Koh Tao, our home for Christmas and New Year, which means we're here for 2 weeks, so a pretty long blog entry I'm afraid!

By now, we're completely travelled out, having covered off Northern and an island in Southern Thailand, Laos and even Burma in the last couple of weeks all over land/sea, so we're looking forward to just settling down and actually unpacking our backpacks for a while. We arrive at Buddha View, our dive school (which was recommended by Carrie's cousin Alex) and check into our luxury room, which it was, TV, flushing western toilet, even a balcony over the swimming pool - the works!

As it's Christmas I decided to get my hair done for the festivities, well, it's been over 3 months since I have visited a hairdresser. A little bit of advice for anyone travelling to Asia, it's probably not the best idea to get your hair highlighted in a country where everyone's hair is black... when I returned from the salon, I had to check if Carrie was wearing her sunglasses before I entered the room as my hair was slightly on the illuminous side! But the hairdresser did give me a lift home on the back of her motorbike which is service you don't normally receive back home! That evening we met up with Kate from Laos and began the routine that we would follow for the next 14 days - BBQ in the Buddha bar followed by a few beers. The resort is looking over Buddha rock, which is a rock that looks just like a Buddha looking out to sea and the stars at night literally start from the horizon - a perfect setting.

In Koh Tao it seems that there is one major party each night which are located in different areas of the island. Luckily for us the party was just along the beach along a rather small and poorly lit concrete jetty. But we got there and there were the usual fire dancers so we sat on the beach and partied on until the next morning.

During all the chat, I explained how nervous I was about diving etc, but everyone was so nice and Phil from South Afrifca had taken out his underwater camera and showed me what was awaiting me under the sea. Unfortunately he later lost his camera with all his photo's which was a shame, but gave him an excuse to do it all again.

We were only awake for half of Christmas Eve, but the most amazing thing happened that night. We knew that the big party on the island was happening at our resort, what we didn't know was that 'Job To Do' the Thai version of Bob Marley who sing our travelling song of SE Asia - known only to us as the 'Doo doo doo da da da' song - were playing at our resort! It was brilliant. We were there in our Santa hats singing away, great fun.

Christmas Day we head to the beach with a bunch of people we met the previous night for a bit of snorkelling. An Austrian guy called Andy agreed to teach me how it was all done and after I got the hang of it, he and Carrie headed out to sea while I stayed and practiced in the shallow. Luckily I got back to shore just in time to witness the Daniel Craig moment of Andy coming out of the sea. No tiny blue speedos, but good all the same. Unfortunately Carrie missed the histeria caused by all the girls as she was walking out with him, but she has re lived it a number of times and luckily Kate was on hand to take a photo!

Later we went to a restauruant for a traditional Xmas dinner, but Carrie and I both agreed that it certainly was no where near the standards of back home. Even though we are having the time of our lives, there is no place like Xmas at home and were surely feeling rather homesick that day.

The next few days were just consumed by diving. We met our diving instructor, Perry and the rest of our group - Michelle from Birmingham and a couple of Dutch girls. After a bit of classroom action (we even had homework!) we got into the pool for a practice in all our gear. Had it not been for Gary, the American Dive Master who was there to help but actually all he did was hinder, I would of been fine. We later found out that Gary used to be a Chippendale, which figures. (Later, Carrie even came out with the classic "if he wasnt checking out his reflection in the coral, he might actually be able to help us!") But we all got the hang of it pretty quickly, even me! So all that mattered now was actually being able to dive in the sea.

Over the next next 2 days we completed our Open Water Beginners course, 5 dives in all, 1st off was a practice down to 6 metres, then we just covered off the general skills such as taking off our masks, taking out our regulators (the bit we breathe from!), removing our BCDs (the jackets that keep us afloat) and simulating the various 'out of air emergencies'. As Carrie and I were buddies, we were pretty good at this and I think secretly we were Perry's favourites! (sorry Michelle, but if your buddies hadn't kept losing you, you may have been up there with us! ;)

Carrie and Michelle were desperate to continue, so that night went on the night dive to start their Advanced course. I hear visibility wasn't that great, but they did see a Great Barracuda (1.5m) eat a Rabbit fish! Apparently Carrie was having trouble with her mask as it kept filling with water, however Perry told her this wasnt anything to do with the mask, if she could just stop smiling, the water wouldnt come in so much...

