We arrived in Koh Tao mid morning after traveeling from Bkk since 6pm the previous day. Tghe boat to Koh Tao was choppy, some people were sea sick - the boat wasn't really that comfortable especially as io hadn't got much sleep on the bus over night. Loads of people on the boat were going scuba diving so we heard a lot of stories and advice from various people. From the port of Koh Tao we walked for about 2-3km north along the main beach which thereare loads of diving reorts, we stopped at quite a few, to try and compare them against each other. in the end we settled for Coral Grand dive resort - as it was the cheapest and seemed the most professional. We managed to get an open water scuba diver course, 5 nights accomodation, insurance etc for 9000 baht or 150 quid. Bonus was that the first night we stayed in an expensive bungalow as there was nowhere else for us to stay thatnight, so air con, a warm shower and a tv were very much appreciated! The next day we were moved to a 'divers' accomaodation room - verry basic but was gfine.

Koh Tao was awesome, really love the place. We went snorkelling on the first day over some coral, and played football on the beach with some of the staff at the resort and other tourists leading up tpo sunset - awesome! After sun set we got into a routine of going for a swimin the pool before going out, as our shower was blocked this was the closest to cleaning ourselves we could get! The folllowing day we met Jonas our dive instructor, from Denmark, the funny man and amazing diver and Claus the other member of the dive group! We all got on really well and had sucha good laugh the whole time we weere together pretty much!

Tghe first day we were in the swiming pool learning some basic techniques, then the following days we did open water dives, 4 in all! The visibility or vis was poor about 5-10m the whole time as its near full moon so the coral is going crazy at the moment! I had 1 panicky moment on my first dive as i mistaken thoufght you werent supposed to breathe in when ascending to the surface due to the bends, so i tried to breathe out for about 10m, then having to take a fews breaths on the way up, i thought i was going to be sent to a recompresiin unit! but aslong as you maintain breathing and ascend at 18m or less a minute you are safe from the bends. I was then the subject of quite a few jokes for the rwest of the course!

On the last day a videographer filmed our last 2 dives, which we watched in the pub that night, its was absolutely hilarious as our instructor showed us some 'brilliant signals' basically rude signals which we found so funny, so much so we now use them in every day conversation. The video was really funny as it was footage of us on the boat aswell larking around, but there was a heftyprice tag on the dvd - 2500 baht or 40 pounds!!! ouch! so we had to leave it. On the last night it got a lift with 3 other people on one of the instructors scooter, over bumpy roads - was actually terrifying at the time, but it was only a 100m stretch, and i survived! They do it all the time here we've seen 5 & i think maybe even 6 ppl on a scooter at any 1 time (including children!)