Once more a group of very international guests is ready to join the MV Smiling Seahorse for a week of diving and celebration. Bring it on 2020!

Could we possibly wish a better end to 2019 ?
On the first day of the cruise around South Twin, we had the pleasure to dive 3 times with plenty of Oceanic Mantas!
On the 2nd day we spotted 8 different Seahorses around Shark Cave, Square Rock and Submarine dive sites!
It was also time to say goodbye to 2019 and we celebrated the New Year with a firework and enthusiastic divers ready to party! What a great night we had!!! Dancing the night away in the middle of the Mergui Arquipelago was a night to remember.

We started 2020 with a new adventure. We decided to navigate West to the Burma Banks, some huge flat sandy seamounts in the middle of nowhere! These underwater hills are covered by hard corals, some thousands of years old and so so massive!
Because the floor goes very deep around the banks, it is a great spot to meet with sharks, many sharks and many different sharks.
This time we were in awe to observe a Silvertip Reef Shark, swimming into the blue, and plenty of nurse sharks, chilling on the bottom, hiding below a rock, or cruising around. With a 30m visibility and a cristal blue water, we couldn't have started the year better than that!

We finished this incredible journey around the South West of Mergui Archipelago, we started with Seafan Forest, which was absolutely gorgeous, full of life, from Stone fish to school of Barracudas, Golden trevallies, yellow fin snappers etc...

During the dive we found a big ghost fishing net covering the East part of the reef. The 4 instructors onboard decided to go for an extra dive in between 2 dives and take it off! Ghost nets are not only ugly, they continue to kill fish which will never end in a plate and will just be wasted at the bottom of the ocean. 
Seafan forest is one of our favourite dive sites, we just cannot leave this net there. It was a 20 minutes work for our team of 4, but we managed to remove it all, and to set free a beautiful stone fish caught in the net! It was a great satisfaction for all of us. 

Congratulations to David, Liz, Tav and Schezo for becoming Nitrox divers, and thank you Jeff for coming back, year after year, for now 8 seasons!! 
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Happy New Year to all of you !

​During this special 7 days trip, we navigated to South twin where we spotted marbled rays, schools of trevallys, hawkbill turtle and lots of cuttle fishes!

​The next day we travelled to Black Rock where we expericenced strong currents. They brought us massives schools of big-eye trevallys, rainbow runners, barracudas and long-nose emperors.

ps: Franck, our regular cruise director and photographer was not onboard this week so I'm illustrating this post with underwater photos as well as the Whale video from previous cruises :)

Myanmar, also known as Burma, is a delightful tourism destination. Whether you are looking for nature or culture Myanmar got it all. Today I wanted to talk to you about Myanmar’s traditional fishing methods both in the lake and at sea.
Inle Lake, located about 600 km north of Yangon, has been one of Burma's top tourist attractions in recent years. The Inthas living around the lake have been an ancestral fishing method which has now become a real tourism attraction.
being an Inle-based fishermen requires a great deal of agility! These acrobats definitely have a technique of their own: The fisherman balances on one leg at the stern of its – very unstable – wooden pirogue in order to use its other leg to help as an extra hand! They either wrap it around the oar to have two free hands or use the leg to launch their trap or net.

For this second last cruise in Burma, we have been spoiled with great weather and amazing outdoors sceneries!
Hundreds of islands, settled or non settled ones, with sea gypsies around, emerald waters and white sand beaches ... 
Sounds like paradise, doesn't it?
Here are some more amazing shots from the last trip!

"A huge thank you for this wonderful week! Nice discoveries, top crew, top guides, top food, no complaints!"

It has been a trip full of surprises, for most of us a dream come true ... watching whales at the surface coming close enough from the boat so we can enjoy the show!

We welcomed on board: Gérard, Corinne, Kévin, Emilie, Pascal and Fanny from France; Bob, Lee, Eric and Pamela from USA; Kristel and Daniel from Germany; Olli from Finland, Yosita from Thailand; Christopher and Amanda from England.

Oh ... what a cruise!!!
For our last exploration trip in the Burma Banks, we have been very very blessed meeting so many fantastic creatures!

Our lucky group on board: Christophe, Chloé, Stéphane, Laure, Sandra and Gregory from Switzerland; Fabian and Michaela from Germany; Sylvie, Ghislaine and Patrick from France; Ivy from Australia; Andre from England; Areena from Thailand and Gils from Netherlands.

Happy faces for this Belgium charter who had the chance to have a fantastic cruise, full of life and manta from day one!!!
Welcome to: Alain, Liliane, Régine, Patrick, Joel, Béa, Jean-Marc, Sabine, Jacques, Magali, Michel, Christiane, Florence, Françoise, Philippe and Annunzio.

Beautiful corals and fishes everywhere!

Why we love Burma ? That's a question many persons are asking us, and the only way to know it's to try !
This week was a blast ! Good Divers, little bit of luck, blue water and we have an awsome trip with so many surprises.

Oh what a wonderful surprise on our last trip!
A Manta Parade where we were not expecting them ;)

The lucky spectators of these fantastic moments were over the moon: Ronen from Israel; Jen and Nuno from Canada; Siu Fun from Hong Kong; Jerzy and Aleksandra from Poland; Kostas from Greece; Juan G. and Juan M. from Spain; Raymond and Martina from Germany; Erica, Taylor and Lynn from USA; Mohamed from Belgium and Laurent from France.