Diving in the Gulf of Siam (continued)

Those last two dives on Monday were indeed something special. We saw a reclusive ray with a long tail nested under a large rock, more schools of silvery barracuda (small in size for a fish with such a reputation for being fearsome) and moray eels. An odd sight was a ring of rocks that had been constructed by divers to cordon off two clown fish and their anemone companions. Dominic advised us not to cross this circle as it had been specially set up to protect this fish, now diminished in numbers in the sea by the clown fish as pet mania that followed the Disney film, “Finding Nemo”.

I’ve discovered diving to be a pleasurable experience even without the vistas of coral marine life. Scuba divers work at all times underwater at achieving neutral buoyancy. That means weighing no more or less then the surrounding water and this can be difficult as it is dependent on a number of variables including body weight, wet suit, remaining tank air and the adjustments to the buoyancy control vest. I made a pretty good go of it as I swam close over the coral without colliding without it. That sensation will be the closest I will ever get in my lifetime to experiencing virtual weightlessness. And like being out in space the sounds are limited. You hear yourself breathe through the regulator (because sound travel faster under water then in air), the bubbles that that makes and maybe the noise of the boats overhead. When Gemini astronaut Ed White ended the first space walk by an American in 1965 he felt that it was the “saddest moment of his life” to have to re-enter the space capsule. When we completed that first dive what I felt wasn’t an Ed White moment but I was already rueing that we only had one more dive to go for this trip.

Dominic took an underwater camera with him on some of the dives and filmed Bryan and me along with shots of marine life of particular interest. He turned it into DVD that he tried to sell us for $100 USD. Besides the price I balked at buying it because of the awful syrupy sounding Thai music he added as a sound track. As I mentioned earlier I had problems with our video camera because of the heat and humidity. I had my cell phone camera but certainly nothing I could use underwater. I have posted a few pics we took in Thailand on my Flickr pages, including the Wat in Bangkok where the Reclining Buddha statue is located.