Nov 2006

So we headed south from Perth towards Margaret River, via the 'city' of Bunbury for a long weekend. We decided after much investigation that the easiest and cheapest way to get there would be by train. This was mainly due to the fact that the supposedly greatest surfing nation on earth has a tendency to make it either difficult or expensive to travel with a surfboard. I have to admit that as soon as we started to find out the charges for taking a surfboard on the train or bus I began to wish that I had waited until we reached Queensland to buy a board!

When we booked the ticket we were told that we were lucky and had got the last seats in the carriage that carried surfboards and bikes. Phew, what a relief. It was only when we got on the train that I realised what a joke that was; there were no other boards or bikes on the train and mine went in the overhead luggage carrier!

Anyway, we arrived in Bunbury and sought out the Wander Inn, our hostel for the next few nights, only to find that the reception was closed from 12 to 4pm, so we couldn't check in. Our room was OK, but the hostel seemed to have a number of more permanent residents who weren't travellers but sat around smoking and doing nothing all day.

That evening I volunteered to make dinner, Chicken Pilaf. This was the first time that either of us had cooked since we left (apart from the famous Thai cookery course) as it was so cheap to eat out in Sri Lanka and Thailand that it wasn't worth cooking for yourself, and none of the accommodation we stayed in had any cooking facilities.

I immediately hit upon a problem when I tried to find a pan to cook dinner in - there weren't any! I headed off to reception to ask where I could find one and was told by the owner that I would have to hand over my room key in exchange for a battered old saucepan. It was hardly something that I was going to steal! I was sorely tempted to tell him that it wasn't flippin' Le Creuset, but thought better of it as we were booked to stay there two more nights.

The next drama that we had didn't emerge until the next morning when Sarah went to check the washing drying on the line. Only not all of it was drying on the line. Someone had stolen three pairs of Sarah's knickers, which was a particular problem as she was only travelling with four pairs in the first place. What kind of weirdo would steal someone's pants?

This really summed up the Wander Inn, a bit rough, and Sarah spent the rest of our stay wondering who else in the living room was also wearing her pants, female or male?

The only good thing about Bunbury

On Sunday morning we decided to go down to the Dolphin Discovery Centre, where we discovered that the dolphins weren't coming out to play. We were hopeful that they might make an appearance the following day, as it was my birthday and our last day in Bunbury, but again a no show from Flipper. Don't they realise that we are on a very tight schedule?!

From Bunbury we took the bus down to Margaret River, where we were picked up to go to the Surfpoint Resort at Gnarabup. It was then that we learned that you really need a car to get around the Margaret River area and that the surf was flat!

We amused ourselves the following day by renting a scooter again and headed off into town to explore. It cost roughly twenty times more than our Thai racing machine, but this time we had helmets and they wanted to see a driving licence, which was reassuring.

Now where did I park my moped?

The next morning I retraced our steps north on the bus to pick up a hire car. It was a Kia Rio, the car of choice of people who don't like cars. It was actually an upgrade from the bottom of the range car we had ordered, because they didn't have any of them in stock, I dread to think how small that would have been. Good news, the board fitted in the car....there was room for Sarah on the roofrack. Once again we were mobile, so we headed straight to a farm in the middle of nowhere to live like hippies for five days. As you do.

Yes, we had decided that in a bid to save money, the planet and bring some moral justification for taking six months off work, we would spend some time WWOOFING. For those of you who don't know what that is, it has nothing to do with dogs, but actually stands for 'Willing Workers On Organic Farms'. Unfortunately it should have been WWSETLING, 'Weirdos in the Woods Searching for Extra Terrestrial Life', or something like that. Yes, I know it's not as catchy, but it's more accurate. Crop circles, you know the hoaxes that were exposed many years ago in Britain, well the news that they weren't created by aliens doesn't seem to have filtered down to South West Australia.

Sarah spent five days cleaning kitchen cupboards, one of her favourite household chores, and I spent five days building a fence that was twenty foot long and I could have built in five hours if I'd been doing it on my own! (It wasn't actually finished when I left.) Sarah also spent one day learning to sculpt...or was it learning to dust sculptures, she's still not sure. They were actually a very nice family and made us very welcome, but we are now no wiser as to the ways of organic farming than we were before we started. We did manage to fit in a few quick trips around Margaret River while we there, to Redgate Bay, a beautiful beach with white sand, completely deserted, Hamelin Bay, completely packed out with school leavers and flies, and also to Augusta and Cape Leeuwin, where the Indian and Southern Oceans meet. Very wild and windy.

