Ok I realise that it has been at least a week since I last updated my site, and once again it has been another busy week so bear with me (sorry, I know this is fast becoming a cliche)

Starting with Chiang Mai I spent a little over a day in the end, doing sightseeing, which involved a few temples and exploring the very touristy night markets, adding photos to my site and I even found time to fit in a very painful 2.5 hour back wax, for which I wont bore you with!

Upon one of my evening strolls I was pleased to bump into one of my friends from my Chiang Mai Trek, who like me had finished the trek and gone away for a few days before heading back to Chiang Mai. As we were both heading in the same direction we decided to travel together and we managed to get a night bus to Bangkok on Thursday evenning. As you all know my first experience of Bangkok left me with a sour taste in my mouth, however I was pleased to say that my impresssion improved somewhat second time round. We both spend a couple of days, shopping in the state of the art MBK (bought a fab pair of diesel Jeans for 14 quid), seeing the main sights like the Grand Palace, which was spectacular, and the reclining buddha, which was equally impressive, and we spent the one night we had there doing a bar crawl down the infamous Koh San Road (had to be done!). All in all we both enjoyed ourselves and we didn't once get approached once by any pesky Tuk Tuk drivers!

On Saturday we boarded a second night bus followed by a early morning ferry to the island of Koh Tao, which is on the gulf coast of Thailand. The island is beautiful and a renowned place for doing a very cheap PADI diving course. I inititally came with the intention of not diving here as I had already promised my cousin I would dive with him in Cairns, however, the temptation was too hard to resist and I found myself starting my 4 day course later that afternoon (sorry Steve). Both myself and Ayla were knackered following our exhausting journey from Bangkok, however luckily the first afternoon was pretty relaxed, as we started off watching some videos and discussing the main theory involved with diving.

On day 2 of the course, we were able to start putting the theory which we had already learned into practise with our confined water dive, this basically meant we learnt to assemble our gear and the main skills involved in a swimming pool. This was all fine except there was one skill which involved filling up our masks and emptying it by exhaling through our nose, well I can definately say I am a person who is used to breathing in and out through my mouth, so when it came to my turn, I tried and tried to breath out through my nose and my brain just could not comprehend exhaling through my nose, much to my instructors amusement. Oh well I picked it up in the end. The afternoon was spent doing our written exam, for which everyone passed successfully, although in my case I only managed 41 out of 50 when the pass rate was 38! Still a pass is a pass, right?

Day 3 was the day that everyone was looking forward to, as we were able to put the skills we had now learnt from the previous day into a real life open water situation with 2 dives of 12m! It was such an amazing feeling to be able to breathe under water and quite litterally swim with the fishes and around the stunning coral. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, despite a few people, myself included who had problems with our ears on the descent! Although, I guess this comes with practise, I certainly wasn't complaining though as I was in awe with the experience.

Which leaves me onto today our fourth and final day, in order to succesfully pass the course we had another 2 dives out into the ocean at a lower depth this time 18m and we had to demonstrate a series of skills, including simulating out of air scenarios, clearing our masks (my personal favourite, not!), dropping and retrieving our breathing piece (obviosuly not the technical name for it, but I have already forgotten), and finally maintaining bouyancy which basically means trying to find the perfect balance with your breathing so you neither float or sink! Well, we all passed with flying colours, and we were all so gutted to have finished the course. What it means now of course I am now officially a certified diver and can litterally dive anyway in the world up to 18m! I am sure I wont have any trouble here, and I am already lining up my next dive in Phi Phi and Australia as well as future trips after this one!

So, what now you might ask! Well, tonight we are all going for a celebratory piss up to celebrate passing the course etc, I am quite excited about this as I definately feel that I have earned a decent night out! After this, tommorrow I will be getting another night ferry and bus combo to Krabi which is on the other coast. As I have had a very hectic few weeks I am looking forward to spending a couple of weeks chilling out and sunbathing and recharging my batteries! Hopefully I will fit in at least one dive at somepoint.

Anyway, it is now beer o'clock and I am already dreaming of my first bottle of Singha Beer, I hope everyone reading this is ok!

Take Care

Jon