Ahh, last night I got the first full uninterrupted night’s sleep since we arrived in Asia. No stupid chickens crowing at 3am and the room doesn’t have AC so don’t have to worry about noise which has its good and bad side.

I’m really in love with this place. There are a total of 6 guests on the entire island and it’s absolutely relaxing and quiet. One of my favorite things to do so far is sit in the restaurant at night and watch the gekos hang on the lanterns to chase down bugs.

I woke up at 7, had breakfast, and met our diving instructor Phillip who moved from Poland 5 years ago to be a diving instructor, at the dive shop at 9am. Alex didn’t do any scuba education before we came but he was invited to join us anyway, in the end he decided to get certified here because of how much fun it looked. I had a lot of issues with my mask leaking water, I had it too tight and too high up on my face so I was concentrated more on getting that resolved under the water than everything else that was going on :/

I’m really glad I chose Coral bay to do my open water certification. Phillip was very patient and a good teacher. They have their own private coral reef that is just exploding with life. I’m frustrated I don’t have good internet speed here to share all the great footage and pictures I took while underwater. I was told that the owner of the resort has made the reef a sanctuary and it’s not allowed to go fishing in the waters therefore there are a ton of different fish and they are not afraid of people. Some even approach you under water.

We wrapped up an hour dive in the morning and Alex spent the rest of the day doing his video and textbook courses to get officially certified. I couldn’t get enough of the marine life so I went snorkeling in the afternoon. I saw sea urchins, an eel, a sea turtle, lion fish, clown fish, and a bunch of other fish I’ve never seen before.

Tomorrow we’ll do another dive in the coral reef and the day after we’ll do 2 dives in the shipwreck area. I’m really excited to continue diving, it’s just such a different experience that I would recommend to everyone.