It took me ages to do my hair this morning!

After we left the WWOOFERS we managed to fit in a day visiting a few wineries. Well it would have been rude not to! We sampled a few in various locations, but it was definitely Sarah who got the most out of it, as I was driving and had to spit most of them out. (It'll be Sarah's turn to drive when we visit New Zealand's wineries.)

Labour shortage in South West Australia leads winemakers to resort to desperate measures

We spent another night in Margaret River and met up with Sarah's friend Matt and his girlfriend George, who it turns out, I worked with when I was working for BT in Bristol, small world, as they say. (Good luck Matt and George - you should be somewhere on the Nullabour Plain by now on your way to Adelaide we think.)

The Margaret River area is renowned for three things, wine, surfing and caves. We had tried the first two so on our last morning we headed off to the Lake Cave to learn about stalagmites and stalagtites. It was actually very impressive, but one cave is more than enough for me, so we headed through the famous southern forests of karri trees to Pemberton. There wasn't much to see there, so two toasted sandwiches later we were headed for Walpole where we were booked in for the night at the YHA.

I decided to start a new paragraph to describe Walpole, but it doesn't really merit it. Sarah described it rather aptly by saying that it was like driving 100 miles to stay in Porthyrhyd for the night, but without the pubs. For those of you who don't know Porthyrhyd, let's just say that it's small and there is no reason to visit it.

The next day we headed straight for the Valley of the Giants and its Treetop Walk. This was very impressive as it was a 500m long walkway through the Tingle trees - 40m above the ground at it's highest point. It had a tendency to sway a little when you walked on it, which was mildly alarming at times.

Looking very pleased with ourselves

We then followed the advice of one of our WWOOFING hosts and headed to a spot called Conspicuous Cliffs. This involved an 8km drive along an unsealed road, think red dirt and ruts, which our hire car was neither designed nor insured for. It was worth it though, it was by far the best beach that we had seen so far on the trip and it was completely deserted. It was very windy, but we managed to eat our picnic on the beach, although our sandwiches were very sandy!

Comes complete with squeaky sand

We were very careful while walking along the beach as the night before we had been warned by a local to watch out for King waves. These are freak waves which occur in the Southern Ocean and have a tendency to take fishermen who are standing on the rocks by surprise and sweep them away. Phil, our friendly local advisor, didn't know why they are called King waves, but we have found out since that there is actually an apostrophe missing from the front of King. This is because it's actually an abbreviation of the last words uttered by a fisherman shortly before being swept to his death. The full version is "Oh no, look at the size of that ***king wave!". I'd like to apologise for my language, I have been in Australia quite a while now and I seem to be picking up the local accent...

That evening we did our usual trick of leaving it to the last minute to book somewhere to stay, but this time we fell on our feet. We arrived at the Cruize Inn in Albany to find the best hostel we've stayed in yet, it was very comfy and quite small and all the time we were there we saw no fights, swearing and the police weren't called out once (unlike in Bunbury, where they were called out twice). We celebrated by having fish and chips by Middleton Beach, which was lovely, but sadly there was no surf. Apparently it had been really good on Monday. Typical.

The next day we managed to fit in almost every tourist stop and sight in the area before heading off to town to get Sarah a book and me a new rucksack. We also found somewhere that did a lovely cup of tea, so that made us both very happy!

It was very cold and windy at the edge of Australia

After all too short a time in Albany we headed back up to Perth, dodging a plague of locusts on our way. Well, trying to anyway, but there were quite a few attached to the front of the hire car when we handed it back. Albany was really very lovely and we could have spent much longer than we did there. The climate was much more pleasant there than Perth and Kristin summed it up perfectly when she said that Albany was where they should have built Perth!

We headed back to David and Kristin's in Perth on Friday, which just gave us enough time to visit Lawrence, Sarah's grandfather's cousin, for a cup of tea.

I also managed to see Sebastian play cricket on Sunday morning. He's going to be playing at the Waca during lunch on the Friday of the third test, so keep an eye out.

Sunday morning we waved goodbye to our new found family. Hopefully we will see them all in Wales soon ...

