Koh Tao and Koh Phangan

Koh Tao is 55km from the Thai mainland and is a two hour ferry journey from Samui. It is a very laid back, chilled out island dealing mainly with divers. All resorts offer free accommodation with a dive package. I chose the Open Water PADI certificate that allows any qualifying diver to dive up to 18m anywhere in the world.

The course had both a theory element - three hours in the classroom and a written exam and 5 dives where we had to go through numerous skills. The haredest was probably sitting on the ocean floor, 12m down, taking off my mask, swimming off and returning to put the mask back on and clearing it of water! Although I passed and I am sure I will use my license when I get to the Great Barrier Reef, I dont think water sports are for me - there is too much preparation and safety checks and not enough doing!

From Koh Tao I moved onto Koh Phangan, home of the infamous full moon party. Even upto to the full moon party the area of Haad Rin was buzzing and during the day a local hotel organised a 3 day beach soccer tournament. Our team was thrown together at the last minute and comprised of several Brits, Yanks and Norwegians. looking at some of the opposition - a team from Israel, one from Chile and the reigning champions from Thailand, we didn't think we had much chance but after a quick team talk which some of you who know me probably will not be surprised to hear it went along the lines of "Two at the back, two up front. Look at the pitch. You can't play football on that. Just launch the ball up front and if we get a throw in I will just throw it as hard as I can at the goals!"

Well 3 days later we had kicked the Israelis off the park, bundled in a few throw-ins, outskilled the Chileans (you would have been proud of my goal JC) got to the semis and missed a hat-full of chances against the worst team we had played to date. We eventually lost out to a dubious golden goal penalty. But we made up for it by beating the Thai holders in the 3/4 play-off to win 100oB and spent it quickly on buckets of samsong and sprite. Thanks to the lads who made those three days such a good time and thanks for their graft in such hot conditions. Come on the Wankers!