Friday 5th October 2007

The alarm woke us up at 6am this morning - because we'd booked to go scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef. The first thing I did, before getting ready, was to fall straight back asleep for another 20 minutes! Luckily, I woke up in enough time for us to get ready and get down to the Reef Fleet Terminal for check-in, by 7.30am. We did start walking, but when the Bohemia bus passed us after about 5 minutes - we were happy to jump in! Once we were all checked, we filled in our paperwork and then relaxed as the catamaran set off.

Our first stop of the day was a place called Saxon Reef, which was quite a way off the coast! The catamaran set off at about 8.40am and we had our safety briefing (which was at the Reef) at 9.45am. We were told that, as we were introductory divers, we'd all be taken down to see the Reef in groups of four - one group at a time. We were group 5, so had about an-hour-and-a-half to do what we wanted. We were only having one dive today - but could do as much snorkeling as we liked! Me and Nikki didn't hang about - we dived straight in!

The water was fantastic today - it was about 25° and a gorgeous crystal blue. We were out for ages, snorkeling about - looking at all the different coral and fish. The coral didn't seem to be as bright as it was on the Whitsundays - but it was still pretty fascinating. Our time passed really quickly and we were soon being called for our scuba dive - I couldn't wait, but Nikki was terrified - she was worried about her ears exploding, running out of air and... getting eaten by a shark!

We started by getting fitted with our oxygen tanks and weight belts and then sitting on the edge of the water whilst everything was checked. In no time at all we were all in the water doing our safety tests. Test 1 was to clear water from our masks and Test 2 was to remove you mouth-piece, blow bubbles and then put it back in - all about 6 feet under water. We all passed fine and we were soon linking arms and setting off into the deep.

Nikki dived for about 10 minutes, to a depth of about 5 or 6 meters, but then decided she didn't want to do anymore (I think she felt quite restricted with me hanging on her arm). I was so proud of her though - for weeks, as we've been seeing companies offering dives on the Reef, she's been saying she doesn't know if she'll do it, she's scared, but she gave it a go and the instructor was really proud of her. So was I - what a gal!

The rest of us continued for another 10 minutes and got down to about 12 meters - it was crazy down there - a completely different experience to the snorkeling. The coral was huge and we were coming to walls of it that looked about 20 feet high. We didn't see much different to what Nikki saw, so that was good (for her) - but we did get to swim through some underwater valleys and I got to see some massive fish and picked up some Sea Snail things, which are like giant, furry cucumbers.

I got back on the boat just in time for lunch. I loaded my plate up (we had an Aussie BBQ of fish, steak, sausages and all sorts of salad) but when I sat down to eat I came over all weird - I think I came to the surface too quickly and so I had a quick snooze. I woke up about half an hour later feeling much better - and amazingly my food was still there, so I ate that and then found we were at our second stop - Hastings Reef.

We didn't go snorkeling straight away. Instead we got on a glass bottom submarine thing and went for a tour of the reef. As the tide had just changed the water was quite cloudy - but we still got to see loads of cool coral - some of which was about 100 years old. We also saw a Reef Shark having a quick nap on the bottom and we saw Nemo - he was hiding, but we spotted him... finally! When we got back to the catamaran I quickly put my wet-suit on and went snorkeling again. Nikki didn't bother because she didn't know if she'd dry again in time for when we got back - so I went out on my own. The coral was much the same, but there were thousands more fish - all different shapes and sizes - and all amazing bright colours. When everyone was safely back on board we headed back to Cairns.

This evening we hung about in the centre - sat at the Lagoon, chatting about how brilliant scuba diving was - and how cool it was that our first dive was on the world-famous Great Barrier Reef. Then we caught the free bus back to our hostel. We didn't bother having any tea. Instead we had showers and then went to one of the pubs, just round the corner, for a well deserved beer.

I knew Nikki would be ok - she jumped out of a plane for God's sake!