Next stop Melbourne......

So, from Singapore our next destination was Oz - for three months and the bulk of our trip. Our first stop was Perth in Western Australia. We had a great flight, leaving at 9.30am, lasting only four and a half hours and best of all - no time difference to adjust to. It took us nearly as long as the flight to clear customs - Australia has very strict rules on what you can and can't bring in - there was a lovely little beagle sniffing all our luggage and we had some wooden things in our bags that had to be declared and checked over by the customs officers.

Eventually we got through to the Arrivals Hall where David, and his son Sebastian were waiting for us. We haven't worked out exactly what we are, whether it is first cousins removed or second, third, fourth cousins - who knows - but what we do know is that David's father Lawrence and my Grampa are first cousins. We got in touch before we left the UK and despite never having met us before, David had offered not only to collect us from the airport but to let us stay with him when we first arrived. We left the airport and drove to Mount Hawthorn, a suburb of Perth, where we met the rest of the family, Kristin and Stefan. It is a long time since I have had to introduce Gareth to family members and good on him, he behaved himself well.

In case you have forgotten what we look like, it's from the left: Me, Gareth, Sebastian, Kristin, David and Stefan.

Unusual for us you might think, but we made no plans at all for our time in Australia (except that we need to get to Dai and Di, wherever they might be, in time for Christmas dinner and mince pies) so next morning we decided to start by getting the bus into Perth for a look around. It didn't take long before we found City Beach surf shop and Gareth was the proud owner of a new Dale Chapman 6'5" surfboard. I managed to restrain myself in the face of bikinis, flip flops, and beach bags on a scale I've never seen before.

Surfboard mission accomplished, we left the shops and walked off in search of inspiration. It didn't take long to find Swan Bells, an impressive looking building that was one of Australia's Millennium projects and is one of the largest musical instruments in the world. Twelve of the bells came from St Martin in the Fields in London. I have never thought of bell-ringing as the most dynamic hobby but it was pretty amazing to see this petite white-haired lady, who didn't tell us her age but gave away she was at least in her seventies, ringing one of the heaviest bells (weighing 863kg - same weight as a Daihatsu Sirion apparently). While we were there we had the chance to chime some of (much) smaller bells ourselves (and we have a certificate to prove this!). The main difference between ringing and chiming bells is that when you ring a bell it starts and finishes in an upside-down position whereas when you chime it you start in a normal bell position and really just wiggle it from side to side - so it is a lot easier (as our bell-ringer lady was at great pains to tell us - I think she wmight have been a battle-axe teacher when she wasn't bell-ringing). I'm sure that Gareth and I could learn to ring the bells too but apparently it takes between three weeks and three months and we only had that afternoon to spare.

Afterwards we walked down to the Esplanade and as I sat marvelling at the number of jellyfish in the water (jellyfish in a river??) Gareth was marvelling at a sight of his own. Sitting behind us in a posh looking restaurant was ... wait for it .. Toady from Neighbours.

Yes, Gareth and I do come with an in-built celebrity radar...

To finish the day we walked over to the Western Australia Museum. I'm not normally a big museum fan but I had read in Bill Bryson's Down Under travel book that it had a fantastic collection of stuffed animals - well you all know how I love something cute and cuddly. Best of all, entrance was free! It is quite a cool collection, they had a tiger, an elephant, a koala, a platypus, a seal, a sealion plus loads more - and in the middle of it all a massive bison that was a bit scary. I don't like the way their eyes look at you... There was plenty more to see in the museum, including lots of beautiful butterflies, information on European settlement and an explanation of the Dreaming (how Aborigines explain how Australia was formed) and I know I should have paid more attention but after the stuffed animals, the only thing that got me going was the lifesize Tyrannosaurus Rex replica. I was looking forward to seeing Megamouth, a massive shark that was supposed to be on display in a giant preservative bath but we never managed to find it. It was a bit disappointing as I had already discussed it with Sebastian who had told me it was very cool. Never mind, plenty more sharks in preservative baths to see.

David and Kristin live just off Scarborough Beach Road so next morning it was a short bus ride to test out Gareth's new board. The waves were pretty small and I missed Gareth catching his first wave as I was too busy texting Dai and Di but I got his next one and I think you'll agree that I'm improving in the surf photography stakes.

