Snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef

Well they say it is a once in a lifetime opportunity. We have just returned from a few days at Airlie Beach in north Queensland. We were a little take back at the price for a day trip to snorkel the reef, but decided to seize the day - and what a day it was. We traveled by high speed catamaran for about two hours out to sea to reach the reef.



They took us to 'Reef World', a floating pontoon which was our base for the day. It was more like a small town. The boat docked at the pontoon and you then had the choice of underwater rooms, submarine rides, or actually getting in the water yourself and snorkelling.

I choose a very glamorous outfit and decided to take to the water at once.
Sarah and Emily joined in as well, whilst Jo opted for what she considered to be the safer options.

Now you will no doubt be able to tell, we didn't take all these pictures ourselves, but wanted to give you an idea of what we saw.


There was an amazing array of fish of every kind, size and colour. Im not sure if Nemo is still lost, but I found him.
The sites were every bit as good as the pictures.
Some of the fish were very large. There were a number of larger gropers very similar to this fellow. They were bigger than me and very playful. I actually got to ride on the back of one.

Well it a marvelous day. My wallet will need time to recover, but the memories will last a lifetime. The Great barrier reef is definitely one of the wonders of the world.

Yesterday we traveled back to Viv's place in Bundaberg and will stay the weekend here. On Monday we head back to Brisbane, pick up Simon at the airport and head straight to the Gold Coast for a week of theme parks and fun.