The little known town of Bang Saphan lies 180km (2 hours by car) south of Hua Hin. It’s attractions are miles of empty beaches, acres of coconut groves, quaint beach bars and bungalows, idyllic offshore islands and of course none of the traffic, noise, construction, tourists and mayhem that is commonplace now in Hua Hin.

The main island of Koh Talu is popular with weekend Bangkokians who jostle for the shady spots on tour boats offering fully clothed snorkeling day trips from the mainland. Sadly the once pristine fringing coral reefs of Koh Talu have suffered lately from careless captains dropping anchors, and tourists standing on the coral and littering.

My mission was to find some new undiscovered snorkeling and diving spots and so I headed for the two islets of Koh Sing and Koh Sang with a friend who happened to own a small boat! Once beneath the surface the coral cover and condition was impressive, large boulder corals abundant along with carpets of sea anemones and finger corals. Although maximum depth was seldom over 8 meters marine life was plentiful enough to keep me occupied. A moray eel was found free swimming, a group of remoras decided to attach themselves to me, crabs scuttled for cover and large schools of glassfish parted like a silver curtain as I swam through. Some large pufferfish could be spotted and a rare saddleback anemonefish family was discovered vociferously protecting their home from the scuba intruder!

These two small islands are a haven for marine life and ideal for novice divers and snorkelers as currents were slight and everything was found in the shallows. There are plenty more undiscovered dive spots around Bang Saphan but I’ll save those for the next trip!

More information on the area can be found on www.bangsaphanguide.com

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 5th, 2007 at 4:12 pm and is filed under Hua Hin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.