Great food, very friendly locals and a bewildering choice of experiences await you on a Thailand vacation. Thailand has long been a favourite destination of those youthful backpackers of the world, all drawn to Thailand for its variety of culture, a multitude of very scenic destinations, and some of the best beaches in the world all at very cheap prices. Thailand also caters very well to the non backpacker tourist, with good quality accommodation and fabulous service, still all at discount prices.

Phuket is the main draw card for diving in Thailand. It is located on the west coast of Thailand on the Adaman sea. The best diving is from November to April when the cool winds come from the North East. From May to October winds tend to be from the south east, are much stronger, up to typhoon level and tends to bring in poorer visibility.

From Phuket you can either dive the local sites around phuket, phi phi islands or Ao Nang sites. The second choice you have in diving from phuket is a live aboard, by which you can get to the less frequently visited sites in the northern Adaman sea. Most of the diving is on soft coral reefs with very dramatic seadrop offs, tunnels and swim throughs all adding to the impressive amount of fish life you can see. The one thing worth seeing is the whale shark which can be seen in the Adaman see at the right times of the year.

Phuket is a very touristy setup, with lots of night life, restaurants, resorts and tourist activities to do.

Phi Phi islands is a series of small and very beautiful islands. There are some very good dive sites around the islands including Kings Cruiser Ferry Wreck. The islands is for people who find Pukett to busy, as no cars or motor bikes are allowed on the islands.

Krabi, also located on the west side of Thailand, operates most of its diving out of Ao Nang. Ao Nang has a wonderful bay which is dotted with James Bond style islands (Limestone structures rising out of the water). Krabi also has several live aboard boats that are cheaper than those that run out of Phuket.

Koh Tao has mostly year round diving except in November, when big seas can cut the island off. Koh Tao is predominately a backpackers paradise, with bare feet, diving, sunbathing and relaxing your basic staple diet. Mainly it has soft corals and pinnacles to dive on, but it can also get whale sharks making visits as well.

Koh Samui is not a spectacular diving destination in itself, but it is a great place for a holiday. What you can dive from Koh Samui is Red Rock, Sail Rock and a few other first calss diving destinations.

Pattaya offers year round diving as it does not have a monsoon season. It has a wider range of soft and hard corals due to a large amount of Plankton in the water. The large amount of plankton does reduce visibility to 8 - 10 meters generally. Pattaya has the normal range of tropical fish life and also has Thailands first artifical reef. The reef has several WWII wrecks and a new 1000 ton, 62 meter long, medium size landing craft recently sunk by the Thai Navy. There is supposedly a group of technical divers, that visit some not well known sites, that are ancient pottery wrecks, that operate out of Pattaya.

Pattaya, originally grew from US troops visiting on R&R from the Vietnam war. It has now developed into a more general tourist destination with a large array of high quality hotels and restaurants available at cheap prices. It also has a host of non diving related activities including shopping, tourist attractions from crocodile farm to buddist temples, traditional thai massages on the beach, tandem sky dives etc.... Pattaya is a good place for a family holiday where dad can have a dive and there is still lots for mum and the kids todo without getting bored.