Our trip from Kathmandu to a Thai island was quite the adventure! We arrived at the Kathmandu airport in the morning to find that a plane had run off the end of the runway and the airport was closed. A nice stranger told us they were trying to open in the next 3-4 hours, so we decided to wait around and see; as long as the plane took off by 2pm there was a chance we’d make our bus in Bangkok.
Eventually, the airport opened and we boarded the plane. We got excited as the airplane started taxiing right at 2pm. Our hopes were quickly dashed when a passenger decided he didn’t actually want to take the flight. Therefore we had to return to the terminal to drop him off, lost our departure slot, and were delayed until after 3pm. Once in Bangkok, we rushed through the airport to get a taxi because the bus terminal is on the other side of the city. Despite a car crash creating a lot of traffic, we arrived at the bus terminal only 15 minutes late. Amazingly, the bus was still there! We ran over and boarded just before it left! It was a 2 day delay if we’d missed it, so we were really relieved.
The overnight bus trip went from 9pm to ~4:30am, taking us to a pier in Southern Thailand. At about 7am, we boarded a catamaran ferry to make the 1.5 hr trip out to Koh Tao. It was just a bit after sunrise and we were exhausted, but it was amazing to go from the Himalayas to a tropical paradise so quickly!
Once we were on the island, one of the first things we did was walked into town to look into getting our PADI scuba diving certification. To our surprise, they were starting a course in a few hours. So we signed up, got our medical exams at a nearby clinic, and jumped in. Learning to dive was an absolute blast and we had a great experience. Unfortunately, no underwater dive pictures yet because it wasn’t allowed during the class, but here are some from the boat:
We decided to wait a few days before returning to do some fun dives using our new certification. In the meantime, we’re snorkeling and hiking around the island every day. It’s only 2 miles wide and 4 miles long, but the mountainous terrain make for slow going.
There are a bunch of cashew trees growing all over the island. Don’t know why the fruit and nut are separate, but they’re huge!
It’s almost monsoon season, so it rains every day. We either walk through it or get something awesome to eat while waiting it out.
We’ve gone to two different snorkeling places so far. It’s amazing to snorkel right off the beach, though the visibility isn’t great. Snorkeling visibility has been 4-5m max, while our scuba diving visibility further off the coast was well over 20m! Snorkeling, we’ve seen star fish, a tiny octopus, lots of parrot fish, a few trumpet fish, and of course tons of other colorful fish. Priscilla particularly enjoys the violet anemones while Andy enjoy making the colorful Christmas tree worms duck back into their burrows.
I love playing around in the water. Even just snorkeling and not diving, being in this much open water is a real treat.
Trumpet fish!
A very common scene of a school of fish “grazing”.
One of Priscilla’s favorites, anemone with anemone fish. Fun fact, our scuba instructor pointed out that Nemo’s name is hidden in the word “anemone”.
Highlights of Koh Tao so far:
- Scuba Diving! We’re having an amazing time and can’t wait to dive again soon
- Snorkeling. There’s a ton of different beaches we don’t have enough to see them all
- Thai food. We missed it
- Hiking up to viewpoints
Wow! That food looks delicious and the views on the island are amazing. I love the anemones with fish! and the giant clam! so cool!
Yes, I love the anemones! And there are so many clams, the giant ones and also ‘small giant clams’ in so many different colors! The pictures don’t do them justice.
I really like the underwater video, and see that you have returned to your favorite, mango sticky rice 🙂 I wonder if New Zealand’s food will live up to what you’ve found in Thailand, India, and Nepal.