|
Diving in The Similans – by Rick Hawkins Rick's Page | Jazz Art | Digital Art
You're floating above a huge valley, looking down on a sandy bottom populated by blue-spotted stingrays 35 metres below. On one side there's a blue void, on another side there's a steep incline going to the bottom at an angle of about 70 degrees covered by a huge and amazingly complex reef with hundreds of different types of coral and anemones and inhabited by thousands of different species of fish, molluscs, crustaceans and reptiles; you're travelling fast in the void because you're in a strong current that's dragging you parallel to the reef; you point yourself towards the bommies and bare rocks that are swathed in gigantic but delicate gorgonian sea fans; circling around you there are big, silver barracuda; you can see large parrotfish gliding effortlessly through the coral and rock, biting off chunks of coral and excreting sand; suddenly you're aware of a ghostly and bizarre image: a large sunken boat, its bow pointing upwards; you glide over and swing on the railing as you pass; a turtle appears and grazes near you in a relaxed fashion; someone points to a black and white sea snake, winding its way through the coral; then a giant moray eel, with a head as large as a Rottweiler’s, grimaces at you in a ghastly fashion; there are beautiful but poisonous lionfish floating quietly, waiting for their unsuspecting prey; then you see a breathtaking sight: a leopard shark, about 2 and a half metres long and with a remora attached, glides towards you, passes and then turns and comes back, passing closely again; you fly over another cliff-top and there's another leopard shark, fast asleep at 30 metres on the sand; you then start to make your ascent and the current gets stronger; now you're flying through the void with the huge valley below and the blue void out to the west, going to India; you wait at 5 metres for 3 minutes and maybe do a few somersaults, while you contemplate the wonder of it all; then you're at the surface and the big boat is approaching with the dive head-honcho (who looks like a young and very tall Mick Jagger, and has a London accent to boot) yelling: "OK, guys, start swimming to the boat!" The current is like a wild river now and you swim with and across it and grab the rail at the end of the boat before you're swept away. Then you disengage your fins and climb back onto the boat to divest yourself of your weight belt, tank, BCD, reg, wetsuit and boots and go up to the mid deck to get ready for the next dive and do it all again! If you’re a diver and you’re in Thailand, you must visit the Similans, a group of nine uninhabited islands about 100 kilometres northwest of Phuket in the Andaman Sea. The islands look like beautiful jewels set in the bright turquoise sea. They are covered with tropical vegetation and boast many pristine white-sand beaches, whose beauty you can contemplate from the deck of your liveaboard while you wait for the next dive. There are great possibilities for jungle treks and lazing on beaches that have little sign of human interference, save for the many dive boats moored offshore, but the ‘landscape’ underwater is even more dramatic, with radically different geographies on the western and eastern sides of the islands. The west is exposed to the monsoon winds, which make diving from May to October all but impossible, and exposing stark, black granite boulders that extend 30 to 40 metres to the sandy bottom. This landscape, and the strong currents, makes diving on the western side an exciting experience whilst the eastern side offers more contemplative diving, with gorgeous and wonderfully diverse coral reefs, and all the busy goings-on and symbiotic hustle and bustle of reef life laid out for you to experience. Getting to the Similans is easy – an hour and a half speedboat ride from the mainland delivers you to the waiting liveaboard. I went with South Siam Divers, a Thai company that operates a number of boats including my home for the next three days and two nights, the imaginatively named South Siam 3, a 30-metre vessel that can sleep 34 people. Late April being near the end of the ‘season’ there were relatively few divers on board, indeed on one night of my two night, three-day stay there were only about 12 of us: a good international mix of Brits, Americans, Germans, Thais, a Canadian, a Malaysian and me, the solitary Aussie! The DMs are multicultural as well: our boat had two Thais, two Brits and one Dane and my group was led by one of the Thais, a cheeky-looking young fellow named Gatt, one of those great divers who make everything they do underwater look effortless (I swear I hardly ever saw him finning, let alone using his arms!) Getting into the water is always a lot of chaotic fun on a busy liveaboard: there’s the captain (Ian in this case, the tall, Mick Jagger look-alike mentioned earlier) exhorting everyone to “get a move on, get your fins on, get to the back of the boat and jump in”; there’s the clown of the group (Klaus, a big bear of a German in his late 50s, utilising the little English he has by bellowing “manta rays, whale sharks” as if he will be able to conjure them up on the dive); there’s the sound of the horn - the signal for us to jump in. Everyone finds his or her group and dive leader and Gatt, our leader, is waiting with impish face: “Everybody ready? Let’s go! See you later” and you descend and watch Gatt below you, doing somersaults as he quickly drops the 28 metres to the bottom.
