Thailand
Bangkok, Krabi and Koh Samui

by Richard Scarsbrook.

Background
Thailand The Kingdom of Thailand is roughly the same size as Spain. Its population is about 60 million. It lies wholly within the tropics from about 20º N to 5º N, 100º E. Most of the available diving lies around the central part of the peninsula which extends SW of Bangkok for 500 miles towards Malaysia and Singapore, flanked by the Andaman Sea on the west and the Gulf of Thailand on the east.

My wife Jen and I visited Thailand in February 2004, as part of a longer trip including Borneo and Nepal. We spent 6 days on the island of Koh Samui off the east coast, 4 days at Ao Nang, Krabi, on the west coast, and 4 days in Bangkok.

Our visit was during the dry season, which runs from about November to May. The temperature was in the high 20s every day; it was fairly humid; and there was no rain. Most days there was hazy sunshine, and occasionally clear blue skies – even in haze the sun was fierce and sunscreen/covering up were essential. The wind was light or non-existent at Krabi and the sea was calm. Around Koh Samui it was calm in the mornings, but in the afternoons a 15-20 knot wind from the E or SE got up, making the sea choppy offshore.

English is widely spoken in the tourist areas, but if you venture even a little from the well-trodden path you are likely to encounter some communication problems. One issue is how to pronounce words – the name of your hotel for example – so that they can be understood. Thai is a tonal language, and the same syllable can have several different meanings depending on the pitch at which it is pronounced. For example 'mai' can mean 'new', 'wood', 'burn', or 'not' depending on the tone (high, low, middle, up or down) used to speak it. It's a good idea to get a card from your hotel that shows the address in Thai script so that you can be sure that taxi drivers will know where to take you. The Lonely Planet Thai Phrasebook is excellent because it shows the Thai script against each entry, so if you are having trouble you can always point to what you are trying to say. It's also conveniently compact.

Money
The currency is the Baht. The exchange rate was about 70 to the pound when we were there. The Baht is linked to the US dollar, which was then a weak 1.90 to the pound, making Thailand a cheap place to visit. We had no trouble finding ATMs to obtain cash. Credit cards are widely accepted, but we found that some places charge fees of up to 3% for using one.

Booking and Travel
The overall trip of which Thailand was a part lasted just over 6 weeks and involved 19 flights. Some of these were internal flights booked separately either direct, or purchased as part of a mini-package, but that still leaves about a dozen international and connecting flights. At the outset we had a long list of places in Asia that we'd like to visit, an approximate duration and time of year, an approximate upper limit on the amount we were ready to spend on flights, and a recognition that there was neither the time nor budget to visit all the places on our list on this trip. The flight booking systems available to the general public on the internet are not adequate for arranging something as complex as this. If you want to go point to point on a specific date, they're great. If you want to find out which airlines fly where and on which days, they are at best tedious. If you want to explore the cost and feasibility of visiting a flexible list of destinations one after another over a loosely defined period of time they are completely impossible.

The solution is to sit down with a good travel agent who has access to the airlines' private booking systems, and who can offer good prices on the airfares. For this trip I spent 2 hours in Trailfinders Manchester office, and I was very impressed with the service I got. I will have no hesitation in using them to help plan our next complex trip.

We entered and left Thailand by air, via Bangkok - not a bad airport, as they go, and due to be replaced by a brand new one in 2005. The flight from the UK is over 10 hours, and the time change is +7 hours on UTC, so you will be tired and jet-lagged on arrival and should allow for that in your plans for the next couple of days. You can hire basic rooms by the hour at the airport, which beats trying to sleep on the floor or the seats in the departure lounge if you have a long wait for a connection. We got one on the way back from Borneo – Jen slept and I watched live Thai boxing on the TV.

You can get to the diving areas by road, rail or air. We flew from Bangkok to Koh Samui with Bangkok Airways, and back from Krabi with Thai International. The flights took an hour or so, they were reasonably cheap, there were no problems, and we'd do the same again.

