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Back to Koh Bida again. The weather was getting pretty rough and it was getting very difficult diving. The problem is getting back on the boat safely when the dive platform is going up and down and people are trying to climb a ladder with their fins off. So we wound up just doing a couple dives and then going back to Phuket.
Covid is still devastating this tourist island. It has been slower such as when I visited last year but it’s still not doing well at all
enjoy these photos taken on my trip two months ago
The boat started moving and I am wide awake now at 5:30 going for coffee upstairs, dictating my first remembrances on a moving boat with the wind coming at me and hoping I’ll be able to correct all mistaken dictations, completely contorted by the noise of the engine and the wind. It feels so good to get up early as I always did when I had customers on board. Being the first one up I’m able to greet people individually in the galley as they come up the stairs.
It is such a good feeling to be up and ready and waiting for a job I don’t have to do. This is really the first time I’ve been a customer on a dive boat. Comfortable but now i realize there is something about having worked on a boat that never leaves you, the need to always be looking out for something or someone or some situation.
The dives were good, they say, but getting back on the boat today was challenging. Everyone is fine though a few close calls.
The wind is getting stronger so the waves will make boarding the boat more problematic. So the captain just told me the plan is to back to closer islands that provide better shelter around Phi Phi islands. This is a difficult time of year to be diving in the Andaman sea since the monsoon winds are already strong. Strong winds equals big waves.
I woke up at six as usual, went upstairs for cups of coffee and then decided to go for a swim. It was still not very light since Maya bay is on the opposite side of the sunrise. I was thinking about going close to the sailboat attend decided since it was quite late and I didn’t see any people up on deck it was probably not a good idea since they might sink I was attempting to orthopod and steal something. You never know.
The first time was at Koh Bida Nok. The waves were not too high so this should be a fairly easy return to the boat.
The wind is getting stronger, should be up to 25 knots later and up to 30 tomorrow with rain.
The second dive is at Koh Bida Nai.
you already know I am living in paradise compared to many other places I could be during this pandemic. But now you know I have some Italian friends who are excellent cooks. Giuseppe is a baker so he made pizza with a very nice but unusual crust as a starter. So, basically, eat your hearts out.
Koh Haa is our first stop to drive around those small islands. I am not diving since I still have this very painful hole in my mouth from the extracted tooth operation. They didn’t do the famous cave dive, just the coral reef areas. I haven’t been on this boat for 22 years, having worked on her for eight years with customers from all over the world.
I noticed I have my old habits of picking up garbage whenever I see it and rearranging things so they look a little bit better and wanting to carry some things or just generally check things out. I think this is now solidly in my DNA so it’s probably impossible to become just a true lazy customer on a drive trip.
The food is very good as always, some rice porridge and some cooked vegetables with small amounts of meat and some spices on the side. I find myself in the habit of drinking a lot of coffee. I normally don’t do this but it used to be a habit since I needed to stay alert watching the customers and checking for safety all the time. So it’s gonna be hard to take a nap during the day. Well, i tried a nap and got in a few winks.
At 5 PM after the last day dive we stopped at a very calm place so I just went for a swim with fins and tried a few skin diving tricks to try and get my breathing partially back to where used to be so I could go down and see some 5 meter corals and sea life.
The Thai customers are very quiet and considerate. I was expecting they might start Karaoke but they didn’t. I think they just preferred some quiet and joyful talk. They’re from the same dive club, brought their own instructor to be divemaster l. I would have chatted more with them but I have my own issues with the painful hole in my, able to eat only on one side very slowly. I didn’t want to bother them with my affliction.
In the evening I just took some extra strength paracetamol and watched a few television episodes I saved on my iPhone, finally going to sleep at 8 PM.
OK, so it’s time to get off the plane in Phuket and prepare for the journey, a live aboard dive trip south of Phuket along the coast islands of the Andaman sea
For hotel in Patong, before you depart, you can book at their hotel Andaman House. their dive shop and swimming pool are there as well.
I should note here that the lower deck is more comfortable than the upper deck cabins since the boat rolling sensation is much less on the lower deck. So the crew sleeps on the upper deck. OK, so now we depart. Talk to you later.
my options were to buy something online as a cushion for my motorcycle seat or I could have made something by myself or I could have gone to the city and found someone to make something for me. I decided to make my own.
After taking out some filling duct tape works just fine to seal it up.
Now for the dogs!
When I was growing up I would often go to the city (San Francisco). Sometimes I will go to fisherman’s wharf area and there was a place where the old Italian men were playing bocce. I didn’t know anything about the game but I was intrigued. Now I’m in Thailand and because of a good friend I am able to play the game several times a week and learn some Italian as well. At the end of this blog you can see a video, explaining how the games played and showing some very good and some very poor players. It’s all in good fun.
Adding to the video below, each person gets 3 bocce balls so the maximum score on each toss is 3 (the closest to the red target ball).