Thailand Liveaboard Trip

Hey all,

Just got off the boat from an 8 day 7 night liveaboard trip on the Deep Andaman Queen.  Originally this trip was going to be up through the Similan Islands into Burma and diving along the way but due to Burma's elections and the happiness about that, Burmese immigration was closed when our documents would have needed to be processed.  So instead, we did North and South diving around Phuket.  North being the Similan Islands while South was around Phi Phi and beyond.  While it would have been cool to do Burma...and I still want to one day, the trip was pretty awesome overall.  Good boat, nice dive guides and a great crew made for a nice trip.  My one complaint would have been that I wanted more Thai food offerings for meals.  It was a mix of western and Thai and I would have been happier with more Thai.  Oh well...never satisfied.

22 dives = lots of photos.  I will try to kee the number of lion fish and scorpion fish and eels down.  Saw a lot of them and have a lot of photos.  Today we are in Patong (city in the south of Phuket) and will be here for a couple of days before heading to Bangkok for a couple of days.

Not a whole lot else to say...oh...the other people on the trip.  There were 8 of us on a boat that would do 20 or more so it was nice and not crowded.  Good group of people including a Swiss lady, Nathalie, an English gentleman, Adam, two guys from Denmark, Kris and Junior (hilarious guys), A guy from Colorado, Bret, and a woman from Australia, Sam.  We got along well and had a good time on the boat.  Enjoyed all their company and would love to dive with them again some day.

Until then, how about some pictures!

Lobster!!!  Dinner!!!!

A grouper...crap...forget the name

One dive just had a field of purple soft coral.  Really beautiful

Nudi!

Tons of fish at the dive sites.  Schools.  Awesome

The only turtle we saw the whole trip!.  It was up at the surface as we were coming up.  I snapped this as it was heading back down

2 Nudis!  I was using Stacy's camera (she wasn't able to dive a couple of dives because she couldn't clear her ears).  I didn't do the flash and didn't get good color here.

Another Nudi..same flash problem, but you can still see the details

This anemone adds bits of coral to camoflage itself.  Crazy

School of fish hugging a table coral in a pretty decent current

Looking out from a chamber called the cathedral.  Awesome visibility on this dive.  Those divers are a ways away

These are Derbin Dancing Shrimp.  You see one, there are a ton more around

Puffer fish from the front.  Look at those bottom teeth!

Stacy enjoying her dive 

some purple soft coral.

Yellow Box Fish

Green Moray...coming at yah!

This is a juvenile angel fish.  Really cool...and also freaking fast and fidgety.  Best photo I could get of it

Bat fish.  Not shy at all

A moorish idol snacking on a jellyfish.

Sea Fan...it was large

Another jelly floating along.

Another Moray Eel

Some kind of slug...or maybe a baby sea cucumber?  I dunno

Crab!

Cool line showing the edge of a school of glass fish.  Tons of them...look like swallows shifting around and stuff

Purple sea dragon

Clown trigger fish

Nudi!

2 dinners!  Actually there were 5 or 6 lobsters in this crack...all were large

Lion fish

2 purple sea dragons

The boat crew has this phallus on a string they would attatch to people's tanks as they would jump off the boat.  Then you would have this cock floating above you the whole dive.  This was Bret with the penis.  And yes, I had my dive with the cock too

Oriental sweetlips.  Really bright yellows.

Banded sea snake

Two trumpet fish cruising along

Red Banded Boxer Shrimp.  Tons of these around...hard to get good focus...at least with my camera

Juvenile oriental sweetlips

closeup of a scorpion fish.  Look at the coral-like bits hanging from his lower lip.  This attracts fish...to their death!

More Derbin Shrimp

Scorpion fish blending in 

Two red banded boxing shrimp

Nother crab!  Should probably mention here for Sophia's sake: didn't see any mantas at all :(  One of the other groups on our boat saw one on a quick flyby, but that was it.

white eyed eel

Peacock Mantis Shrimp.  Really cool looking..and super faast.  One of their front arms whips forward to break things.  So strong, they break aquarium glass because they see their reflections and are super territorial.

No mantas...but we got whale shark!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Cruising along with it's entourage

Sooooo Awesome...

One more...whale shark!  (it's the same one, but one more photo)

Big grouper

Sort of out of focus, but in front of those derbin shrimp in the middle background is a red frog fish.  It's mouth is a little open and you can see it's beady eye looking out.

Oh the Moray and the puffer will be friends....

Another school of a fish...so awesome

Lotsa bat fish with Stacy and Adam

This is a side view of this freaky crab that isn't in the books.  It scuttled from side to side...it was freaky

Unicorn Fish.  Really, that's its name

These bad boys were large...like 3 feet long!!!

Crap...I forget what type of Moray this is.  Pretty cool, though

Scorpion fish coming at yah1

Devil scorpion fish

2 white eyed eels...little ones.  Cute

Zebra lion fish.  Pretty awesome, huh?

Nudi!

Hermit Crab

Another Nudi!

Spotted Nudi!

Yet another nudi!

Tons of fish on the last dive...like swishing your hands to get them out of the way tons.  Awesome diving

Stacy telling you to hang loose!!!

Whew!  Tons of photos and I paird it down!  The whale shark was hands down the highlight, but the diving was pretty darn good overall. Some days had better visibility than others, but for sure every dive had at least one cool nugget.  Thanks to the crew on Deep Andaman Queen for the trip.  Hope to do it again with you one day.

Going to be in Phuket for a couple of days and then off to Bangkok.  More blog to come!

Until then; it's our time, the people's time!

love to all
Jim