We travelled from Koh Samui to Krabi by ferry and bus. I didn't organise this until we got to Koh Samui. It was easy to buy a ticket from one of the many agencies there. It was incredibly cheap – about £5 each. In fact we paid as much for the taxi from the hotel to the ferry terminal as we did for the rest of the journey. Our bus terminated at Surat Thani, and we had to change on to a different one. This was a surprise, but not a problem as the bus crew gave clear information and directions. The long-distance buses are air-conditioned, fast, and comfortable. The total journey takes about 6 hours. The landscape consists of gently rolling hills covered in forest and plantations, with isolated limestone outcrops. We caught another bus for the short ride from Krabi to Ao Nang.

February is high season in Thailand, and we were also on a tight schedule, so I booked all our accommodation from the UK. For Koh Samui and Krabi I booked online through Koh Samui Online Hotel Reservations , a brilliant website with a huge range of accommodation, excellent information, and a secure booking facility. For Bangkok I booked a night at an airport hotel through Expedia , and the remaining accommodation came with a stopover package I bought from Trailfinders.

Koh Samui
Koh Samui is the largest of a cluster of islands in the Gulf of Thailand, off the east coast of Surat Thani. It is roughly square and about 15 miles across, with forested hills in the centre. A couple of miles to the north lies Koh Phangan, and to the north of that, about 30 miles from Koh Samui, is Koh Tao, a small island only 4 miles long. About 15 miles to the west is a chain of small islands about 25 miles long running north-south, collectively known as the Ang Thong National Marine Park. All of the islands are surrounded by classic palm-fringed white sand beaches, or in a few places limestone or granite cliffs.

On Koh Samui, Chaweng Beach on the east coast is the biggest. It, and the streets behind it are busy and lively (or raucous, depending on your standards) by day and night, with many bars and nightclubs. Most of the dive operators have offices here. We stayed at the Zazen Boutique Hotel & Spa on the much quieter Bophut Beach at the north of the island. An air-conditioned deluxe bungalow on the beach, complete with DVD and TV, was about £55 per night for the two of us, including breakfast. The restaurant served very nice Thai and European food. The beach was attractive, but the sea, though calm and warm, was very murky and Jen was stung by a jellyfish. Bathing was unappealing (I think this holds true for the whole of the island) but fortunately the hotel has a pool.

We chose to dive with Captain Caveman's Dive Centre, selected on a recommendation from Dave Covey on the BSAC Travel Club website, and also because they gave satisfactory answers to my email enquiries. We were very happy with our choice. With hindsight, I doubt that it was necessary to book in advance, but it did no harm. We did three days diving, one at the National Marine Park and two around Koh Tao.

All the diving was from aluminium speedboats about 10m long, powered by large twin outboards. They have good shelter from the sun, and adequate stowage space for equipment and dry bags. The trips out to the dive site in the mornings took one to one and a half hours to cover the 25-35 miles, and were comfortable in smooth seas. The return trips took about half an hour longer and were rather bumpy into the wind and waves that had got up. There was plenty to drink on board, and an adequate sandwich lunch.

We thought the trips were well organised. Each day we were picked up promptly from our hotel and driven to the waiting boat a mile or so along the beach. You carry your own equipment out to the boat, which is anchored with its stern in knee-deep water. The crew consisted of a Thai skipper and his assistant, and several dive staff, not necessarily all from Captain Caveman since dive shops share boats when required, which makes economic sense. The passengers consisted of the clients, mainly beginners, of each dive guide/instructor and Jen and I who dive unguided. One of the dive staff would act as dive marshal, and gave a boat briefing before departure followed by a dive briefing on arrival.Laminated cards with diagrams of each site were available. The dive staff were friendly and enthusiastic, attentive to their clients, and respected our wish to do our own thing. We paid about £44ppd including gear rental.

For the first time ever, we used rented equipment. It was fine, though you can't beat the familiarity of your own kit and, missing the security of our pony cylinders, we stayed closer to each other than usual during the dives. Although we'd decided to rent in order to cut down on baggage, we did take a few lightweight extras – collapsible flag, compass, computers, DSMB plus small reel, fin retainers, and assorted cords clips ties and bungees.

