Stop #12: Phuket & Liveaboard, Thailand

Before I start this blog, let me give you one piece of advice – do not fly Air Asia.  I’ve never had such little leg room in my life, and I’ve flown a lot of airlines.  I’m a pretty small person but even my knees are touching the seat in front of me.  Lorenzo is not happy with the space issue either and swears never to fly this airline again.  My laptop is jabbing me in my stomach, with just barely enough room for me to fold it open at a 90 degree angle so I can write this blog.  To make it more uncomfortable, every single overhead cabinet, and tray table, is plastered with colorful ads which are actually giving me a headache.  And for some reason, they assigned Lorenzo and me different rows to sit in… and no one is even sitting next to him.  I can’t really get out of my seat to go sit with him, because the two girls on my left are sleeping… and the one next to me is nearly sleeping on my shoulder.  Lastly, this kid in front of me won’t stop bouncing around which makes keeping my laptop open a bit difficult.  This will be an interesting flight from Phuket to Bangkok.

But our trip to Thailand??  Amazing!  It was one of the longest and most strenuous journeys from one country to another, but it was all worth it.  We had to take a boat from our Maldives island (Kuramathi) to a seaplane, to the Male Airport (wait 5 hours), to take another flight to Singapore, to take another flight to Bangkok.  From the Bangkok Airport, we had a very quick transfer to our next flight, which I booked to Phuket.  But when we arrived in Bangkok, we were going frantic trying to find our flight!  It turns out that I booked the connecting flight from Bangkok to Phuket from the wrong airport, which was over an hour away.  Really?!?  How could I do that??  Here we are, trying to rush to our next flight, and we weren’t even in the right airport.  This mistake certainly cost us some money.  Not only did we have to book a one-way flight on another airline to get to Phuket, but we also had to pay overage fees for our luggage.  Whatever, we just wanted to get there already.

Once we landed in Phuket, we took a one hour taxi to Paripas Resort at Patong Beach.  I chose this location because I researched that there is plenty to do in this area, and it also wasn’t too far from the pier, where we needed to catch our liveaboard ship.  Overall, it turned out to be a good choice since we very close to the beach, and many shops and restaurants.  But we must have been completely spoiled from Maldives, because the moment we arrived at the famous Patong Beach, we were a bit disappointed.  We frowned upon the crowds, the not-so-white sand, the not-so-clear water, the many boats and jet skis that infested the water, and the noise.  If we did not come straight from Maldives, I’m sure we would have been delighted to arrive at this beach.  But in this case, we immediately missed the no-pollution, no-crowds, no-cars, no-noise, white sand beaches and clear waters of Maldives.  Regardless, we had a great time walking around the area, dipping into the ocean, and eating excellent Thai Food.  The best part was watching the sunset on Patong Beach, which was quite impressive.  So colorful and pretty with the clouds scattered around, and the other islands in the horizon.  Quite romantic indeed. 

To end the day, we enjoyed a 90 minutes full body Thai Massage for just $20!  For the last two months, we’ve been wanting to get a massage, but we kept telling ourselves to wait for Thailand (since we knew it’d be cheap).  When we got there, Lorenzo kept asking for an extra hard massage, while I kept telling him to stop saying that.  He obviously had no idea what a Thai Massage was, and he completely underestimated the strength of the Thai masseuses.  I knew that they would use all their strength to twist and turn us into agony… which turned out to be true!  We got situated in our “couples room” and got down to our undies (in which Lorenzo didn’t have any).  So they handed him a pair of disposable lady’s panties, or aka a thong.  It was the first time I’ve seen Lorenzo in a thong and it was pretty darn hilarious 😊  In fact, I think he was wearing it backwards.  Regardless, it was a very funny site to see.  It was also really funny to hear Lorenzo wince and groan as the Thai lady twisted his body into shapes he’s never experienced before.  I thought it was awesome!  Lorenzo, on the other hand, was left in a confused state of bliss and pain.

