Once I had settled into my accommodation I headed straight to 'Siam' in it's new beach-front location and was immediately greeted by lots of familiar faces welcoming me back. I signed up for my advanced diving course, but as I wanted to learn with Lee I had to wait a few days until he finished another course- this was fine by me as it gave me the perfect excuse to extend my stay in Koh Tao and catch up with everyone before the diving started.
I easily fell back into the old routine of sunbathing with the girls (Kelly, Terri and Jen) in the day, dinner with 'the gang' in the evening, then partying the night away in Diza, Lotus and Fishbowl. And did the routine feel old? Never!!
The best thing about going back to Koh Tao was that it gave me the chance to build on the friendships that I'd made during my first visit and turn them into 'friends for life'. I loved getting to know everyone better and spent everyday feeling so incredibly happy.
After 4 days of island fun I began my advanced course. There is a lot less theory involved in the advanced course and a lot more diving with the idea of seeing the range of dives available. During my course I did 5 dives; a night dive, a wreck dive, a deep dive (29.5 m), a navigation dive and a dive to practice buoyancy skills. I had an absolute blast on all the dives but particularly enjoyed the deep dive as I saw an incredible amount of tropical fish and the buoyancy dive as we did a lot of silly skills and underwater gymnastics. After my course finished Lee wangled me two free dives, so the next day I did a second deep dive and wreck dive, and it's so lucky that I did, as on the deep dive we saw a whale shark which was amazing.
I had planned on leaving Koh Tao after my course finished.. but I was caught in the island's spell! I was persuaded to stay another day as it was Jen's birthday and we had planned a big meal out (30 of us) followed by a bar crawl to celebrate (any excuse!) We had an awesome night, full of silly challenges for the birthday girl and everyone had a great time. The next day was spent in the usual sunbathing, playing volleyball, eating Zest baguettes way, and during the course of the day I was persuaded to stay another night to help support 'Team Siam' in the beach Olympics the next night (any excuse!) Us girls decided to be cheerleaders to support 'our boys' in the vaguely diving related (mainly drinking related) games. We went all out for the occasion and dressed up, painted our faces and practiced cheers which ultimately lead to a victory for 'Team Siam', meaning another brilliant night out with 'the gang'.
It was very hard to buy my ferry ticket off the island, but it was time to go. I decided to stay the next day and to get the 11pm night ferry to Chumphon (another excuse to stay a bit longer). I had one last day with everyone, and a final dinner in 'El Gringo's Mexican' before Guy whisked me off to the ferry on the back of his motorbike. It was a very sad goodbye and I had to try really hard not to cry, particularly saying goodbye to Lee and Kelly, but I know I will see them again because as I say, they are now friends for life.
As the night boat pulled away, I stood on the back deck watching the island get further away until the lights of Koh Tao disappeared all together, then I returned to my bunk bed to get as much sleep as is possible on a ferry. Next Stop: BANGKOK.
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