Racha Noi and Racha Yai, Phuket

More diving. Today I had a diving day at Racha Noi and Racha Yai. Two dives at Noi and one at Yai.

Dive #: 184

Date: 22.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Noi, Marina Bay
Depth: 25,9m Average depth: 15,2m
Bottom time: 58min
Visibility: 15m
Sea Temperature: +28C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Dive Center: Chalong Sea Sport
Price: 3700THB/90,20€ + Equipment rental 500THB/12,20€

Total: 4200THB/102,40€ (3 dives)

Porcupine fish try to hide.

One of the swim throu in Marina Bay.

Just before safety stop we saw leopard shark on the bottom.

Big rocks and boulders, nudibranches, lionfish.

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Dive #: 185
Date: 22.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Noi
Depth: 16,7m Average depth: 12,2m
Bottom time: 62min
Visibility: 15m
Sea Temperature: +28C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Giant pufferfish.

Octopus hiding. It came also out from the hole, but when I went even little bit closer it went back to hole. This was quite big one.

Big rocks and boulders, very small lionfish, porcupine fish, lizardfish.

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Dive #: 186
Date: 22.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Yai, Bungalow Bay South
Depth: 13,7m Average depth: 8,2m
Bottom time: 58min
Visibility: 10m
Sea Temperature: +28C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Carb.

Scorpion fish.

Zebra moray eel again. Last diving day I saw zebra first time and now again.

Cuttlefish.

Not so special diving day, but good anyway. Relax and long dives.

Shark Point and Koh Dok Mai, Phuket

Today I had a diving day here in Phuket again. First dive on Shark Point and second one at Koh Dok Mai.

Dive #: 182
Date: 19.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Shark Point
Depth: 19,2m Average depth: 13,1m
Bottom time: 60min
Visibility: 10-15m
Sea Temperature: +29C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 4,8Kg

Dive Center: Sea Bees Diving
Price: 3750THB/91,50€ + Equipment rental 500THB/12,20€

Total: 4200THB/103,40€ (2 dives)

Beginning of the dive we saw zebra moray eel. First time for me.

DM Barry with fishes.

More fishes.

In the end of dive we saw two cuttlefishes. I went very close and they didn't go anywhere. Amazing creatures!

I have dived here few times before, but didn't remember how good place this is. So much fishes. Durban dancing shrimp, clownfishes, moray eel, a lot of very big fan corals, nudibranches, titan triggers, very much reef fishes. Very good dive.

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Dive #: 183

Date: 19.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Koh Dok Mai
Depth: 20,4m Average depth: 12,5m
Bottom time: 51min
Visibility: 6-10m
Sea Temperature: +29C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 4,8Kg

Koh Doc Mai is uninhabited island and the dives there are always wall dives.

White eye moray eel.

Diver with the fan corals.

Durban dancing shrimps.

Today visibility was quite bad at Koh Dok Mai. There is anyway quite much marine life. Moray eels, nudibranches, Fan corals, banded boxer shrimp, Durban dancing shrimps, reef fishes. Today was also first time when I dived with Sea Bees Diving. Everything worked very well. Also nice and big boat.

Turtles at Similan Islands

Old story. Best place for diving in Thailand is Similan Islands. It's about 100km from Phuket to north west on Andaman Sea. Dive trips to Similan Islands are usually liveaboard. Typical is five nights on the boat and four diving days. Four dives a day so 16 dives on the trip. I have been on this kind of diving safari twice. Feb 2006 and Feb 2007.

Similan Islands is not good only for diving. It's also superp for snorkeling. One of the most beautiful place there is Donald Duck Bay. There you can climb up to the hill where opens great view to the bay. I visited there in 2006.

After view point we had still time to wait for the next dive. Our boat was on the bay and we saw turtle very near of our boat. People threw bananas to the turtle and turtle ate it. Some of us jumped to the water snorkeling with the turtle. Of course me too. Turtle wasn't shy at all. It just swam around us.

Maybe temptation of banana was too much and it came to eat it also from the hand. Turtles really like bananas. Here you can see little bit banana it's mouth.

It came many times very close. I didn't need to use zoom at all.

There was also smaller turtle, but it didn't come to close.

Great snorkeling session!

Mika

Kingdom of manta rays, Phuket

Today on Tuesday I had a diving day again. First two dives on Racha Noi and last one on Racha Yai. I have dived on Racha Noi only ones before in February 2004 and on that day I saw first time manta ray. Now before dives we heard divers have seen mantas here also on the last dives so the expectation was very high.

Dive #: 179
Date: 15.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Noi, South Tip
Depth: 32,9m Average depth: 15,2m
Bottom time: 55min
Visibility: 10-15m
Sea Temperature: +29C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Dive Center: Chalong Sea Sport
Price: 3700THB/90€ + Equipment rental 500THB/12,20€

Total: 4200THB/102,40€ (3 dives)

Immidiately in the beginning of the dive we saw two mantas.

Here is another.

And more.

Then we saw something which is not so common. This manta was totally black! Manta in stealth mode. Looks very cool!

Big group of barracudas.

Very good dive indeed! So many mantas. Few times we saw two mantas in the same time. There was also big group of gold-band fusilier. Also big group of some very small fishes.

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Dive #: 180
Date: 15.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Noi, Marina Bay
Depth: 26,8m Average depth: 14,3m
Bottom time: 60min
Visibility: 10-15m
Sea Temperature: +28C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Here are many swim through places.

