Full boat, 16 guests coming from Russia, England, America, Canada, Slovenia, Switzerland and Australia embarking to dive 14 times over 4 days.
We start with the beautiful dive sites of the Surin National Park and see juvenile shaded batfish, big Jenkins whipray, huge napoleon wrasses, cute tecacera, called Pikachu nudibranch !

The second day of diving was wonderful, 4 dives in the stunning Richelieu Rock as always !
Ghostpipefish, Seahorse, Ribbon Eel, Harlequin shrimps, zebra morray, peacock mantis shrimp, a lot of glassfish and an incredible amount of schooling fish.

Direction the Similan National Park to dive on the incredible dive sites of Tachai Pinnacle and Koh Bon. Black tip reef sharks, three matings octopus, huge school of barracuda, pregnant lobsters and school of batfish.

Thank you for choosing The Smiling Sea Horse and see you soon above or underwater.

This week marked our third collaboration with Thai Whale Sharks, as we welcomed Marine Biologist and the founder of the project, Kirsty Magson onboard for 8 days of diving as we explored the north and south Andaman on the lookout for the world’s biggest fish. Kirsty delivered daily lectures on all things' shark as she educated guests on Whale Shark Ecology, Shark Biology, Threats to Sharks, Ecotourism, Whale Shark Conservation, Whale Shark Feeding and the Process behind Whale Shark ID. The trip was built around dive sites that offered the best chance to spot some of these gentle giants, so a lot of time was spent looking in the blue, but how did we get on?

Departing from Phuket the first stop on the agenda was Koh Haa and Lanta National Park to dive Hin Muang and Hin Daeng. Theses dive sites famous for the Dendronepthya soft corals which give these sites their names offered a lot of very fishy encounters as we were surrounded by schooling jacks, emperor fish and some were lucky enough to find 2 stone fish relaxing on the reef. Unfortunately, no signs of anything big in the blue this day but we did encounter some very large sea hares (Dolabella auricularia).

Day 2 and 3, we headed to Tarutao National Park, for dives sites such as steps, 8 miles Rock and of course Stonehenge. These 2 days provided us with Frogfish, seahorses, cat sharks, sea slugs, a wide array of hard and soft coral diversity and even a quick hello from another of the gentle giants, the Manta Ray (unfortunately not in front of Franck's lense so no photo...)

Day 5 and we headed North to the Similans to explore Shark Fin Reef, Elephant Head and Three Trees. Octopus and Ribbon Eels were high on everyone’s list of must-see animals. The Similans also provided an opportunity to jump off the boat and feel sand between our toes as we headed to the beach at…….. and the chance of an encounter with the Nicobar Pigeon. We ended the day with a sunset dive at Koh Bon and a blackwater dive, the first for many aboard (and most certainly not the last) with snake blennies, paper nautilus and so much more being seen.
The next day brought us to Koh Taa Chai, encounters with Black Tip and White Tip Reef Sharks as well as Eagle Rays and the school of Barracuda made for some amazing diving.

Day 7 and it was off to Richelieu Rock for 4 dives, and what a day we picked. Conditions were incredible with amazing visibility, low currents and of course some of the best diving in Thailand. The schools of jacks, glass fish, rainbow runners and emperor fish meant there was activity all through the water column and closer to the ground, we found Harlequin Shrimp, Seahorses, Sea Slugs, Peacock Mantis Shrimp and more.

To round off the trip, we ended with 2 dives on the Boonsung Wreck ahead of landing in Khao Lak. The wreck was destroyed in the tsunami, but offers a wide array of marine life living in all the nooks and crannies that can be found. Cat sharks, sea slugs, cuttlefish, and the honeycomb moray eel were favorites of the day and a great way to round off the trip.
Whilst we weren’t lucky enough to encounter any whale sharks on this trip, we were fortunate to enjoy some incredible diving with some amazing marine life. So, until our next adventure, thanks for reading. 

Wanna learn something new from Kistry on our next Whale shark and marine bio expedition?! 
​Save the date for the next edition!

This week we started with a beautiful day in Surin National Park with a very international group of divers from France, Japan, Belgium, China, Germany, and the United States. As usual, Richelieu offered us some amazing dives, and we got lucky, witnessing a ghost pipe fish releasing its eggs and a harlequin shrimp eating a sea star. The reef was alive with big fish hunting in schools of glass fish.

