the speed boat to take him out to the dive boat. Unfortunately given all the indecision we hadn't manage to complete the paperwork in time to allow Liza to come out on the boat so instead she sat on the shore crying goodbye - it was like a scene from a Hugh Grant movie - which didn't really help with Sean's nervousness. However she did manage between tears to give Luke such a "if he dies, you die" look that he knew that he had to take extra care of him.

Once out to the dive site Luke advised us that we had to pass two physical tests in the water before we would be allowed to dive. We jumped in and then told to swim twice around the boat which was around 200m in total. You never really do much actual swimming in the sea when you are at the beach and also further out the waves are so much more powerful and choppy, which meant it was surprisingly tougher than expected. After starting off second he faded badly in the home straight and was basically overtaken by everyone and trailed home last. Exhausted, we were all just about to get out when Luke told us we had to tread water for ten minutes, the second test. Despite a few close instances of drowning Sean survived and dragged himself out of the sea after the ten minutes had passed.

Before we had time to catch our breath we were told to put on our BCD (Buoyancy Control Device - basically a fancy life jacket that inflates/deflates and helps you stay level underwater) and attach this to an extremely heavy air tank. At this point Sean was feeling absolutely shattered and ready to pass out but thankfully it is almost weightless in the sea so we all jumped in ready for our first dive.

Our first dive was just a small taster and we all started to deflate our BCD's and began to slowly descend with the plan being to reach 20 feet and then start swimming around. Little science lesson - air pressure is compressed and means you need to release this pressure or "equalise" by either holding your nose and blowing, wiggling your jaw from side to side or both. Unfortunately Sean had forgot to equalise properly (not enough blowing and wiggling) and so had to come up almost straight away as the pain was quite bad.

At this point he was thinking that it might be a sign that he shouldn't go ahead but Luke came back up and just told him to try it again in his own time and thankfully he listened. After getting down to the bottom it was such an amazing and surreal feeling, you are literally transported into another world and you just swim around in awe looking at the amazing scenery and fish. The previous noise from the boat engines and crashing waves is replaced with this calm, tranquil and almost silent underwater world - all you can hear is the noise of yourself breathing in and out from the tank.

Whilst we were completing some skills at the bottom of the ocean bed on our second dive a water snake just swam between us, it was amazing and Luke had said that that was the first one they had seen this season. We finished off the remainder of the skills for that dive and spent the rest of our time swimming around trying to look for Nemo and some other cool fish before going back to the surface and climbing back on board the dive boat.

By the end of the second dive I was definitely over the majority of the nervousness and the feeling was now being replaced with excitement and wanting to go down again to see more….

Liza was expecting Sean and the rest of his group back at about 6pm but was so worried that she sat on the shore from 4.30pm waiting for Sean with a chocolate muffin as his welcome home present. When he arrived back he looked absolutely relieved and thrilled - although whether that was to see Liza or the chocolate muffin is open for debate :-)

The following day was much easier as we were both more relaxed and this time Liza went out on the boat and was able to watch Sean jumping in and then going under the water for his final two dives of the day and third and fourth in total.

The third dive was where we went down to 60 foot and it is rather scary thinking how far below the surface you are and that if anything goes wrong there is a hell of a long way between us and fresh air!!! However it all went well and surprisingly some of the skills that Sean originally struggled with in the pool, like removing the mask and clearing water, he was able to do without any problems.

The fourth dive was just finishing the remainder of the skills required in order to pass the course. This included navigation with a compass and although Sean did somehow make a slight wrong turn - how you do that when all you have to do is swim in a straight line, turn around and swim back, heavens knows but he did - he eventually managed to find his instructor Luke.

By the time they all emerged from the water they all let out a big cheer and celebrated becoming certified PADI Scuba Divers!!!

From a personal viewpoint I am now so glad that I went ahead with it (Luke and Liza, despite her initial attempt to out me off, I have to thank for pushing me) as it truly was the most amazing thing that I have ever done. It is hard to describe the feeling you have when you are 60 feet under the water and swimming amongst hundreds of thousands of fish but would recommend it to everyone. Its certainly something I will continue to do whenever possible and now am so looking forward to diving the Great Barrier Reef and hopefully seeing some turtles, dolphins, whales and sharks… well maybe not the latter, ha, ha!!!

Away from the diving Koh Tao was a really, really chilled out place and we spent most of our evenings sitting in beachside restaurants, watching movies and eating fabulous BBQ food.

We did foolishly venture away from the BBQ's one evening to try out a Mexican but despite advertising on their specials board burgers with chips when we went to order chips as a side dish they told us they didn't have any - go figure!! Even more scandalous they didn't have any flour tortillas (a rather important part of quite a few popular Mexican dishes) so meant we basically ended up ordering something completely different from what we originally wanted and made us wish we had just stuck with the BBQ.

Overall Koh Tao was a truly amazing island and one we certainly hope to come back to again in the future.