Great Barrier Reef

Tuesday, Dec 15

We woke up bright and early today to get ready to head out for the reef. We ate some cereal, then headed to the Reef Terminal to check in. The crew on the "Passions of Paradise" catamaran were all very nice. All together, there were about 90 of us onboard (including the crew) ready for the 2 hour sail out to Michaelmas Cay, where we were to jump in for our first dive on the reef.

When we arrived, we were surrounded by tropical light blue water spotted with dark blue patches, which of course was the reef. We hopped in the water and began exploring. I don't think 20 minutes had passed before Dave spotted a turtle. It was amazing swimming around the turtle, taking pictures, and just watching him. At one point, he even began to chew on some coral. It was out of this world.

There were all sorts of tropical fish. Some would swim around us, some would swim away, others were swimming in and out of coral, others were gnawing away at it. It was amazing to be in the midst of all that activity, and the whole time, the fish didn't seem to mind two big things swimming amongst them.

I should mention that we ended up renting, or as the Aussies say, "hiring", an underwater digital camera, so we were able to take over 200 pictures! I'll add some of the pics after I get home, as they're on a CD and I can't post them.. :(

Passions of Paradise has its own mooring at a remote part of the reef, which we headed to next. This was spectacular, because unlike Michaelmas Cay, which was like an island with shallow water all around, "Paradise" reef was free standing and therefore had the steep drop offs of coral as far as the eye could see (about 75 feet of visibility). Dave was even able to take a cool picture of some clownfish!

All in all, we were able to spend about 3 hours snorkeling amongst the reef, of which all three were awesome. This is definitely an experience that I will remember for a long time! The trip back was about 2 hours. There was a bar on board, so we all had some drinks and relaxed in the strong Australian sun. Once back in Cairns, we made our way to the camera shop to return the underwater digital camera and get our pictures. They were amazing, and I can't wait to show them to everyone!

For dinner, we found Outback Jack's, that offered an appetizer of crocodile AND kangaroo, the two meats that I wanted to try. The croc tasted a lot like chicken (I hope that's not too cliche!) except with a bit of a fishy aftertaste, and the kangaroo tasted a lot like beef. However, I'm glad to say that I prefer regular beef and regular chicken to both of these!

We stopped into an internet cafe and posted some pictures on the way home as well as shopping around for a didjeridoo (Dave really wants one). We then made our back to the hostel around 9pm. We decided to take a trip up to a village set up in the mountains called Kuranda tomorrow, so we booked that at the front desk (did I mention that our hostel was a full fledged travel agency??), then headed to bed.

What a day!!!