Entering the Similan National and spending the second day in Koh Tachai and Koh Bon for 4 great dives including a night dive. Turtle, lobsters, barracudas, trevallies, fusilliers and some spanish dancer eggs. Cruising south in the archipelago and diving Three trees, Elephant head rock and West of Eden. We love those dive sites for the macro, nudis, crustaceans.

The following 3 days we dive around Lanta and Tarutao National Park. The dive sites are always wonderful, the amount and the diversity of the coral reef impress us every time.

Last day in Phi Phi island and shark point with black tip reef shark, lots of beauty nudis and flat worms. Congratulations to Coralie, Anthony, and Phoebe for their Enriched Air Nitrox course and Kevin for the double certifications (Enriched Air Nitrox & Advanced Open Water course)
Thank you all for choosing The Smilling Seahorse!
​Hope you had a great holiday!!

2023 started with some fantastic photo opportunities as we ran 2 photo clinic back to back with our special guest Alex Tyrrell from Dive4photos. The first one was our dedicated blackwater expedition with blackwater dives planned every night (click here to read the trip report). Our second cruise of the year was dedicated to getting the best photos Thailand's Andaman Sea can offer and this is why we decided to focus on thailand's best dive site and one of the World's top 10: Richelieu Rock for most of the cruise. 
Underwater photographers from Thailand, India, England, America, South Korea and France enjoyed daily presentations by Alex in order to get the most out of their cameras!

We found the delightful pikachu nudibranch and pretty yet oh so mean harlequin shrimps.
We witnessed clark anemone fish's parents nurturing their eggs under the protective skirt of their anemone.

Our wide angle captured amazing action with huge ball of jackfish dancing on the reef. There was so much marine life that we didn't know where to look at. School of trevallies, fusillier, yellow goatfish, emperor, batfish, barracuda and glass fish all of this with the pretty pink soft coral that gave Richelieu rock its name! 

The days were bright and colourful but that didn't stop us from running a few night dives, especially blackwater dives for which The Smiling Seahorse became Thailand's expert!
We tried a new spot near the Surin islands, where we installed two lines to accommodates all the divers more comfortably and what great encounters we had!

What a pleasure it has been to welcome all these talented photographers! Thank you all for coming diving with The Smiling Seahorse, the choice liveaboard for Underwater photographers in Thailand!

The did the first dive at shark fin reef for a check up dive, then explored west of Eden, elephant head, and finished the day with the first black water dive of the week.

Because this cruise was dedicated to "blackwater diving", we went diving at the edge of the continental plate, a few hours west of the Similan Islands, giving us the opportunity to dive above hundreds of meters of water...
​
And what did we see on these ​Blackwater dives?  We saw so many cool and weird creatures... 
We saw some cool pelagic such as anemone larval stage, some salps, pelagic sea snake, flounder in larval stage and more...

The highlights of the trip where a male paper nautilus, snake blennies and flying gurnard. 
​But photos seak a thousand words so let me show you what it looks like!

Above, from left to right you'll see one of many type of squids we encounter on Blackwater dives in the Andaman Sea. A pretty golden filefish and a male paper nautilus! Read more information about the wonderful nautiluses and their cousins the argonauts... Males don't have shells, females do to keep their eggs close-by :)

Have you ever seen pelagic nudibranch? This is what it looks like (top left), in the middle is a pretty larval snake blenny and on the right a baby crab! so cute!

In the 4 photos above, you can see a larval anemone, a larval flouder (before it eyes migrate to the other side of its face! yeah, that's a thing!). You can see a reddish crustacean in front of the cloud of ink a cephalopod left behind and the last photo is the alien looking seasnail crossing oceans with its sail-like tentacules...

Flying gurnards, (top left) are rarely seen on regular dives but quite commonly spotted on our blackwater dives.
Morray eels (middle photo) look like this transparent ghost at their larval stage before they grow big enough to settle back to the reef.
The right pic is a sea elephant (Pterotrachea coronata), a finger-sized heteropod - a transparent marine snailusing its trunk-shaped proboscis to hunt its prays. This gastropod looks nothing like your typical terrestrial snail.

On our more regular dive sites, our macro lenses encountered saw some colourful nudibranches, shrimps and crabs as well as Harlequin shrimps, Ghost pipe fishes and the likes...

Thank you! Elodie and Emma for the amazing male paper nautilus and pelagic tongue fish you photographed and for everyone else who shared this adventure with us. We loved it and hope you did too!