Yellow box fish.

Crab between the rocks.

Very small scorpion fish.

Some divers saw manta also on this dive, but we didn't. On this place there are lot of rocks and boulders, but also some hard corals. Moray eels, trigger fishes and small reef fishes.

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Dive #: 181
Date: 15.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Yai, Bungalow Bay South
Depth: 19,8m Average depth: 9,7m
Bottom time: 61min
Visibility: 10-15m
Sea Temperature: +29C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

There are lot of rocks and boulders on this area. Also small reef fishes, titan triggers, parrot fishes, puffers, etc. Here moray eel.

Great diving day. Especially first dive was one of the best ever. I really enjoyed that dive!

Phuket,

Mika

Phi Phi Islands

Today on Saturday I had a diving day at Phi Phi Island about 2,5 hours from Phuket, Thailand.

Dive #: 177
Date: 12.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Phi Phi Leh, Maya Bay, South Wall
Depth: 23,7m Average depth: 13,7m
Bottom time: 57min
Visibility: 15-20m
Sea Temperature: +30C


Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Dive Center: Chalong Sea Sport
Price: 3700THB/90€ + Equipment rental 500THB/12,20€ Total: 4200THB/102,40€ (2 dives)


There was no current and it was very easy and relax to dive. Also weather was perfect. Some places had lot of small reef fishes.

Anemone crab.

There was also swim through caves, coral band cleaner shripm, harp coral, bubble honeycomb coral, fan coral, nudibranch, pufferfihs, porcupine fish, crown of thorns starfish, etc.

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Dive #: 178

Date: 12.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Phi Phi Leh, Maya Wall
Depth: 18m Average depth: 10,9m
Bottom time: 66min
Visibility: 15-20m

Sea Temperature: +30C

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Second dive near the first one. Just on the other side of the Maya Bay and the different direction. In the beginning of the dive we saw there small turtle. Luckily it was not so shy.

Group of Durban dancing shrimps.

Moray eel.

Fan coral.

We almost went to safety stop when our DM Julia saw something near on the bottom. We went to check it and it was leopard shark.

On the second dive we saw also barrel sponge, pufferfishes, porcupine fishes, parrot fishes, titan triggers, etc.

Here is one video clip where is easy to see how much there was fishes.

Great diving day!

Somewhere in Phuket,

Mika

Racha Yai, Phuket

Today on Wednesday I had a diving day at Racha Yai near Phuket, Thailand.

Dive #: 175
Date: 9.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Yai, Bay 5 to south
Depth: 18,9m Average depth: 12,5m
Bottom time: 49min
Visibility: 25-30m

Equipment
Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

Dive Center: Chalong Sea Sport
Price: 2900THB/70€ + Equipment rental 500THB/12,20€
Total: 3400THB/82,90€ (2 dives)

There was only little bit current and it was relax to dive with the current. Here some old fish cage.

Porcupine fish hiding.

This remora wanted to have a joy ride with a diver.

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Second dive was also on Racha Yai, but in different bay.

Dive #: 176
Date: 9.2.2011
Place: Thailand, Phuket, Racha Yai, Bay 3 to bay 4
Depth: 28,9m Average depth: 12,8m
Bottom time: 52min
Visibility: 20m

Equipment

Bottle: 12L/200bar (air) Wetsuit: short 3mm Weight: 5,5Kg

There are lot of concrete cubics somewhere in 28-29m which divers can swim through.

Bluespotted stingray.

Visibility today was very good especially on the first dive. There was quite much small reef fishes in some places and some hard corals. Also some titan triggers, red tooth triggers, lot of small boxfishes, clown fish, moray eels. Anyway nothing so special. Weather was also perfect, so it was nice diving day. Only problems was my mask (Mares Demon), which has started to leak. Also my dive computer (Suunto Mosquito) shows way too early deco times. This problem has started already in Philippines end of last year. Maybe I have to update both mask and computer.

Last time I wrote about compressor diving in Palawan, Philippines. Today we saw also compressor diving on this trip here in Thailand. Two hoses went from boat to under the surface, so maybe there was also two divers.

Phuket,
Mika

Compressor diving at Palawan

Old story. Last year 2010 in March I was in a small city of Raxas in Palawan Philippines. There I met in karaoke place one local man Chito and he invited me to visit their own private island on the front of Roxas. Sound interested so why not.

Two days later I went to visit on the island with the Chito's brother Cassius. Place name is Stanlake Island. Near the island Cassius said there is still one more thing to do before we can go to land. Boat man should first dive to feed the fishes on the fish cage. Cage was about 100m from the island and depth was about 10-15m. That's nothing new if you use normal diving equipment like BCD, regulator, weightbelt, diving computer and so on. This guy had little bit different kind of equipment. He did it as a compressor dive!

Before I have heard about it, but I never seen it in real life. First boat man removed propeller shaft from the engine, then connected very long hose to the engine and then just started the engine. So engine is pushing air all the time to the hose. Hose around the body, mask to face and self-made fins to feet and hose to other side of the mouth and ready to dive. There was no mouth piece on the hose. Hose just between the teeth tightly to other side of the mounth where diver get the air for breathing. Breathing out just on the other side of the mouth. Not the safest way to dive. You can only imagine what can happen when depth is something about 20-40m and engine stop. I asked from Cassius have ever they had any probles. So far no problems. Hopefully never...

Here boat man has just came back to the boat. Compressor diving is very common in Palawan area.

Cheers,

Mika