Great Barrier Reef

We took this Quicksilver massive catamaran from Port Douglas out to the Great Barrier Reef.

Isn't it beautiful?

We just about got our faces ripped off from the wind on this high-speed venture to the reef, but the motion sickness was much lessened being outside rather than in. We sucked it up inside for about half an hour to get our en route briefing to be prepared to take an introductory dive at the reef.

Our catamaran docked adjacent to this platform at the Agincourt Reef, "the true Outer Reef experience".

Once on the platform, Katie and I suited up in our lovely blueberry costumes, lycra stinger protection suits. Aren't they lovely? And really, aren't we lovely?

Here we are all suited up with our scuba diving gear. Heavy. We loaded up with extra weights to help keep us down at the bottom despite our bouyancy, then strapped on the air tank.

Oh yeah, loving the respirators.

Here's Katie with our dive instructor and guide, Hiromi.

Our pet fish, Maurice.

We saw a couple turtles from the semi-submersible vessel.


This is an example of the brilliant colors we saw at the reef.

I was freezing when we got out of the water after diving - my lips actually turned purple.

Here's us in the semi-submersible vessel. We caught the last tour before the catamaran returned to Port Douglas.

We saw this funky looking rose-shaped bright green coral on our expedition. There were so many different kinds of coral - colors, shapes, textures.


Look at that cutie server at PJ Obriens... hmm, hmm Katie

Is that beer for me?

Sunday we had the opportunity of a lifetime to scuba dive at the Great Barrier Reef. Neither Katie nor I had ever dived before. We've been snorkeling a handful of times and really enjoyed that, but we were ready for the next great adventure. We really lucked out because we got paired with our own private guide so we didn't have to share the experience with anyone but each other. We did a few underwater drills before descending down ropes, then off for a swim holding hands on either side of our guide Hiromi.

Wow, we didn't know what we'd been missing. Diving was extraordinary, thrilling, a completely different world. It actually felt like we were part of the underwater life. The colors were brilliant and we were shocked when our guide led us to touch much of what we swam past. One of our favorites was Maurice, a 2.5 meter long humpheaded maori wrasse fish. It's colors were spectacular and almost animated. We affectionately termed him our Great Barrier Reef pet as he followed us throughout our dive practically asking to be pet. At one point, Hiromi put her hand in his mouth along his teeth and prompted us to do the same. He was so gentle and sweet, about 50 years old and is expected to live another 20 or so years. The first thing that really freaked me out was touching a giant clam and it closing up. I wasn't expecting it to move at all, so it really took me by surprise and I had to remind myself that I was 12 meters under water and had no choice but to keep breathing and not freak out. We saw a giant moray eel as well (we didn't touch it). We touched lots of different kinds of coral and other fish. Katie's favorite was the Christmas tree coral which had tiny purple buds which retracted into the coral when you touched them or got near. I wanted the experience to last forever, but alas our dive did come to an end. We considered going again but not wanting to miss anything, opted to try out the semi submersible vessel (half hour tour) and snorkeling. Nothing compared to being in it as a diver. Now I want to get certified!

We returned to Cairns that evening and headed out for a night on the town. We found plenty of entertainment and Aussie blokes at PJ Obriens.