* Hin Nippon - 20m. A small outlier of the National Marine Park group of islands, perhaps 100m in circumference. Visibility was a disappointing 3-4m, and the overall impression of colour was brown. There were various small to medium tropical fish, large barrel sponges, and many whip corals. It was better in the shallows around 5m where there was a small archway on the NW corner, with reasonable encrusting life.
* NW side of Ang Thong – 13m. A slightly better dive than Hin Nippon, with some shoaling fish and a small blue spotted ray. The National Marine Park is very pretty above water, and would be a good place for kayaking, but on the basis of these dives we couldn't recommend it to experienced divers.
* Hin Bai (Sail Rock) – 33m. An isolated rock north of Koh Phangan, which we dived twice. The architecture is quite impressive, with steep walls dropping from above the surface. There were attractive shoals of fish at the SW corner. There are a couple of outlying pinnacles, and an obvious small, rather barren, chimney it is possible to swim through. We swam round the whole island in a leisurely 30 minutes. There was a layer of murky water hovering above the seabed - above 20m the visibility was 15m or more, but below that it was 3m or less. In the afternoon it was busy, with 3 boats at the site.
* Chumphon Pinnacle – 32m. This is a very pleasant submerged reef about 10km NW of Koh Tao. The top of the reef is about 15m; it is no more than 100m long and perhaps 10m wide; and the sides fall steeply to the seabed at just over 30m. The visibility was 10-15m, and we saw barracuda, grouper, shoaling fish, and an unidentified shark in the distance. There is a permanent mooring on the reef, and when we were there several boats were attached to it in line astern. It would be at least inconvenient if divers failed to come back up the line, and needed picking up. A good dive.
* 'Twins' – 20m. This site is a series of small submerged rocky outcrops on a surrounding sandy seabed just south of two islets at the NW corner of Koh Tao. There were plenty of small fish, and an isolated clown fish guarding its nest that the dive guides seemed to think was something special – maybe we're cynics but it seemed a fairly pathetic specimen to us. There were half a dozen or so boats moored around this pleasant but unexciting spot. Above the surface Koh Tao looks a very pretty place.

There is plenty to do on Koh Samui apart from diving. During our short stay we:
* rented a motorcycle for a day (about £3). A good cheap and fun way to get around, but risky. Thailand's road fatality rate is about five times the UK's, and the fatality rate in Koh Samui is the highest in all Thailand. We saw two accidents while we were there.
* rented a jeep for a day (about £15) and drove round the island. We liked the SW corner, it was peaceful, and most of the people there were Thai. A delicious two course lunch and drinks at a small restaurant by the beach cost less than £3 each.
* walked up to the waterfalls at Na Muang. It's about a half hour walk uphill on a rocky forest path. You can bathe in the pools at the foot of the waterfalls. Lovely.
* visited the market at Nathon, full of colourful fruits and vegetables. We bought rambutan and papaya, both delicious.
* went to a Thai boxing evening at Chaweng stadium. A fascinating event, and some awesome bouts, not recommended for pacifists or the squeamish. A VIP ringside seat was £15.

Krabi
Just north of the large island of Phuket the mainland curves east and then runs south down towards Malaysia. This geography forms a large bay about 30 miles across its mouth and 60 miles from north to south. In the centre of the bay is a series of islands running roughly north-south, of which Koh Phi Phi and some small outliers to its south are the principal diving interest. Krabi is a region and town on the east (mainland) side of the bay. Ao Nang, where we stayed, is a tourist village a few miles west of Krabi town. The whole area is limestone, and there are many large vertical and overhanging cliffs on the mainland and on the islands. Some of the small islands are spectacular limestone spires, famous as the setting for Scaramanga's lair in the James Bond film 'Man with a Golden Gun'. All except the steepest surfaces are covered with tropical vegetation. Ao Nang is a bustling (but much quieter than Chaweng) village with a wide range of accommodation, and plenty of bars and shops, selling the usual range of fake designer goods.

We stayed at the Krabi Resort , a comfortable 3-star hotel set in attractive landscaped grounds next to the beach. An air-conditioned deluxe poolside room was about £55 per night for the two of us. The in-house restaurant was OK, but not special. However there were plenty of other beachside restaurants to choose from nearby. As on Koh Samui the sea was fairly murky, and we preferred the pool for swimming.

