Feb 18 Scuba Diving and getting sun burnt

We woke up at nine o clock. We were an hour late for scuba diving. Quickly we got dressed, I was very grumpy. But our luck was beginning to turn around. The scuba diver driver guy had waited for us. Somewhere in the south coast of Ko Chang a boat load of scuba diving tourists eagerly waited for our arrival so they could go scuba diving, they had been there an hour at that stage and were probably cursing our names.
We got a quick speed boat ride which was great fun though the guy spent the entire time trying to make us fall overboard and thought that was funny. We were left on a large ship and off we sailed.
There are 37 islands in the archipelago around Ko Chang, most of them are small places, inhabitable rocks: perfect sites for scuba diving.
When we got into the lovely, warm water we were met with a school of fish who greeted us jovially, swimming around us, eager to be fed. Going under water we could see coral, interesting rocks and an array of cool, colorful fish. We got back on board and had some hot chocolate. We sailed around for a while and watched the ship's crew fishing, then we stopped for more scuba diving. Another hour of scuba diving showed us new fish and rocks. We had a small island that we could swim around and we got bread to feed the fish with.
After that we had dinner and off we went sailing again. There was more scuba diving which we didn't do (as we'd just eaten) and then a barbecue with the best potatoes I've tasted outside of Ireland. This was followed by more scuba diving and the stark realization that we had been badly sunburned during the first too sessions. We had put on suncream before and after each session, but it wasn't waterproof and the sun got us while we were under the waves. We had all the signs of scuba-diving sun-burners: burned shoulders, back, arms and legs. It was still quite warm as we arrived back at the bay, evening brought no cool breeze, it was going to be a warm, stagnant evening. Charlies, our strange hotel was going to be loud and they had invited us to drink there. We had also come to realize that it was a brothel. We were grumpy,. tired, burnt and staying in a dirty place with loud music. It was clear to both of us that we had to get extremely drunk: I was only sorry that I hadn't done it sooner.
We went for a run on the scooter to cool us down, had a pint in the Irish pub and went back to Charlies country club. As we approached we saw a crowd there that consisted of a live country band, a load of Thai girls, a group of old, western men and an uncomfortable Swedish guy who had, like us, rented a room in the place.
We sped into the area and crashed comically into a large tree. People looked over and everyone laughed and cheered. That's why I LOVE Thailand. Its just so crazy.
We sat down under the palm trees and started on the beers. The trick to getting so drunk that you don't notice your surroundings (a good tip for campers, booze has always helped me when it comes to sleeping in a tent in Freezing cold Ireland) is to drink just enough so it all goes dizzy but not enough to get sick (as that will sober you up too much so you'll have to start the process again... for more information see my fabulous self-help book entitled "How to drink yourself out of horrible situations, chapter 12: the great outdoors). The beer was cheap enough, about 1.20 a bottle, so we had as many as we could hold. The band played a range of songs to disinterested Thai women, each very close to middle-aged western men. Paddy and I were severely sloshed and I remember him saying, extremely loudly "I think this is a brothel"
Charlie came over to us, telling us it was a nice place, his country club and giving us a story about how he loved country music. As we had both dreamed of opening our own internet cafe, our own little piece of heaven, we could relate to that and we all drank together to Charlie's country club.
We got rewarded with free beers and got asked to sing a song. I climbed up to the huge stage and joined the band to sing hotel California, it was one of the best moments of the holiday, it was such a buzz. The music and microphone were so loud that people could hear me all around and everyone said I was really good. We tried to cajole Paddy into singing a song, but he wouldn't budge.
Drunkly we retired to our hut and slept sound, hangover's be damned.