Live aboard dive trip complete ✅ Something that we did actually place on “the list” a couple of years ago. It was (as B-Rod wrote in the guest log) a “memorable” experience.
We left land and set off on the boat Miss Moon to live, sleep and dive for 3 nights/4 days (10-11 dives in total). It’s a smaller boat with a maximum of 10 guests, but as it is the beginning of the season, there were only 4 of us. Maybe because of this, the owner decided to invite a couple of his buddies along and this is probably what made the trip a bit weird. A lot of times on the boat it felt like an us (the guests) vs them (the owner, dive instructors and buddies) type of scenario. “Us” just wanting to dive and enjoy our time, and “them” wanting to drink, smoke and travel down memory lane. It was particularly bad the first night when they picked us up in Koh Phayam (we chose to be picked up and dropped off on a nearby island vs the mainland), we stayed on land for a few hours while they started to get smashed at an expat bar. We finally got on the boat and set
sail where the party (for them) continued. One of the guys kept drunkenly explaining that they hadn’t seen each other for many years, while one of the dive instructors continually reassured us that the first night was about letting loose and we would see their professional side the next day.
They did get better, but there was still a lot of us trying to avoid cigarette smoke (what is it with dive professionals and
chain smoking?) and the sound of beer cans cracking. One of the friends (Peter from Denmark) turned out to be a really great guy. After surfacing on our first dive, puking his guts out and spending the rest of the day sleeping it off, he was kind and considerate and almost acted like a bridge between the us and them divide. Him and B-Rod also developed somewhat of a holiday bromance. However, the other friend (Elliot from the UK) sat in the same spot everyday, looked quite unwell, didn’t dive and started drinking by 10AM. He had originally introduced himself to me as crew, but B-Rod was later told by the owner that he was not (WTF?) We were making bets that the other live aboard boats didn’t have an Elliot!!
Fortunately, even though we were at times pushed to our limits diving, B-Rod and I never felt that our safety was at risk under water
Leaving solid ground
Our fellow divers were Elizabeth and Gary from Austria. Elizabeth had many years ago spent 5 years as a dive instructor in the Maldives. She had about 3,000 dives and Gary had about 400. They spend one vacation a year on a live aboard and assured us that this one was unique!
Our days pretty much consisted of 2 things which we simply repeated numerous times throughout the days:
1. Dive
– we mostly went in directly from the main boat
– occasionally we’d get into the dingy to take us to a dive site
*** ask B-Rod about the time I landed on his head with my oxygen tank getting out of the dingy
– enjoy the dive
– get picked up after the dive
2. Eat, possibly sleep and hang out
– there were a few different areas to lounge on the boat
– lots of things to simply look out onto and admire
– this was the spot where once the sun set we descended into the water for our first night dive (amazing!)
– the one advantage was for the most part we were the only dive boat at our sites
– it wasn’t until the last day at a very renowned spot closer to land we were joined by many other boats. We did 3 dives there and our first one was first thing in the morning with no one else there. What a difference it makes to have fewer divers around!
Some other highlights of our trip included:
- first night dive
- longest dive yet (ironically this was supposed to be our shortest, and since it was so long, we had to sit for many many minutes at 5 meters to decompress)
- deepest dive yet (this also occurred on our ‘shortest, shallowest’ and last dive)
- almost doubling our dive numbers
- Rocky getting sea sick (fortunately only on the first night and then never again)
- discovering the currents we don’t enjoy diving. B-Rod used almost half of his air in the first 10 minutes. It was quite a workout! He was not happy in that moment, and was reluctant to attempt the same site at a later hour.
- Rocky discovering how to calm herself under water after a bit of a panic
- becoming more comfortable and enjoying diving even more
- being able to witness the wonder of the underwater world
During a busy time underwater with lots of other diver traffic, somehow we were the only ones marvelling over these cuttlefish. There ended up being three pairs in total which the owner and the dive instructors said they had never seen before (this is what caused our “short” dive to be the longest one we’ve had yet!)
We’re back in Ko Phayam for the next few days to decompress, chill out and do a bit of planning for the final phase of our adventure.