- Dive Trip Type: Local
- Suitability: All Divers
- Depth: 4 to 30 metres
Koh Haa means “five islands” in Thai and is made up of one large island, Koh Haa Yai, and five smaller islands. With the limestone cliffs jutting out of the water and a lovely white sand beach, this area provides some stunning images above and below the water!
The Lagoon is a great place for all levels of divers and perfect for snorkelers as well. Three islands in this group create a beautiful sheltered lagoon. The lagoon has a shallow sandy bottom at 4-6 metres with coral bommies dispersed around. This makes a perfect location for learning to dive or completing a scuba refresher after not having dived in a while. There is plenty of life in the sandy lagoon including giant morays, lionfish, clown fish and very friendly porcupine fish.
Most dives start in the lagoon but move out around 1 or 2 of the islands along the walls that drop down to about 27 metres and are covered in colourful soft and hard corals, anemones and barrel sponges. A large shoal of barracuda is often encountered along with puffers, sea snakes, box fish, garden eels, scorpion fish and squid. When crossing between the islands the sandy bottom offers a wealth of interesting things from flounder and stingrays to peacock mantis shrimp, sea moths and literally hundreds of partner gobies with shrimp guarding their holes.
Another wonderful site is The Cathedral which offers a unique topography along with the huge varieties of marine life. This site is named after the large caverns in the island that are only accessed from under the water. There are two caverns beside each other that have large openings from about low tide level down to 14 metres allowing plenty of bright blue light to enter creating no need for a torch and amazing views out. Also the caverns are connected with a swim through and the best part of entering is that you can ascend to the surface inside the heart of the island. Stalactites hang from the ceiling over 30 metres above. Light filtering through the water from the entrance creates a blue glow in the chamber.
Outside of The Cathedral are many interesting pinnacles, walls and canyons to explore. The bottom outside the caverns has many types of nudibranchs and usually a large hermit crab or two crawling around. A couple of really great swim throughs are in this area as well. There are also squat shrimp and porcelain crabs in anemones and giant puffers, triggerfish and sometimes a turtle swimming by. We often see an octopus moving around the reef and large groups of squid swimming in formation off in the blue!
Koh Haa No. 1 is an excellent site and has amazing soft coral coverage. The south side of the island has many large boulders that create swim throughs and crevices that are loads of fun to dive. The outstanding feature of this dive is The Chimney with an entrance at 18 metres into a small cavern with an opening going up, narrowing and eventually coming out of an opening at 5 metres! This makes for excellent photos and you are surrounded by cavern sweepers as you slowly ascend up.
There are often curious batfish that will follow you around or a hawksbill turtle feeding around this area. As you reach the bottom away from the boulders there is a field of beautiful soft corals and if you wait a few minutes hundreds of fusiliers will swarm around you! There is a very shy tigertail seahorse that is often spotted hiding along a small wall at 22-24 metres and enormous shoals of snapper congregate near the tops of the many boulders. Nudibranchs, morays, lionfish and clownfish are also plentiful here.
Go back to Dive Sites of Ocean Divers.