Phuket-Koh Tao Bashing

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you west coast nancies might like your spotty fish and safe diving, but us Gulf of Siam men are real divers, not interested in sun tans and snaps, but real exploration, which is the heart of scuba diving - to me anyway.

People are different Jamie and most recreational scuba divers are happy enough exploring colorful reefs, looking at fishies and taking pics at comfortable depths with just 1 tank strapped on their back. They have no desire to go down to 70 meters with 3 tanks, spend 15 minutes on a pile of rust and hang for hours on a line decompressing. That's even the case in the Gulf, like it or not.

when was the last time you dived a site no-one had ever been to? King Cruiser,Elephant head? Eeerrrrr, Racha yai? The moray called Bob?

Most of the sites I've dived where no-one has ever dived before were absolutely crapulent. And believe me; I've dived a helluva lot of sites as a "first" in Thailand, Myanmar, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and Irian Jaya. Only rarely did those exploration dives show something good and exciting.

before you spit too much, don't forget this thread was supposed to be light hearted banter
The one spitting seems to be you.



:D
 
no don't worry, i'm not spitting.

doesn't have to be deep and tec, just something different!

same old, same old doesn't do it for me.

sorry you've had un-exciting exploration dives, but even the build up to a crappy new site is a buzz, isn't it?

i think that was his name, now he was always exciting, but i was never stupid enough to feed him.
 
sorry you've had un-exciting exploration dives, but even the build up to a crappy new site is a buzz, isn't it?

Yes. And even after many crappy exploration dives I still like trying. You never know what's down there until you've had a look at it for real

i think that was his name, now he was always exciting, but i was never stupid enough to feed him.

The guy who lost his thumb got now his big toe on his hand. I don't think he will ever feed morays again..

:D
 
Emma's a sweetheart who loves to have her chin stroked.

Anyway, I heard the de-thumbed fellow was trying to feed her sausages.
So it's no wonder the old girl got a bit confused - he's really lucky she went for his thumb and not something else dangling from his body :wink:
 
People are different Jamie and most recreational scuba divers are happy enough exploring colorful reefs, looking at fishies and taking pics at comfortable depths with just 1 tank strapped on their back. They have no desire to go down to 70 meters with 3 tanks, spend 15 minutes on a pile of rust and hang for hours on a line decompressing. That's even the case in the Gulf, like it or not.

:D

The numbers show most are just not into this type of diving. That must make it even more attractive for those into what Bowmouth describes above. I think you stated it well and this is how many of us feel about extended deco dives. In the end, do what you like. Thankfully we have an outlet for divers seeking this sort of adventure through Jammie in Thailand. I am happy to watch Deep Sea Detectives-:) My taste may change some day as others may, but going back to a handful of reefs and wrecks is fine for me. I enjoy the escape from the world above. Has anyone read "Finding Flow"?

Get back to bashing and have some fun. Lighten up :rofl3: This is good for Thailand as an even more varied group of divers will visit. In the end hopefully, we all get switched onto saving our oceans.

Arizona
 
Well, as a Bangkok (as opposed to Ko Tao or Phuket) resident I don't have dog in this fight, so to speak. But one thing that strikes me about both sites is the dismal state of conservation efforts in Thailand. I remember diving both sides in the late 90s and it breaks my heart to come back, to Ko Tao in particular, to see the explosion in construction and the number of dive shops in supposed marine parks. On any given day one can see a dozen dive boats on a small reef offloading divers, many of whom appear to be newly certified, or inexperienced at any rate. The reefs just can't support this. I would hope that some form of regulation can be imposed, but fear there's just too much money involved to make that likely.
 
They built a bio rock on Koh Tao now... there's quite a lot of grassroots conservation going on here but much like the rest of Thailand there's very limited support from the local government. Most of the actions to save the environment on Koh Tao is done with private fund raising and events so it's hard to actually get things done. Be nice to see PADI or SSI get involved and actually use their ECO rederict with Project Aware to some good use but it's not a huge issue since most who see Koh Tao's dive sites are new and have nothing to compare it to. Is it the same on Phucket?
 
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