The next morning, a mini bus picked us up along with 4 other people (1 American guy & 3 Chinese ladies).  We were all heading to our 3-day scuba diving liveaboard!  I’ve never been on a liveaboard in my life, although I recently got Advanced Certified with Lorenzo in Tulum, Mexico.  I was really looking forward to it, but I was also quite nervous.  One reason is because I ALWAYS barf on boats.  Always.  And the other reason is because this liveaboard required its attendees to have a minimum of 30 dives, and I’ve only had 20 so far.  They were planning to do 10 advanced dives in 3 days, and several of the dives included specialties that I’ve never done before – such as shipwrecks and stronger currents.  I told myself that if I could just accomplish 1 dive a day, I would be very happy with myself. Let the adventure begin…

As soon as we got on the boat, I felt nauseous, so I just tried to stay busy and distracted.  We checked out our “Deluxe Room”, which turned out to be the tiniest space that Lorenzo and I have ever lived in together in our entire relationship.  The room was basically a double bed, with just enough space to turn around.  The “bathroom” was basically a toilet inside a tiny shower. I guess I really shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up, even if we upgraded to a Deluxe Room – which meant we got a (tiny) window (which didn’t open).  Ah well! At this point, nothing could surprise me.

About an hour after we left the pier, we were briefed on our first dive which included a shipwreck.  I was already nervous about this, since its been a while since I last dove, and I wasn’t 100% confident about my buoyancy control.  But the dive actually went well!  It was easy and quite smooth, although not as pretty as I had hoped.  There weren’t many fish or coral to see, but it was cool seeing my first shipwreck.  Getting back on the boat was another story.  As soon as I got back on, I took off all my gear and headed straight to the common area to sit down.  The smell of lunch being served made me feel even more sick.  And the moment I put one spoonful of food into my mouth, I went running to (where I thought was) my room.  I prepared to fling open the door and barf in my room, but as soon as I stuck my head in, I realized it was the Captain’s room.  So I did a 180 degree turn and barfed over the railing… about 4 times.  Unfortunately I was on the 2nd floor of the ship, so chunks of my bright orange vomit ended up on the 1st floor.  I felt so sick, I really didn’t care.  Needless to say, I skipped the 2nd dive of the day.  I just took a seasick pill and took a nap.  Which seemed to work! 

My 2nd dive was a lot more pleasant.  There were coral and interesting fish to see.  At this point, I still wasn’t too impressed with the diving in the area, but I was confident it was going to get better in the following days.  That evening, we enjoyed a delicious dinner on the boat, with a sunset view.  Lorenzo and I ended up adopting the American guy, who came alone.  At first I wasn’t keen on him tagging along, but it turned out that he was incredibly interesting!  He was in the Navy for a number of years, as a fighter pilot (his videos were awesome).  Then he was a pilot for JetBlue and Cathay Pacific.  Hearing his life stories and experiences were very intriguing.  Lorenzo, who was getting drunker by the minute, was absolutely fascinated.  So I left the two love birds alone and went to bed early, hoping tomorrow would be a better day.

Making new friendships along the way... Josh & Zo

The wake up bell rang at 7:00am sharp.  We had 30 minutes to get ready and go to the next dive briefing.  Luckily, I felt a whole lot better and quite excited for the dive.  This dive included 3 under water pinnacles and a lot more coral and fish.  I was very glad I went, as I was becoming more and more confident in the water.  My two favorite parts of the dive were watching the clown fish poking in and out of the anemones (always my favorite to see), and discovering puffer fish for the first time.  I couldn’t believe how big the puffer fish were, they were as long as my whole arm!  And they weren’t very scared of us at all… if you just hang out and just watch them, they will come up to you and observe you quite closely.  I was so close to them, that I was afraid they’d puff up and pierce my face with their spikes.  Hey, it could happen!  But luckily it didn’t. 