Next stop was a haircut for both of us. Gareth's hair had been getting a bit crazy and it's nice to be able to see his face again. Somehow I went in with long hair and despite just asking for a trim I was scalped. Oh well, it takes less time to wash now.

With much lighter heads, we headed over to Fremantle, a small port town south of Perth with lots of nice coffee shops and fantastic ice-cream, yum. Sebastian had already told us about the Maritime Museum there so we went over to have a look - got in free since it was the second Tuesday of the month (I love a bargain). If you like boats it's quite impressive - they've got Australia II - the yacht that won Australia the Americas Cup and Parry Endeavour - the yacht that took lone yachtsman Jon Sanders three times around the globe. Gareth thinks he can't have many friends. The museum really is a bit of a giant boys toy and at one point I left Gareth behind in the mock-up submarine muttering 'Captain, I have the con' to go and watch a video about the Swan River.

The poor river has taken a bit of a battering over the years with parts of the bank blasted away to make it easier to navigate boats through. All of this has caused the river to change from freshwater to saltwater - with a significant effect on the original fish and plants - explaining the jellyfish I'd seen the day before. Outside the museum is the Thank You wall where the names of all the first European settlers to reach Western Australia are listed on gleaming tablets. I liked that but I still think Gareth's favourite bit was the submarine.....

Wednesday we got up early for train journey and a morning of education - at the Western Australia Aquarium, or AQWA. Sebastian had primed me for this so I knew what I was looking our for - sharks, rays and most importantly, the Danger Zone. This was going to give me all the information to let me safely get into Australian waters (I stayed firmly on the sand at Scarborough the day before - you need to be informed here before doing anything reckless like paddling).

Well I'm not sure whether it was a good idea to walk through the Danger Zone as it certainly confirmed one thing - there are a lot of nasty things in the sea out here - and they're not all sharks. As we walked through we passed tank after tank with nasties - I think this was the full list: sea snakes, lion fish, cone shells, blue-ringed octopus, and a stonefish plus big displays on sharks, box jellyfish and pufferfish. A lot of these little critters sit quietly in their tank looking harmless so they also play video footage so you can see them in action. The blue ringed octopus is titchy but can kill 10 people!

Luckily the Danger Zone didn't affect our appetites too much so after AQWA we got some fish and chips at a cafe overlooking the beach and then got the train back into Perth for a look around Kings Park.

One thing I haven't mentioned yet is Perth's fantastic public transport arrangements. Apart from the fact that buses and trains run on time, are clean and the staff are friendly (which would be a good start for us in the UK), within the centre of Perth there are three CAT bus lines, that take you from place to place for FREE! There are also other free buses that service other areas. Guess what, Perth doesn't seem to suffer very much from traffic jams and you don't see many cars in the centre. Isn't that a clever idea? I think we could learn a thing or two from other countries public transport services y'know.

So we got our free bus to Kings Park, which is four square kilometres of natural bushland in the city, and is beautiful. I could have spent hours there. Perth is a long way to go for a beautiful garden but if you're near here ever, visit it. You approach the park down a tree lined avenue - the trees here are nearly eighty years old and all have plaques to say who planted them. At the entrance you get a spectacular view of Perth and the Swan River. This is one we did on the timer - as you can see, the view is pretty fab.

The park is so big there was no way we could see that much of it in just a couple of hours but we did the Tree-top Walk (16 metres above the ground at its highest point) and came back through the Water Garden walk. We made another exciting discovery at Kings Park - in Australia you can get Cadbury's Picnic ice creams - yum again.

We'd already decided that on Friday we would head down south by train so we spent Thursday on Rottnest Island, which is about 20km off the coast from Fremantle. We took the ferry across, it took about 45 minutes and was much smoother than anything we'd been on in Thailand. There are hardly any motor vehicles on Rotto so we hired bikes and snorkelling kit and headed off to explore. It's a great place to cycle for someone like me, (who really can't cycle very well) because despite there being a few hills, they're quite gentle and you can normally work up enough speed coming down the hill below to fly up the next one. We didn't get very far though before we ran into trouble - Gareth's bike had a flat tyre.

Should have taken the bus.....

