We continued our island hopping, less cycling, and a little snorkeling — from Koh Phi Phi to Koh Lanta. A week on Koh Lanta went by really quickly. Ferda and I spent three days taking a freediving course with Lion at Phoenix Divers in Ban Sala Dan, the same town where the ferry from Phi Phi dropped us on Lanta. We had a classroom day, a pool day, and an open sea day. Mostly we learned techniques: relaxation breathing, duck dives, kicking with long fins. In the pool we did both static apnea (how long can you hold your breath under water?) and dynamic apnea (how far can you travel underwater with fins?). In the open water we practiced our duck dives and rescuing a disabled diver from 5m. Our goal was to learn a bit to improve our snorkeling. Along the way we earned PADI freediver certification for whatever that’s worth.
Here’s Ferda rescuing our instructor, Lion.
As a little bonus, almost as soon as we had completed all our skills tests for the certificates, a zebra shark swam under us.
We also saw a black-tipped reef shark, some melon butterflyfish, red tail butterflyfish, cleaner wrasse, skunk clownfish, Clark’s anemonefish, two Titan triggerfish chasing (?) each other in tight circles, a porcupinefish chasing another porcupinefish, crown of thorns starfish, a surprisingly fat and long sea snake, a giant moray eel, … but none of those are exciting enough to bother you with poor quality photos. The zebra shark photos probably aren’t very exciting either, but I had never seen one before.
As usual in Thailand it was easy to find tasty food on Koh Lanta.
We stayed at Lanta Resort where one of our daily goals was to sit on the lounge chairs and watch the sunset.
We enjoyed getting to know new friends — friends of a friend — Greg and Praow who were staying a month on Lanta Resort. After our week there, we agreed it’s an easy place to spend a month.
Ferda and I had one short day of riding to get from where we were staying at the NW part of the island to the east side to what’s called Old Town Lanta where the boats depart for Koh Kradan. We noted that Lanta had more forest than we’d seen anywhere on our ride from Cha-Am to Krabi.
Another ferry to another island…
