Yesterday was the big day. We were picked up by the Tusa Dive minibus at 7.30am in the rain and were taken down to join the boat. After a short safety brief and guidance to where the sun (or rain) decks were we began our journey. We were heading to "Hastings Reef" which is in the Outer Reef, about 40km from Cairns so we were in for about a 90 minute trip. The weather wasn't great and the journey was rough from the word go. We had both taken the free ginger pills that we were offered as they are meant to help with travel sickness. . . . . they don't! Within about 5 minutes we were both out the back with our faces in bags. Needless to say, the journey was not pleasant. Unfortunately the only real cure for sea sickness (as my Dad always says) is to sit under an Oak tree and surprisingly there weren't many of those around!!
Luckily as soon as we moored up we both felt better and were able to get on with our day. I had booked 3 dives and to fit them all in we had to get started as soon as we had moored up. The visibility was not great due to the weather but down at 18m I could see about 5m or so in front of me and close up everything was perfect. The reef was really amazing, so many different types and colours all housing thousands of different species of fish. Of these I only saw a tiny percentage (and even fewer that I recognised!) but it was still enough to fill three 45 minute dives. Among the things that I saw that I actually know the name of were: Angel fish, Lizard fish, 3-stripe Humbug fish, a Pineapple Sea Cucumber, Butterfly fish, Pink Anemone fish, Catfish, Dogfish, Clownfish (that's Nemo by the way!!) and the highlight of the three dives for me came on the last one, a Green Turtle! They are so calm and didn't seem to mind that there were 7 people floating there. I took lots of photos with the camera we hired (about 200) and hopefully some of them will be good.
Megan had booked 2 intro dives as she has never tried it before. Unfortunately it was very choppy and this didn't help with her first experience. She didn't like this first session at all but she's not a quitter and decided to carry on and give it another go for a first proper dive. The instructors knew she was nervous so didn't push her into anything. She tried again but after about 10 minutes of being under decided that she really didn't like it so came up and went snorkeling instead, which she liked a lot more. The fact that she could breathe normal air instead of oxygen was better and she was on the surface too. Megan also saw lots of fish and coral and was really close to the reef. The only thing she was disappointed about was that she didn't see Nemo!
On the trip back we learnt from our mistakes and bought some proper sea sickness tablets (for a whole $2, we really should have done it on the way out!) and were much better!
Today we are off to Townsville and we are currently on the train. This is the first train to leave Cairns for 5 days due to flooding. We are very lucky that we've still managed to keep to our plan really. The train we were supposed to be on, "The Sunlander" is in Townsville so instead we are on the "Cairns Tilt Train" which is entirely Business Class. Huge Seats, TVs at every seat hidden in the armrest and loads of legroom too! It is a 6-7 hour trip and we're certainly doing it in a bit of luxury.
Luckily as soon as we moored up we both felt better and were able to get on with our day. I had booked 3 dives and to fit them all in we had to get started as soon as we had moored up. The visibility was not great due to the weather but down at 18m I could see about 5m or so in front of me and close up everything was perfect. The reef was really amazing, so many different types and colours all housing thousands of different species of fish. Of these I only saw a tiny percentage (and even fewer that I recognised!) but it was still enough to fill three 45 minute dives. Among the things that I saw that I actually know the name of were: Angel fish, Lizard fish, 3-stripe Humbug fish, a Pineapple Sea Cucumber, Butterfly fish, Pink Anemone fish, Catfish, Dogfish, Clownfish (that's Nemo by the way!!) and the highlight of the three dives for me came on the last one, a Green Turtle! They are so calm and didn't seem to mind that there were 7 people floating there. I took lots of photos with the camera we hired (about 200) and hopefully some of them will be good.
Megan had booked 2 intro dives as she has never tried it before. Unfortunately it was very choppy and this didn't help with her first experience. She didn't like this first session at all but she's not a quitter and decided to carry on and give it another go for a first proper dive. The instructors knew she was nervous so didn't push her into anything. She tried again but after about 10 minutes of being under decided that she really didn't like it so came up and went snorkeling instead, which she liked a lot more. The fact that she could breathe normal air instead of oxygen was better and she was on the surface too. Megan also saw lots of fish and coral and was really close to the reef. The only thing she was disappointed about was that she didn't see Nemo!On the trip back we learnt from our mistakes and bought some proper sea sickness tablets (for a whole $2, we really should have done it on the way out!) and were much better!
Today we are off to Townsville and we are currently on the train. This is the first train to leave Cairns for 5 days due to flooding. We are very lucky that we've still managed to keep to our plan really. The train we were supposed to be on, "The Sunlander" is in Townsville so instead we are on the "Cairns Tilt Train" which is entirely Business Class. Huge Seats, TVs at every seat hidden in the armrest and loads of legroom too! It is a 6-7 hour trip and we're certainly doing it in a bit of luxury.
3 comments:
you found Nemo!!
Was he thwimming out to thea??
i didnt manage to see nemo :( but is was still fun snorkeling!
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