Great (its the) Barrier Reef

Trip Start Sep 12, 2005
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Trip End Aug 15, 2006


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Flag of Australia  ,
Wednesday, April 12, 2006

We boarded our boat at 6.45am the next morning. As our crew introduced themselves to us Mairead noticed a on the opposite side of the boat from us waving frantically. It was Lisa a friend from back home! What a small world! three hours later we reached the Outer Reef about 50 miles from Cairns. Even out here we couldn't escape the weather. There were a few pretty big rain storms and although they passed over fairly quickly the sky was grey and overcast. We didn't care as it was time to hit the water. We got our gear on and snorkeled around for an hour or so. The reef was really impressive with hundreds of different fish and coral. Conor decided he would try scuba diving and after a 10 minute training course he strapped on his tank and went for a 45 minute dive. The dive was amazing and although it was only 35 feet down it felt like another world. It was a great experience and was definitely worth the money. After a nice lunch we moved onto a different part of the reef to find some sea turtles Out at the Reef
Out at the Reef
 . These dudes were really friendly and loved the human attention. We fed and pet them for a while before it was time to go. To round off a good day we were encouraged by the crew to try a bit of boom netting. Basically the boat trawls a net through the sea which you try your best to hold on to with one hand while trying to keep your clothes on with the other. After 5 minutes Conor was floating naked in the sea and was embarrassingly picked up by the rescue boat. Mairead and the other girls managed to hang on at the expense of flashing their bottoms to the photographer who was recording the events of the day!We all had a good laugh at the video on the way back to Cairns as we sipped on our free wine. It was a great day and was definitely one of our highlights of our time in Oz.
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