To my surprise, I ended up diving the next dive too which turned out to be my favorite one of the trip. It was another shipwreck, deeper than the last one, and teeming with sea life.  There were literally thousands and thousands of fish (mostly red snapper and barracuda) swimming very quickly around and around the ship.  There were so many that I even lost visibility of my group!  All I could see were flashes of silver and yellow, it dizzying.  At that point, I could really care less about the ship – I was memorized with all the fish.  There were also a ton of huge puffer fish, which I continued to observe.  We did go inside the ship once, which made me a little nervous.  As I expected, my tank got caught a couple times in the tight spots, and my leg brushed up against some coral.  I’m really not keen on cave diving (no light), but luckily there was still a little ray of light when entering this ship.  When we completed the dive, I was really proud of myself for accomplishing this challenge.  So proud of myself that I laid down, took a nap, and skipped the next dive.

By the time I woke up, Lorenzo had gotten so sick he didn’t want to dive for the rest of the day.  I was really surprised because he absolutely loves diving, so for him to miss any dives, he must have been really sick.  He had a bad headache, clogged sinus, and felt weak.  It was a shame because as soon as I woke up from my nap, I felt great!  I felt so good that I was energetic enough to go on the next dive, even without Lorenzo.  This was the first and only time I’ve ever suba dived without Lorenzo.  And it turned out to be a really cool dive.  As soon as we reached the ocean floor, we (the guide and the American guy) discovered a very large fish cage that was illegally placed there.  No one is allowed to fish in the national park area of these islands.  The cage was full of hundreds of fish, swimming very quickly around and around inside the cage, trying to get out.  Our guide untied the gate of the cage and set all the fish free.  It was SO cool to watch the hundreds of fish dash out the door and be free!  I”ll never forget that moment, we felt like heroes.  The rest of the dives was excellent, as I got to see many clown fish inside their anemone homes.  And these anemones were different – some were bright blue, bright yellow, bright white, and bright purple – colors I’ve never seen before!  Needless to say, it was a very satisfying dive.

That evening was a really fun one, as we docked at Phi Phi Island to check it out.  We all got dressed up and took a dingy to the island.  It’s a pretty nice island with many shops and restaurants.  Lorenzo and I found the 4 souvenirs we always collect from every country – a postcard, a shot glass, a magnet and a patch (the hardest one to find).  Lorenzo also got a nice shirt, and I got a cute bracelet.  One funny part about the evening was when Lorenzo, Josh and I tried to drink our beers from a 3-pack at the same time… just goofin’ around!  After a couple of hours of walking around, we headed back to the boat on the dingy. There, I enjoyed my favorite midnight snack (cup-o-noodle) and left Lorenzo and Josh to chat it up again.

On the last day of the liveaboard I did 2 out of the 3 dives.  The first dive was another shipwreck; the deepest shipwreck out of all of them at 32 meters.  Even though I was nervous again, I was also really excited.  With a little Sudafed, Lorenzo was able to do the dive as well.  So our group headed down for another great experience.  Again, we saw thousands of fish surrounding the ship – even more than last time.  We also swam through the ship twice which was scary and thrilling at the same time.  For some reason, I kept imagining a dead body floating up to my face, which kept me in an uncomfortable state.  But that didn’t happen.  Coming back to the boat was really rough, and I really wanted to skip the next dive.  But the guide said we would very likely see seahorses, which has always been Lorenzo and my goal on every scuba dive.  And although that next dive was fun and interesting, we did not see any seahorse ☹  So I skipped the last dive and rested up for our ride back to shore.

I never knew stingrays could be so cute!

We spent that night back on Phuket Island.  Lorenzo was still feeling very sick, so we just had a small dinner and went back to the massage place.  This time we got aromatherapy, thinking that it would be far more relaxing than the last massage.  But actually, it was almost just as rough.  I don’t know if my masseuse was angry or what, but she beat me up real good.  She beat me up so badly that I left that place feeling sick.  The next morning, I had a throbbing headache and a very runny nose. I always heard that massages were detoxifying, but could they really make you sick?  From our experience, Lorenzo and I both think so, and it pretty much ruined the rest of our trip in Thailand.  We took a flight from Phuket to Bangkok, but had zero energy to explore the city.  The next morning (today), I felt even worse and dreaded our flight from Bangkok to Bali.  And here I am, back on Air Asia, the airline I despise the most…

PHOTOS OF THAILAND