The first dive was Deep Six, south of Koh Similan, the largest island. There were large schools of lunar fusiliers, with their beautiful iridescent blue sheen, swimming around the huge gorgonian sea fans that proliferate in the Similans and add to the stark beauty of some of the barren valleys on the western side. Also prolific were large parrotfish, their faces permanently affixed with a smile; big triggerfish (and there were many stories from divers in Thailand about trigger fish attacks, making these cantankerous and pugnacious buggers one of the most feared fish in Thailand!); angels; butterfly fish; sweetlips and unicorn fish. Apart from the impressively-laced fan coral there was table and maze coral in abundance. The second dive was at East of Eden, two or three islands south, and there was a semi-tame giant moray eel resting at the bottom. I’d seen many morays whilst diving off Phuket but didn’t realise they got this big! The first sight of him was awe-inspiring and his irascible expression didn’t change one bit when one diver gave him a big hug, which he seemed to tolerate magnanimously. East of Eden has a huge bommie covered in coral and there are plenty of the magnificent gorgonian sea fans and anemone gardens with their always-vigilant clownfish. The third dive was at Anita’s Reef and here we saw a real variety of coral, including the intriguing leather coral that spreads over the rocks. A large octopus slid across the coral, taking refuge in whatever hole it could find and changing colour every few seconds, something I never get tired of observing! At 30 metres on the sandy floor, garden eels poked out their heads, with their beady eyes observing all of these strange creatures passing by. The first night included a night dive only made eventful by the fact that it was my first. The next morning we were submerged by 7.30 at Shark Fin Reef at the southern end of the island group and the current was strong which made for an exciting dive; spotted rays drifted just above the sand at 30 metres while more garden eels had a good look around; above us, a Napoleon wrasse languidly patrolled the reef. Shark Fin Reef proved not to be eponymous as our first shark sighting was at Boulder City: a leopard shark, accompanied by a retinue of remoras and other hangers-on, cruised closely past us in one of the dramatic amphitheatres at this site. At 30 metres, another leopard shark lay asleep. At Beacon Point we observed a black-banded sea snake going about its business, winding its way through the coral labyrinth. There are supposed to be over 300 species of coral here, including soft corals of every colour imaginable and staghorn, leather, plate, maze and fan corals amongst the hard varieties. Bright yellow trumpet fish stalked their prey while lionfish, triggerfish and squid went about their businesses in this superb setting. The second dive at Beacon was with the current, which was a relief (on the previous dive I felt like I was swimming through treacle as we doggedly made our way against the current) and, as we drifted over a bommie, a dramatic sight greeted us: the wreck of another liveaboard, sunk in a monsoon storm a couple of years ago, about 15 metres below the surface, its prow pointing upwards on the steep slope. It was late afternoon and the light made the wreck more eerie – we swung over the railings and drifted on; I looked back as the ghostly vessel disappeared in the plankton-rich water. The second night was shaping up to be a good party. One of the Americans lined up large bottles of Jack Daniel’s and Absolut vodka and invited everyone to “help yourselves”. Gatt and Bam, the other Thai DM, persuaded me to get my guitar out and the boat started rocking while we all sang along to “Roadhouse Blues” and “No Woman, No Cry”. Very suddenly, a storm hit: the wind blew anything light off the tables and then started to blow everything off the tables! The sea got very choppy; the boat was literally rocking and the captain decided we needed to seek shelter on the other side of the largest island so all but the most foolhardy, or drunk (me and the American!), went below deck. The last day dawned bright and peaceful after the tempest of the night before. Once again we were briefed by the laconic Ian (who sloughed-off some of his torpor when a bunch of pretty, single women boarded the boat the afternoon before) assuring us that manta rays were likely to be seen at this place, known as North Point. While the mantas proved elusive, it was a very nice dive with two leopard sharks dozing on the bottom; a ghost pipefish almost indistinguishable from the surrounding flora; a young turtle moving through the gardens in a very relaxed manner; another octopus changing colour and returning my fascinated look with an intense stare; silver sweetlips; and trumpetfish in their vertical hunting position. During our safety stop we were very close to a pack of blackfin barracuda, looking sleek and menacing as they hovered nearby.
Leaving the liveaboard was all confusion as the speedboat arrived and all the crew hurried us off. There was gear to collect, tips to give to Gatt and the boat boys and eventually the overloaded speedboat took off, only to run out of petrol halfway to the mainland (“typical Thai organisation”, bemoaned the Germans). We drifted in the middle of the sea, unable to make radio contact with the mainland and starting to get slightly apprehensive until contact was made and eventually another speedboat arrived with spare petrol! Of course, there was all manner of confusion back on the mainland when it came to despatching everyone onto buses but that’s another story and all part of the charm of beautiful Thailand and the beautiful Thai people in this fantastic part of the world. |
Try to imagine this: 
The desire for the elusive Manta rays
prompted the captain to head for the Surin Islands further north to a site
called Koh Bon where mantas are almost guaranteed. Underwater, the sad
sight of dynamited coral was interspersed with impressive healthy coral
gardens and we saw giant sweetlips; a free-swimming giant moray eel (my
first sighting of any moray out of its hole); another banded sea snake; a
family of lobsters hiding in a cave; large butterfly and angel fish and
big fat porcupine fish. The captain was so sure that the mantas would make
themselves available that we dived at Koh Bon again, though this time
Klaus, the big old German, declaimed, in his booming voice: “no manta, no
whale shark – no diving!” as he opted out of this, the last dive. A large
leopard shark and a very big lionfish compensated for the lack of mantas.