Koh Samui: Chilling and Diving
I know, I know, this is L O N G overdue, as this was our “transition trip” between the end of living in Abu Dhabi and moving back to the US. You know, back at the end-of-January/beginning-of-February. Honestly, this is the first time that I have been still enough in to even think about catching up on this blog, that I treasure dearly, in all too many months.
So, how did we celebrate the close of our time living abroad? By returning to Thailand! This time we ventured to the island of Koh Samui, for both relaxation, fun, and a jumpstart to fitness (details of our a$$-kicking will be captured in the next post).
The relaxation and fun part of our trip was some layover time in Bangkok (eating great food), living it up at a beach resort, and FINALLY getting into scuba diving! Adam was in charge of everything for this first week of our trip, and booked us to stay at Deva Samui. The resort, the staff, the fresh and complementary breakfasts, and beach were all amazing….as was the private bungalow (instead of standard room) was incredible. To include our own private pool.
Using this as our base, we partnered with Silent Divers: Koh Samui to attain our Open Water SCUBA certifications. This involved online reading and course work (achieved beach- and pool-side), a pool session, and two days out on the open water. We were super lucky that we were the only customers during this time period, as we had our incredible dive instructor all to ourselves for the entirety, without having to pay the price of a private course! While there were other students, instructors, and divers on the boat with us, it felt like our own world! Also, if you are looking to achieve this, we cannot recommend Silent Divers more highly. They were very professional, very economical given the expense that comes with PADI certifications, and extremely responsive to our queries.
Freshly certified and fully relaxed, we enjoyed a final evening at our resort before transitioning to other side of the island for my portion of the trip.