We welcome this week 14 guests from Switzerland, Luxembourg, Germany, Finland, Japan, United States and England and we had a blast, both on the boat and underwater. Thank you for choosing the MV Smiling Seahorse to “pass the cap” on board. 

Starting the trip in the Surin National Park, the highlight of the first day was a curious guitar shark visiting us on our very first dive! 

Big school of fish, trevally, barracudas and fusilier were  present around the famous Richelieu Rock. Looking on the reef we could spot ghost pipefish, a seahorse and 2 pairs of harlequin shrimps for the pleasure of all!

Cruising down south to the Similan National Park for the next two days, everyone really enjoyed Koh Tachai pinnacle which was teeming with life. it’s always great to see the diversity of this ecosystem and two dives are far from enough to see it all. 
The first night dive was at Koh Bon where we saw the tinniest Pygmy squid, plenty of moray eels hunting (some where huge!!!), cool crabs like anemone crab or decorate spider crab. The reef was alight with shrimps eyes shinning in our torches and getting closer we recognised Durban dancing shrimps, transparent cleaner shrimps, marble shrimps and tapestry shrimps (both are saron shrimp and oh so colourful!)

A smooth cruising down south to Koh Lanta National Park where we dove the next day around Hin Daeng and Hin Muang, including a wonderful night dive! On this second night dive this week we encountered many crustaceans and morays including another pair of harlequin shrimps!

Despite being tired by 4 dives that day, quite a few guests and most staff were also up for a big new year celebration, starting with a succulent barbecue and ending up dancing on the sundeck with music, hats and party favors! We all ended up drinking champagne (courtesy of the smiling seahorse) with  bright hats on our head, blowing party horns to the sea breeze :) Fun times! 

Back to Lanta National Park, the cameras flashed again in front of harlequin shrimps, a massive stone fish and the amazing wall full of soft coral of Hin Daeng (Red) and Hin Muang (Purple).
We spent the rest of the day in Koh Haa, hunting a variety of nudibranch that even some guides had never seen before ! We went through the scenic Cathedral and Chimney perfect prop for our annual group picture!

Last day but not least, Bida Nok with its many black tip reef sharks and their dense school of yellowback fusilier.
Last dive before heading back to Phuket was at Shark Point with the perfect finish to this wonderful cruise: a long and chill encounter of a Zebra Shark !
 
Stay tuned for our next adventure ! Thanks for reading, more fishy stories for you next week !

Merry Christmas to all, we had a really amazing Christmas trip and hope you also enjoyed the festive season with your loved ones. We had 15 fantastic guests coming all the way from France, Switzerland, Germany, Canada, and Sweden to visit the best spots of the North Andaman Sea of Thailand: Similan National Park and Surin National Park for a 7 day- cruise. What a blast!

Unfortunately Franck took the week off to enjoy Christmas at home with the kids, which was a treat for our family but means no underwater photos this week! Thanksfully our dream team took over with lovely photos onboard and it looks like everyone had a fantastic trip without us (Camille and Franck).

Great dives were had with lots of schooling fishes, cute nudibranch, octopus, and black tip reef shark. Torinla Rocks, In surin islands, were amazing this week, with Pikachu in their trees (hydroids) and kuhl's stingray flying over a bunch of garden eels.

Richelieu was incredible, we saw a seahorse, few ghost pipefishes, ribbon eel, zebra moray and a huge amount of fishes dancing over the rock, trevallies, barracudas, fusiliers, rabbit fishes, batfishes.

In the Similans, Three trees had strong current, but the school of barracudas were hovering over the reef which gave us a magical show!

Fun was had onboard, especially during Christmas eve as we enjoyed a wonderful Banrbecued Lamb shank and a few drinks! Thank you to our lovely guests for joining us this Christmas ! A

​ll the Smiling Seahorse team wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year !

Do you know how the Christmas Trees tradition started?

Long before the advent of Christianity, plants and trees that remained green all year had a special meaning for people in the winter. Just as people today decorate their homes during the festive season with pine, spruce, and fir trees, ancient peoples hung evergreen boughs over their doors and windows. In many countries it was believed that evergreens would keep away witches, ghosts, evil spirits, and illness...

Looks like our tree brought us luck this week and kept bad spirit away :)

How was your Christmas? Did you take a holidays?  Did you go diving somewhere cool?
Or did you stay home?
Did you get fun scuba-diver gifts under the tree?
Tell us all in the comment section!