Thailand Diving - Krabi

King Cruiser Wreck, Koh Kiaew, and Shark Point

Friday  22nd February, 2008

The family made a trip to Krabi for a four-day weekend this February, and I got a "super day" of diving with Coral Diving out of Ao Nang.  The plan was to dive the King Cruiser Wreck, Anemone Reef and Shark Point.  The currents made Anemone Reef too difficult, so we dove Koh Kiaew (a nearby island) for the second dive instead.

The King Cruiser is a wreck that sank in 1997 (I think).  It was a car ferry and struck Anemone Reef, tearing a huge hole in the hull and causing it to sink.  Funny thing is that Anemone Reef was on all of the charts at the time, so it shouldn't have been a surprise.  Luckily, all of the passengers were saved.  (Again, from my memory...)  It's got a maximum depth of about 35 meters, with the top part of the wreck at about 15-20 meters depending on the tide.  We dropped in and grabbed the anchor line and started our decent.  One of my buddies was having trouble getting to the line due to the current, so we hung out on the line for a few minutes.  Oh well.  We dropped down to the bottom and the first thing I noticed was a "wire crate" structure filled with lion fish.  We swung around the back and went under the area near the props and came up the other side to come out on the top deck in about 22 msw.  Lots of coral growing on the wreck, and schools of fish everywhere.  One group from our boat spotted a leopard shark at the front of the wreck, but we didn't make it there, as one of the other guys was low on air.  (For those of you that know me, you are probably wondering why I wasn't the one low on air.  Well, I asked for a 15 L tank instead of the standard 12 L tank, so I was just about to signal turn-around pressure, but got beat to the punch.)  We headed to the line and began our ascent.  When we got to about 8 msw, there was a huge crowd on the line making their safety stop.  I felt for a minute like a climber waiting at the bottom of the second step on Everest.  Well, not really. I've never been on Everest, but I read about it in "Into Thin Air."  The dive was nice, but it felt rushed due to the depth.  And I didn't take very many good pictures.  But overall it was beautiful.  Stats for this dive:  Maximum depth:  32.2 msw; Average depth: 15.7 msw; Dive time:  34 minutes; Average temperature:  29 degrees C.

The second dive was a semi-drift dive on the reef flanking the island of Koh Kiaew.  It ended up being a really nice leisurely dive along the reef.  The abundance of life was amazing, but I think the highlight of the dive had to be seeing my first Crown-Of-Thorn seastar.  Wow, it was beautiful.  I guess they are rabid carnivores and destroy reefs, so it was good to only see one.  Lionfish were everywhere, along with these weird "egg-like" things.  As I type this, I'm not sure what they are.  I saw them here and at the next dive, Shark Point.  I forgot to ask my DM about them.  There were quite a few puffer fish and porcupine fish along this dive also.  The feather stars were everywhere.  Of course, none of my pictures look anything like the pictures in my ID books.  Either I need better pictures or new ID books.  Hmmm.  Overall, a great dive.  Stats:  Maximum depth:  22.1 msw; Average depth:  10.9 msw; Dive time:  54 minutes; Average temperature: 29 C.

For the last dive of the day we visited Shark Point.  Allegedly this dive is famous for leopard sharks.  I say allegedly, because they were (of course) nowhere to be seen.  The current was actually quite high, so the dive was a big challenging, along with low vis.  Shark Point has three "pinnacles" along the reef.  One breaks the surface of the water, while the other two don't quite reach the surface.  The plan was to start on Shark Point 1 and drift along to two and three.  Somewhere along the way, we ended up fighting the current more than planned, and didn't even get to the third reef.  And of course, since we were fighting the current, the dive was cut short by low air.  I guess that's what happens on a group dive like this.  Oh well.  The reefs were covered in beautiful gorgonian (fan?) corals.  I'd say the two highlights were spotting a "family" of moray eels and seeing a bluespotted stingray.  And there were more of the "egg" things on this dive.  So I was bummed that we didn't see any sharks at Shark Point, but I guess you can't have everything.  My definition of a good dive:  If I see cool stuff and come home safe.  This fit my definition, so I can't complain too much.  Stats:  Maximum depth:  19.1 msw; Average depth: 13.4 msw; Dive time: 39 minutes. 

Below are some pictures from the day of diving.  A few of them turned out alright.  Click on the image to see a larger version. 

(Note: A few pictures were cropped, but none of the images were "photoshopped" in any other way.)

The Wreck of the King Cruiser
The longtail boats on the beach at Ao Nang.	Loading the dive boat from the longtail.	An unidentified nudibranch.  (For the purposes of full disclosure, this picture was cropped.)	A view of the collapsing deck of the King Cruiser, with a large school of fish hanging out.
A sea urchin and a soft coral.	A longfin bannerfish.
Koh Kiaew
An urchin (don't remember the species off the top of my head, but it's a new one for my "collection.")	A soft coral of some sort.  I have a hard time identifying most of the corals/anemones.	A cushion star.	A Crown-Of-Thorns star.  (My first time seeing this beautiful critter.)
A net left over on the reef by somebody.  Ug.	A coral formation.	A sea cucumber doing some cleaning of the coral.  This was another "first sighting" for me.  I took loads of pictures of it.	A soft coral formation.  (Or is it an anemone?)
A lionfish.  I never really got any great pictures of the lionfish, but they sure are beautiful.	Some barrel sponges.  I can see Jan Kocian saying something like, "Dad, mom and the two kids."  (For more great pictures by Jan, check out his site.)	Not sure if the term "juvenile" is correct for a sponge, but I thought this one looked cool.	Koh Kiaew as we leave for Shark Point.
Shark Point
A "family" of morays.	A view looking down on a fan coral.	A yellow boxfish.  (Photo cropped.  And by the looks of it, maybe a bit too much...lost some clarity.)	More barrel sponges.
Not sure what these are...but they were everywhere here and at Koh Kiaew.  Eggs? Edit:  These are Bubble Coral, Plerogyra sinuosa, as identified by LeslieH on ScubaBoard. (Check out the thread on ScubaBoard here.)	Some mushroom coral pieces that were overturned.  Not sure if this is natural or not.	A scorpion fish on the sandy bottom.	A "mini" school of cardinal fish hiding from the current.
A feather star.	I found Nemo.	A bluespotted stingray.  (Not the same species as the bluespotted ribbontail ray I see in the gulf.)  This was a new species, and very cool to see.	Looking at Shark Point as we leave.