Gareth was about to cycle back to the settlement on my bike when a Ranger (wearing a polo shirt and driving a little jeep, not on horseback and wearing a poncho) came past and radioed the bike shop to send a replacement. Twenty minutes later, we were back on the road. We stopped at a beach called Little Salmon Bay, to do a bit of snorkelling, sunbathe and eat our picnic. Except that the 'picnic' was really just a giant bag of crisps and I'd eaten most of them waiting for the replacement bike. Snorkelling it was then.

The memory of the Danger Zone from AQWA was still raw in my mind so I was a bit nervous getting in the water but it looked so inviting - crystal clear - it reminded me of gin! In only knee-deep water, when you looked under with your mask there were fish a foot long and when you swam a little bit further out to the reef you started to see loads of colourful tropical fish and we saw a cute red octopus - I don't think he was venomous but as soon as he noticed us he wobbled off to hide in some rocks. After diving, snorkelling feels restrictive because you can't swim into the water but it was still very good. We spent the rest of the afternoon sunbathing before cycling back to the settlement, spotting a few quokkas along the way. Quokkas are small marsupials - like kangaroos and wallabies they carry their young in a pouch. They're normally quite shy - but on Rottnest they're tame and friendly and there are loads of them - although we only saw four between us - but they were four very cute ones. I would like to bring one home for Owen if I could but I can't see us getting through customs. Then it was the ferry back to Fremantle, the train to Perth station, and finally the bus to Mount Hawthorn.... public transport is great but it will be nice to get a car!

So, a busy first week in Oz and we have packed in quite a bit in Perth. Now we head south to Margaret River and beyond in search of surf for Gareth and wine for me. Bring it on!

So onwards to Singapore, a pretty straightforward journey from Bangkok, and a very comfy ride in a brand new Mercedes taxi to get to Lee Ann and Duncan's apartment, quite an improvement on the Tuk Tuks that we've become used to! We hadn't seen either of them for eight years, so we were really looking forward to catching up.

First things first, a cup of proper Tetley tea and we were ready to start exploring. Out we went to Club Street for a few drinks and then onto a great place, with the most strange selection of foods on their menu that I have ever seen. Duncan and I decided to go for the Roast Pork (a spot of local cuisine obviously) along with a pint of Guinness, it made a change from all the lager we had been drinking.

We really packed things in while we were in Singapore, on Thursday we explored Orchard Street and Sarah got a bargain dress for $27 (about eight pound) and then we went across to Sentosa island on the cable car. It was very, very high up there. We had a look around the island and saw the the most laughable musical fountain display. Not a great reward for getting absolutely soaked in very heavy rain!

We were going to have a quiet night in with a chilli crab takeaway that evening, but at the last minute Lee Ann got a call from her friend Jaymee saying that she had got us on the guest list for a Kelly Rowland gig (one of the other two from Destiny's Child) which was at a private function that night. Party on! The party was at the old British army barracks, which have been turned into a club. They had set up a small stage out the back and we sat in the VIP area, tucking into the free food and very weak Watermelon Martinis and being photographed by the paparazzi (no, seriously, keep an eye out for us in Hello, OK, Heat etc.) Kelly Rowland was very good, but was only on for about 15 minutes. If any of you don't believe us, here is the (slightly fuzzy) proof.

Afterwards we headed off to a karaoke bar, which has little booths that me, Sarah, Lee Ann, Duncan, Jaymee and our new friend Carl all crammed into. It was great fun, because you don't have to stand up on a stage in front of a whole club to do it, and they kept bringing more food and beer out all the time! The highight of the night was, without doubt, mine and Duncan's note perfect rendition of 'Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me'. Elton John and George Michael have nothing on us.

On Friday we went to see The Departed in the Gold Class seats in a new cinema. There are only about 25 seats in the theatre and they are all electric reclining seats that are so comfy it is like watching it at home in the living room, but better! You even get a snuggly blanket! It was also a very good film. Roll on Casino Royale in Oz!

We followed this by going to another VIP event, the opening of a new Esprit store in Vivo City, a massive shopping and entertainment complex. More red carpets, free drinks and nibbles, served by half-naked men (the top half). No wonder Lee Ann has stayed in Singapore so long.

The plan was then to go for a quick drink at Duncan's friend's party in a Turkish Bar, the Kasbah - but we ended up staying the whole night. More Stella. Well it was rude not to join in the celebrations.