So that brings us on to New Years Eve for the NYE party on Koh Phangan - a bigger version of the Full Moon Party. We decided to not check into a hotel that night as apparently no one goes to bed before 8am and the ferry back to Koh Tao left at 9. The 2 dutch dirls, Michelle and us went together and the ferry over there was rather scary - we were upstairs in the open air and I ended up wearing the life jacket. At first it was to protect me from the torrential rain that decided to unleash as soon as we set off (so glad I hadn't straightened my hair..), until the boat started listing rather heavily. It's funny looking back but at the time I really didn't think I would see in 2009. Steve was staying on Phangan and the plan was to meet up at the party, so we were very touched that he turned up at the pier to welcome our arrival - thanks Steve! Unfortunately we then lost him while we tried to find the meeting point, but we miraculously found him later just before midnight, although at this point we looked slightly different as were covered in illuminous paint, in our 'tribe' colours. It was a very fun night, with lots of random people (Rabbit man and 'quite' attractive man get a special feature for Michelle's reading pleasure!)

Next morning the ferry was delayed, so we sat around looking rather ridiculous displaying our various body artwork. The ferry wasnt much better on the way back.. We were sat downstairs in the dry, but that meant that we were actually disappearing under the water when we listed. (Mental note: Take valium next time.) Of course, we didn't sink, so we boarded our free taxi back to Buddha View. The taxi's over here though are open top benches on pick up trucks, so of course it chucked it down. None of us were particularly happy, and that obviously read on our faces, as when we arrived, one of the instructors grimaced and said simply: "I'll get your key"... Needless to say, we slept most of the 1st Jan!

Stupidly Carrie and Michelle decided to continue with their Advanced course on the 2nd. I had the much more sensible idea of a lie in! Next day though I started my Advanced course and we met Ben from England who is living in China to learn Chinese - brave man! Carrie and I buddied up again and the Videographer joined us. 1st off was the Deep dive (30m) which was scheduled to be at Chumpon where all the sharks are... I was pretty nervous, but luckily thanks to the weather it was too rough to dive there so we went somewhere else where there are no sharks - phew! When you dive to 30m you can suffer from Narocis where you basically act drunk underwater. Luckily for us we were able to pass the test (we are pretty good at acting sober under the influence now!) Next we had our Navigation course which came up brilliantly on camera, Carrie and I spending ages deciding where to go underwater, then surfacing miles away from where we were supposed to! But hey, we were trying to find Nemo and ran out of air - what were we meant to do??!

Carrie and Michelle passed their advanced that day - well done ladies! I still had 3 more dives to do - so I buddied up with Ben the next day and we took out the under water camera which was fun. Later that day, Carrie and I took advantage of our free fun dives and it was well, fun! No tasks, no skills, just diving! We had Chris as our instructor and he was hilarious. Visibility was also improving so we had a pretty good dive - we even saw a sea snake which are 5 times deadlier than a cobra, but they can only bite the thinnest of skin so as long as you keep your fingers close covering your earlobes, all is good.

All I had left was the night dive. Fortunately Ben was as nervous as me, so we were bricking it together. But actually it was my favourite dive! More adrenalin as you just swim along slowly until you see a Great Barracua then you follow it at full pelt and shine your torch on a poor Rabbit fish (the Barracudas have learnt to feed off the torches of the divers). I'm normally against this sort of thing, but down there, I was actually wanting to witness the thrill of the chase. It wasn't hungry so I think I'm glad I didn't see it after all. I did see a great big Grouper or Trigger fish sleeping in the rocks (Did you know fish slept?!) Very sweet - he was so colourful and fast asleep and about 2m! - AMAZING!)

So after all that, I passed my advanced too, so Carrie and I are re-budgeting our trip as we now need to dive everywhere we go..!

Its time to leave (kicking and screaming, wanting to give up our travels and stay to become instructors!) but we cant leave when our visa tells us to, unless we get the boat which took us to Phangan. Having already proimised myself I will NEVER get on that boat again, we agree to over stay our visa by a day (which costs 10 GBP) and take the Catamaran to Chumpon.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!

Sharon x