Time to Relax - Day 15

Whew! The instructor exam (IE) is behind me now so Breanna and I will spend the rest of December exploring what Thailand has to offer. I am happy to report that the exams went well and I am now officially a PADI SCUBA instructor, back to teaching again. The IE lasted for three days and consisted of three parts. Friday we took 6 exams, Saturday we taught a skill in the pool and demoed 5 additional skills, Sunday we did taught two skills and performed a rescue in the ocean. All 6 of the candidates from my class passed the exam with flying colors and we celebrated together at a Reggae bar over looking Kata Noi beach. It was hard to say good bye to everyone especially Jo and Tim. They have become really good friends and we were sad that it was time to go our separate ways.
Bre and I got up nice and early this morning to catch a boat to Koh Phi Phi Don Island. We had a smooth ride over while watching Mr. Bean episodes on the boat; though it was pretty dry British humor can be funny to us Americans. Phi Phi Islands are a chain about 100 km south west of Phuket and one beach in particular stared in the movie The Beach featuring Leonardo de Caprio. They offer overnight camping trips to the island that Breanna and I are thinking about doing.
We have rented a room at JJ’s and found the accommodations to be much more rustic than our last stay. Our bathroom was a bit of a shock when we discovered that you have to flush the toilet by filling up a bucket of water and dump it in and there is no hot water for the shower. Not too bad though, its clean, they change the sheets everyday and they have WiFi. We elected not to pay the upgrade for air conditioning and as I type this at 10:00pm sweating I am beginning to wonder if this was a good choice???
After lunch we spent some time walking around a very busy market area full of shopping, bars and restaurants. We then made our way down to the beach to discover one of the most beautiful and interesting beaches either of us has ever seen. The beach is stretches for about a half mile with a very gentle sloping white sand strip about 30 feet wide. The water is crystal blue and is protected from the open ocean by massive vertical mountains that have very healthy green vegetation where life can be supported. There were hundreds of people soaking in the sun, some too much, and most of the women were topless. We walked down to the water got our feet wet and by the smile on Bre’s face I would guess the temperature to be well over 80 degrees.
The owner of the shop I did my instructor course through set me up with a dive shop over here and told me I would have to do some fun diving while in Phi Phi. Barracuda Divers has a shop right along the main road as you enter from the boat landing and when I walked in they already knew who I was. Bre decided not to dive today so we signed up for a 3 tank boat dive for the morning and I went out for a two tank afternoon dive. The diving is Thailand has been spectacular! I have already found Nemo more times than I can count and have seen a dozen Lion fish. We saw a Leopard Shark, two sea snakes, and a color changing Cuttle Fish. I am stoked on the dives for tomorrow since we are going to two of the top dive sites in Thailand, the wreck of the King Cruiser and Shark Point.
Once I got back Bre and I cleaned up and had an awesome Pizza dinner at one of the numerous bars along “the road”. There is only one road here as best we can tell that snakes along the thin beach line that we walked in about 10 minutes. The shopping here on Phi Phi is much better than on Phuket because the store owners are not hassling you to buy something as you walk by. We watch a lighting storm in the distance for a bit and once it started to rain we headed back to room to catch up on some much needed sleep.

Day 14 and 15 Album (click to see the entire album)

Day 14 to 15