I had deliberately not booked any diving in advance, as an experiment to see how easy it would be to sort it out on the spot. The answer was very easy. Thailand is a cheap and extremely popular place for people learning to dive. We spotted several dive shops from the bus on the way into Ao Nang. We then discovered that there was one at the Krabi Resort. However its dive programme was beginner-focused and very limited, so we went to Aquavision who had a shop about 100m from our hotel. Their shop was clean and bright; they seemed efficient and businesslike; they offered a good selection of dive trips, including Hin Daeng that is frequently rated as 'the best dive in Thailand'; and after some discussion they agreed that we would dive unguided. We were able to book on a dive for the following day. We didn't get to Hin Daeng because that trip only runs once a week (it's nearly 60 miles), and we were leaving before the next one. The rental equipment was good, and the total price averaged out at £44ppd, very similar to Koh Samui. Also similar to Koh Samui was the fact that the cost saving for using your own gear is less than £10.

We did two days diving. The first was at the south end of Phi Phi Leh from Rung Warawan, a large wooden boat with two full decks, and ample space for the maybe 30 people on board. She took 2 hours each way to make the 20 mile trip. We left around 8am and returned at 5pm. Jen and I were struck by the fact that this is similar to a diving day on a club liveaboard trip up the Sound of Mull where the time just flashes by, yet on Rung Warawan I was bored on the boat journey. No craic – that's the difference between club diving and holiday diving. Moral – take a good book next time. The crew served a tasty selection of Thai curries and rice for lunch, and there were plenty of drinks.

The second day was at Koh Ha from ThirtySomething a fast cabin cruiser with flying bridge and sundeck. Travelling on this speedboat was an altogether more frantic affair than the previous day. She took just under two hours to cover the 35 miles to the dive site, in smooth seas. An adequate lunch was provided, and there was plenty to drink. On both days the boarding procedure was the same: wade out from the beach to a longtail boat, carrying your gear; the longtail then takes you out to your diveboat and you climb aboard. The dive staff load all the tanks – they seemed surprised when Jen and I helped.

The diving was safely organised, but I was unimpressed by some of the dive briefings particularly with regard to the currents. On the first dive of day one we were told that the tide was flooding north (it was HW –0200). In fact we experienced a gentle south-going stream except right at the end of the dive. Looking at the chart afterwards it seemed obvious that we had been in an eddy, and I would have expected the dive guide who gave the briefing to have had the appropriate local knowledge to get this right. On day two the dive guide told us the current would be running in one direction when it was clearly going the opposite way. He got it wrong in the afternoon as well. Unlike some parts of the world where currents are genuinely unpredictable, here the principal influence is a semi-diurnal tide running past a chain of islands (like the Farnes or the Garvellachs for example). A diver used to marshalling dives around the British coast would not have made these mistakes. Also on day two the boat was not where we were briefed it would be at the end of either dive. And the instructions on how to find the cave on Ko Ha Yai were useless, though we found it in spite of them. Notwithstanding all this we would use Aquavision again because none of these irritations threaten our safety – we are more than capable of working it out for ourselves; and it doesn't threaten guided divers either, assuming the guides behave sensibly underwater – which they appeared to do.

* Phi Phi Leh SE side – 20m. A pleasant drift southwards along the underwater continuation of a steep cliff levelling out from around 15m. Visibility improved from 6m at the start to 10m by the end. Plenty of small fish, and some beautiful soft coral at the end of the dive.
* Ko Bida Nai – 20m. A pleasant dive into a gentle tide along the west side of this small island to the NW tip where the current splits and the wall steepens. Plenty of fan and branching coral, and a shoal of juvenile barracuda.
* Ko Ha Yai – 18m. We thought this was a gimmicky dive involving some rather barren caves with air spaces (though other divers on board seemed impressed). However we did see our first sea snake (a banded sea krait) during an unsuccessful underwater search for the diveboat, which was not where we were told it would be.
* E-most of 5 pinnacles close SE of Ko Ha Yai – 25m. This was probably the best of the dives we did in Thailand, only slightly marred by being dropped where it was necessary to fin hard into a current for several minutes in order to get onto the dive we had been briefed about (some of the guided groups didn't make it at all). This small island has a submerged ridge running out from its NW corner. The sides of the ridge drop steeply from about 10m to 20m. At the point, where the current splits, there were large shoals of glassfish and other small fish. Tuna and other predator fish were feeding on them. We then made a short drift at about one knot along the west wall, festooned with soft coral and with crayfish in the cracks; then up onto the plateau out of current, and round again for a second lap. A very good dive.