After that Lee Ann and Duncan took us to Lau Pas At. This was a huge open air buffet, with loads of stalls selling a huge choice of food, including Chilli Stingray. I decided against it as I had recently travelled halfway around the world to go diving with stingrays and I thought it was a bit cheeky to then go and eat one. We ended up trying Rojak, a weird sweet and sour mix of every piece of food going, some delicious chicken wings and satay sticks, and mugs of very sweet tea, made with condensed milk that has been thrown around like a cocktail.

Saturday was our last chance to pack in everything that we hadn't done before, so obviously it rained.

We still managed to get loads done though, we saw some dragon boat racing while taking a cruise down the river, ate in Chinatown, bought an umbrella, and visited Raffles. As we had been eating and drinking almost non-stop for three days now, none of us was really in the mood for cocktails, even the famous Singapore Sling, (I know, you're surprised, Sarah turning down a cocktail).

In the afternoon we visited the Tea Chapter to sample some of the Oolong tea that the Queen drank while she in Singapore and to be taught how to make it properly. This process is quite long and complicated and to be honest I prefer Tetley in bags, but it was still good fun.

Next stop the Singapore Night Safari. The only time that day that the rain eased a little, which was helpful, but the wetness gave it more of a jungle feel anyway. We feasted on Bongo Burgers first, the Bongo is a type of African deer, and is almost certainly endangered, so my guess is that they weren't made of real Bongo, although I can't be sure. Maybe that's why they're endangered. Then followed the safari trails, which are very dark, but very well done, at one point we were about a foot from a Tiger on the other side of a pane of glass, it was massive and looked amazing (and maybe a bit hungry).

So we had a great time in Singapore and were very well looked after by Lee Ann and Duncan. We've agreed that we won't leave it eight years until the next time we catch up!

We've had more complaints about being slow updating the blog ... that's because we've been so busy learning to dive. More about that in a minute. Seeing as we have spent the week being 'buddies' to each other this blog entry is a joint effort.

We left Chiang Mai as planned on Sunday morning, flying with Bangkok Airlines to Koh Samui. At Chiang Mai airport there was a customer lounge offering free drinks, cakes and internet access so we made the most of that - our trip motto being 'Eat when you can, you don't know where the next meal is coming from'. The flight was uneventful although we had a slighty bumpy landing as it was a propeller plane rather than the Boeing 747s we've got used to over the last few weeks. Samui airport is very, very small - just a roof on stilts, the titchiest luggage belt EVER and a desk selling bus and ferry tickets. We hopped on a bus for Mae Nam, a little village a few miles up the coast. Mae Nam isn't really a tourist destination, I think most visitors are either avoiding the rest of Samui or using it as a base to get the ferry on to one of the other nearby islands, which is exactly what we planned to do.

All the accommodation in Mae Nam is on the beach, so with heavy rucksacks on our backs and under a red hot sun we trudged up and down the sand (and occasionally through the sea) looking for somewhere to stay. Along the way we found some extremely nasty huts and our first ladyboy, who had the longest, leanest legs in the shortest hotpants ever, but sadly couldn't hide his stubble and an extremely low voice. (During our stay in Mae Nam we heard that the ladyboys hang around ATMs at night trying to pick up Western men - I think it's the only time ever that Gareth has needed me to accompany him for protection).

Eventually we settled for a nice little mini-villa (Gareth thinks this is over-selling it) with a clean bathroom, bedcovers we could sleep under and a little verandah where we could sit and listen to the sea. Well we could have done if we didn't have to dodge all the mosquitoes. Our plan was to stay in Samui one night and then head off to Koh Tao but it was so nice to be back in a comfy bed after the concrete slab we had slept on (or not slept on)in Eagle House 2, that we decided to hang on another night and spend a lazy day on the beach instead. It's a hard life.

Tuesday morning we were up early to catch the 8am catamaran to Koh Tao. We don't normally suffer from seasickness but our 90 minute crossing was pretty choppy and they started handing out sick bags halfway through. Luckily neither of us needed one but we were really glad to get back on dry land.

Now the sole purpose for our visit to Koh Tao was Gareth's Big Diving Plan. This was the plan he'd been working on from the start of us planning this trip. Whereas Gareth is a proper water baby, I am most definitely not but Gareth's Big Diving Plan was for us both to get our Open Water Diving Certification.

