Ko Tao is a place to go if you dive. If you are a non-diver, you should either be doing your beginner's course (which means, you dive), or you may just risk feeling rather left out (in case you thought the tourist site "Japanese Garden" is really a garden) At least at Hat Sai Ri area, Caucasians outnumbered Asians by far, many of them were evenly tanned, looked like models, talked about things like dive sites, dive shops, dive clean-ups, and your next dive. Some of them had a rude attitude towards me because they thought I was Thai (observing the attitude change was rather sad). Bungalows on the beach is the standard approach, and the sea served as the backtrop for everything including the first breakfast, the sunset drink (while writing dive log and playing with the very cute Lucia), the fire show, the Thai massage, the swing towards the dark ocean, and the many times of lifting my eyelids in front of the turquoise blue. Charlotte and I went through pancakes, fruit shakes, beer, handstands, and the Ko Tao festival - it's great that it didn't end with the motorbike. 
