






Follow Amber and Tim on their world traveling adventures. Country count: 32
Amber: Today has been the most relaxing day of our travels so far. We slept in, then had espresso and banana pancakes for breakfast. Concerned that we would do nothing if we didn't do something, Tim convinced me to leave the room in search of adventure on our orange motor scooter. Today we went East where the road went from paved to steep and rutted heavily from the last rain. Having driven as far as we could on the bike, we left it on the side of the road and continued to the beach on foot. The beach was beautiful as was the hike through the palm forrest and flowers to get to it. Having gotten fairly sunburned yesterday we opted to wear shorts and tees, with no swimming wear. Big mistake at one in the afternoon after a long hike down a steep path! The ocean was so inviting, but we decided to stay dry and not dive in. The hike back up to the bike was grueling and hot. On the way up the winding path we came to an agreement that from here on out we will save the hiking for 7am when the sun has just risen and the temperatures are lower. With a nap at mid day, of course!
Content that we had accomplished an adventure for the day, Tim has put in ear plugs and is taking a nap. We plan on going to the same little place that had 1/2 off on pastsa for dinner tonight as on Mondays they have 1/2 off on pizzas!
Amber: We bought our first two bottles of aloe and after sun lotion after spending all day soaking in the 84'F clear sunny skys yesterday. I began my day reading Rolf Potts's "Marco Polo Didn't Go There" pool side while I waited for Tim to get up, then we went and had the best coffee I've had in Thailand while briefly catching up with my sister on the phone. As it was so hot out, even at 10am, Tim and I found a resturant with a fan and 50% off pastas on Sundays! It was a coincedence about the coffee, but after drinking 7/11's coffee, this was an amazing espresso! We decided that the best way to cool down was to drive around on our motor scooter, hoping that 30mph would create a bit of a breeze while we toured the island. We found a beautiful overlook, but the road was so steep that the motor scooter didn't have enough guts to drive up the incline with both Tim and I on it, so I ended up huffing and puffing up the hill to enjoy our first view point. I have got to learn how to drive a motor scooter so Tim can hike and I can drive!!! We decided to go up even further, and ditched the moter scooter. The incline was the steepest road or even trail Tim and I have ever seen, it was like doing Flat Top but with no switch backs, in flip flops and blazing sun! We finished our climb by going through the jungle up a rickety wooden latter and ending on a huge granet rock face that was too steep to continue on in sweaty flip flops. The view was amazing and a good vantage point to see our dive sights.
We were supposed to meet up with Ricko, Justin, Joe, and Fai and go to Shark Bay, literally in search of sharks to swim with, at two, but got a text from everyone but Joe saying they were a little under the weather, so wouldn't be venturing out into shark infested waters. At this point, we were hiding from the sun in our room and had discovered pixar movies playing on the tv! I would have happily nestled in and finished Indespicable Me but Joe called and still wanted to go snorkeling, so we ventred back out into the sun, 15spf liberally applied.
Shark Bay is beautiful in itself, but the fact that we were going to go find some sharks and go swim with them was so cool! We rented some fins, snorkels and a mask and hiked down to the ocean. Finding a nice little beach to stoe our belongings at we dove in. Initially the water was clowdy, but the fish were plentiful. Once we swam out away from the beach the visibility cleared up and we were able to follow huge balls of feeding fish. It was probably 15 minutes before Joe saw the first shark, Tim and I missed it but after swiming the lenght of the bay we were able to find two nice sized shark and swim behind them for a minute or so. They were about 3' long and fast! It was fun to swim with them, but it seemed to defy all logic for us to actually want to be swiming with them and intentionally follow them, not swim as fast as we could in the opposite direction!! In all we either saw six shark, or the same two, three times. Baracuda like this bay and we were able to spot several. They like to sit right at the surface and are fairly indifferent to one swiming right up to them. Most of the fish were fairly small in Shark Bay but a big parrot fish cruised by us just as we were thinking about going to go shore, we decided to follow it for a bit. It lead us to a sea turtle! Koh Tao means Turtle Island, but we havn't seen a turtle yet during our stay. This one was bigger than any we have seen before, and petty docile. We were able to swim with the turtle for about three minutes before he moved towards deeper water and we decided that two hours was enough time in the ocean for one day.
Tim: Went to a Mexican restaurant for dinner tonight. The food was ok. Both Amber and I think that they used mayonaise as a substitute for sour cream, so the taste was a little off from what we would expect from Mexican food. Many of the beach side restaurants have a movie showing on a large projector screen in the evenings. This evening the movie was Bridesmaids. We stayed until the movie was over, then went to a beach bar for a couple of beers. Tonight was New Year's Eve before the Chinese New Year, so there were a lot of Chinese people out celibrating with fireworks and chines laterns on the beach. Amber and I even set one off for good luck. Its 10:45 am, and Amber and I are still in the room after our excess sun exposure yesterday. Getting ready to explore the other side of the island on the motor bike after some breakfast.
Tim: This morning was our last day of the PADI Open Water Course. We went for two dives this morning starting at 8:00 am. As usual saw lots of fish: sting ray, morrey eel, porcupine fish, barracuda, pipe fish, grouper, etc... Went down to 18 meters. Both Amber and I are feeling really comfortable in the water now and I'm sure we will do many more dives before our trip is done.
Went out to Italian food last night with Rico, Justin, Joe, and our dive instructor Fai. The food was actually really good. Amber road on the motor scooter with Fai, The boys got separated temporarily and we parked our bikes and went into a restaurant called El Gringo. Something about the name didn't ring Italian to me. Amber and Fai still hadn't showed up when Rico and Justin had ordered a beer. Rico gave Fai a phone call to see where they were at only to find out that were were in the wrong restaurant. Farangos the Italian restaurant was the next restaurant down, not the Mexican place we were sitting in. The beer drinking by Rico and Justin for most of the day may have lead to the mix up.
After a nice dinner of Lasagne and Pizza, we all went back to where Amber and I are staying. There is a nice pool with chairs and tables around. We made some cocktails with Thai Whiskey (Sam Song) and played a card game (up and down the river). Overall a really enjoyable day!
Amber: Tim is walking up to where we had pizza last night to rent a moter scooter. Rico usually gets his from there and they are supposed to be the best value on the island; 150 baht a day. Being as we are done with the our open water diver certificate, tomorrow we are going to cruise around the island and see if we want to stay else where than at Ban's. Better price is always good, but our location is centeralized and clean.
Diving was really fun today - we practiced taking our maskes completely off under water and putting them back on. Surprisngly, I did better with the whole mask removal than the trial partial. We also did cesa, which is where you hypotheically run out of air and need to surface with out your buddys air supply. I was fairly certain that I would run out of air half way to the surface, freak out, and have to do the whole test over again. Nope! I passed first try, as did Tim. The fish here are amazing, or maybe it's just that we can actually get down to where they are swimming and haing out for a bit! There are so many different types, and they are everywhere, so it's hard to pick your favorite. The morey eel and the sting ray are pretty cool. The first dive today I got a bloody nose, but other than that, both of us did well. We are hooked, and considering doing our advaned dive certificate so we can be cool like Justin, Ricko and Joe and go to 30m and swim with the big kids (and fish)!
Tim got a professional hair cut after 6 months of cutting it on his own. For 200 baht - about $6 US! Gotta love how frugal the man is! For 200 baht, it definately looks like a real hair dresser cut it, not Tim, with a mirror and hand sheers!