Carmen, Sean and I arrived in Thailand one day before Kingsley and so the three of us planned a snorkeling day trip to the Similan islands.  We went with a tour group called Fantastic island Tours.  Interestingly most of the staff were ladyboys who moonlighted as dancers which made for an incredibly entertaining 3 hour ride to and from the islands.

Lucy better known as Rucy was our boat guide and let me tell you she had her hands full.  The day we went out to the islands was pretty windy so we got rocked around ALOT on the boat.  As we all know boat rocking is never good for those who tend to get a bit seasick.  Of the 30 people on our boat I would say about 10 were vomiting (excessively) the entire 3 hours and pretty much everyone else felt like tossing their cookies at some point during the trip, including me!  Rucy with amazing instincts was somehow there the moment someone was ill handing them a new barf bag, disposing of the old and holding ice to the back of necks.  I don't know how much Rucy is paid on these tours but whatever the amount it is not nearly enough to compensate her for the 50 + barf bags she disposed of (always with a smile) on our trip.
The Similan islands were beautiful but due to the wind and waves we were not able to go to the typical snorkel sites so the places they did take us were pretty disappointing for snorkeling.  Saw a few fish, one giant moray eel and lots of bleached out coral.

Also though the islands are stunning there were so many tourists crammed onto a few beaches which although it made for some amazing people watching (and photographing) it really took away from the overall experience. Though I would highly recommend Fantastic as a tour group I probably wouldn't recommend the Similan islands for a snorkeling day trip tour.
Lunch was excellent - thai red curry, cashew chicken and fresh pineapple and watermelon.