I had already thought about the pros and cons of this crazy idea:

PROS
1) It might be fun (a bit like the train journey to Chiang Mai)
2) It would give me bonus points for being a good wife
3) Gareth would have a dive buddy
4) It would be a chance for me to feel the fear - and do it anyway

CONS
1) I hate water in my face, up my nose, in my mouth
2) I hate being out of my depth in water
3) I'm scared of what might be in the water e.g. sharks
4) I'm scared of being eaten by what is in the water e.g. sharks

I had put Gareth's Big Diving Plan to the back of my mind and decided I would cross that bridge when I got to it. Well now it seemed that it was time to cross that bridge, or rather that pier, as a smiling Thai chappie, wearing a bright yellow t-shirt saying 'Easy Divers' approached us as we stepped off the catamaran. Normally we do a Barry John style sidestep away from anyone trying to sign us up for anything but he had a nice smile and wasn't too pushy and as usual, we had nothing else organised. Easy Divers had all sorts of things to choose from, they did specialist courses, fun dives, night dives (...why anyone would consider getting in the water at night was nuts in our opinion but whatever floats your boat I suppose...). Minutes later we were signed up for the PADI Open Water course, starting that afternoon. So began five days of spending so much time on boats that we when we were back on land we never stopped swaying.

Our instructor Zigor was from the Basque region of Spain. (One night over a beer he confirmed something that I (Gareth) had long suspected. It's not just Welsh football supporters that think John Toshack is a useless manager, they think it in Spain as well!). By the end of of the four days he had persuaded us to go on and get our Advanced Certificate. This would only take two more days and five more dives, one of which was a dreaded night dive.....

Saturday morning we started the Advanced Course. One of the dives was a navigation dive where we had our first, totally silent, underwater domestic over the right direction to go in. (We were working from different information!- Gareth). We were then left by Zigor to explore the reef on our own for half an hour, then find our way back to the boat. Gareth - If I'm honest, I have to admit that this dive was the one I was most nervous about, which is probably a bit strange, because the following day we were supposed to be going diving with SHARKS. I have a greater fear of getting lost than of being eaten alive!

I never thought I would say this, but I was disappointed the following day when we didn't see any sharks. We were doing our deep water dive, down to 30m and were told that we were pretty much guaranteed to see sharks. Unfortunately the visibility at depth was very poor, which is a shame, because if you know you are surrounded by grey reef sharks, you might as well be able to see them. A few other divers saw a couple, but they were hiding from us. Maybe they were scared!

All that remained was for us to do a night dive. As we mentioned earlier nobody in their right mind would dive at night....would they!? Well here is the proof that we did!

There was a pretty scary moment for me when I couldn't keep up with the rest of the group (it's always the one at the back that gets taken isn't it). Gareth was ahead of me and his torchlight was getting weaker and weaker - eventually it completely disappeared and I was on my own, in the dark, 12 metres down. Or so I thought ... turned out I had been floating upwards and that was why I couldn't keep up with the lights. Luckily they found me and we carried on, with me and Gareth linking arms so I couldn't disappear again. We did the coolest thing at the bottom - we all switched off our torches and waved our hands around. It causes the plankton to phosphoresce and it looked like underwater fireworks. Magic!

Monday was our last day in Koh Tao and we decided to use it for a bit of exploring. We'd spent all our time in Mae Had but there were loads of other places around and the best way to do that is by moped. It's a bit scary how easy you can hire one - it costs less than three quid for a day's rental and they're not interested in seeing a driving licence - just your passport. Luckily 'Safe Hands Gareth' was in charge.

We'd had an idea to have a look at some of the viewpoints on the island but we quickly worked out that with two of us on board, the moped wasn't too good at hills. Instead we found ourselves at a beautiful beach called Shark Bay, with bright blue water and white sand. Tough day.

Tuesday it was time to head back to Bangkok - a 90 minute ferry to Chumporn and then an eight hour bus ride - so please don't think this trip is all sunbathing and beer! We headed back to Rambuttri Village Inn and got a last meal of Pad Thai and spring rolls on Khao San Road.

So our time in Thailand has come to an end and we've enjoyed it more than we expected. Koh Tao was definitely the best and we were both sorry to leave. The food is delicious, people are friendly and we avoided all the tuk-tuk scams.

Next stop Singapore!