As on Koh Samui, there are plenty of non-diving activities available. We got the impression that there were fewer of the self-guided variety and more packaged tours, but this may have been simply because we had less time to look around. We had a late flight to Bangkok on our departure day so I did have time for:
* a half-day course at the Krabi Thai Cookery School. This was an excellent hands-on affair where you and your fellow students cook and eat a variety of dishes. You get a lot of practical advice, and a recipe book that I now use quite often.

Bangkok
Although in some ways this city of six million people looks like any modern metropolis, Bangkok has an exotic far eastern feel of its own and is well worth a visit. A brief summary of our experience follows. We:
* stayed one night at the Asia Airport Hotel when our incoming flight was too late for the last flight of the day to Koh Samui. The room was spacious and nicely furnished (especially after two weeks in Nepalese trekking lodges) and cost about £65. There was an efficient courtesy bus service from the airport. Otherwise the hotel is a typical anonymous modern business hotel serving eurofood at europrices. However outside there is a vibrant local market and an outdoor restaurant with live music. We'd use this place again in similar circumstances.
* booked a 4-night stopover package from Trailfinders for about £170 each. The hotel was the 4-star Amari Boulevard . The room was OK, and the included buffet breakfast was superb. We didn't enjoy the rest of the package. There were various temple tours. The buildings are impressive but it's all rather regimented, and we soon got 'temple fatigue'. Another time we'd do our own thing and visit lesser known places – there are hundreds – where you can soak up the real serenity of these Buddhist temples. There was also a 'traditional Thai meal and cultural evening' that was dire – the food was sweet and bland and the layout of the room meant you couldn't see the 'cultural' dancers properly. The last part of the package was a boat tour around the river and klongs and floating market, which was OK, but it was weekend so there was no floating market. The tour ended with a river cruise on a rice barge that was a totally synthetic tourist 'experience'. But the fresh fruit buffet was nice.
* hired a tuktuk and went to the zoo. It turned out to be graduation day at a nearby college, and the place was full of Thai families having picnics in their smart graduation ceremony clothes. There were hardly any other western people there.
* went to the Chatuchak weekend market, which has thousands of stalls selling everything you could imagine. Fascinating.
* went to the cinema and watched American films with Thai subtitles. Some of the Thai adverts are very funny. At the start of the performance a video of a smartly dressed chap flying around in a helicopter started playing, to the accompaniment of a stirring tune. After a while we realised that this was the national anthem and everybody had stood up. The Thais take their royal family very seriously.
* discovered that the fast food outlets in the big shopping malls serve delicious freshly cooked Thai food.
* used the Skytrain to travel from district to district, but also walked round the streets by day and night sampling the sounds, sights, and smells. Wonderful.

Summary
Thailand is an interesting and exotic country with something for everybody who doesn't mind the heat. If you are experienced divers wanting a full-on diving holiday with coral and tropical fish, the Red Sea is better, cheaper, and closer; but if you want a range of activities, of which diving is one, Thailand is an excellent choice. There's a trade-off to be made between staying on the islands closest to the best diving (eg Ko Tao, Koh Phi Phi) and staying in the locations with the most to do. From our limited sample, the diving in the Andaman Sea is probably better than in the Gulf of Thailand, but both are worth doing, and both are ideal places for beginners. Thailand would make a good destination for a well-heeled BSAC branch holiday including families and non-divers.

Richard Scarsbrook - BSAC First Class Diver/Advanced Instructor, RYA/MCA Coastal Skipper
Jen Scarsbrook - BSAC Advanced Diver/Advanced Instructor

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