Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Koh Chang



What a beautiful little island on the east coast of Thailand. It was my first time to this part of the country and it was great! (ok, what can be bad about a tropical island) Koh Chang is almost at the Cambodia border. Life on the island is slow and unchaotic (unlike my life in Bangkok) and it makes for a really nice weekend getaway.


I met up with a friend from the TEFL course at the Eastern Bus terminal in BKK at 10pm to take a night bus down to the island. It was a quick 5 hours on the bus and then another 30 mins to an hour waiting for out next shuttle. I am not sure how long because I was fast asleep on a bench. Then we took a ferry over to the island as the sun was rising. Even though I was exhausted, it was a beautiful way to start the day.


Once we got to the island we crammed into one last shuttle to get to the southern end of the island to go scuba diving – Bang Boa.
BB is cute little town in the SE. Very touristy with lots of little shops and restaurants lining the pier. All the snorkeling and dive trips leave from this area.



We met up with a guy named Mike and went with his company. It was sooo nice to be back in the water! It had been almost 2 years since I had been diving in Honduras. I love living in the Rockies, but they don’t offer much scuba diving.  



There were some sweet corals, tons of xmas tree worms, pink anemone fish in anemone, batfish, decent sized schools of varying fish and I found a new fish that became my favorite of the dive – mococle bream.




Pretty sure I have never seen this species before (or maybe just never noticed them). Either way, I love finding new anything under the water.



When we came up the fishing boats had moved closer and were trawling on either side of the dive boat. Terribly sad and frustrating. I wanted to scuba dive over and put a few holes in the bottom of the boats. One day….


I know they will only replace the boat, but it would make me feel better. As long as they have a market to sell the fish, shrimp, crabs, sharks and squid to, they will never stop. This is why I never have and never will eat seafood and why I think people should actually take a minute to consider where their food comes from. Even though the price on the menu is cheap, what about the cost on the environment? Generally the cheaper the price of the fish, the lower quality it is...or they obtained the fish using the cheapest methods possible which usually cause the most environmental damage. One of the nets among various fishing debris we saw is in a photo above. I’m not going to say anymore than that subject because I won’t be able to stop.


After the dive we headed up to the lonely beach area and found a cheap bungalow to crash in for the next couple nights. We were about a five minute walk from the beach and this place had the most amazing squat toilet.


My favorite squat toilet I have yet to come across. It is the garden of eden of squat toilets! (and yes, squat toilets are very different from my favorite outdoor facilities up in Glacier National Park)

oops

David and I walked over to the beach, checked out the town, played pool and grabbed some dinner. After that I was off to bed! No such thing as night life for me the night after taking a night bus and a full day of diving.



The next morning we ate breakfast at a cute place overlooking Lonely Beach and then went swimming. In the afternoon I took off for Bangkok while David enjoyed his 3 day weekend and extra day on the island. Looking forward to going back for a longer visit!

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