Tuesday, March 24, 2009

One last dose of the Great Barrier Reef (Mar. 24/09 - Cairns, Australia)

Finally, a restful night! Although Ken woke up again this morning with a stomach bug, I felt like a million bucks and was eager to get wet. We were moored up at Troppo's Reef, about 30 miles north of Cairns. The morning dive took us along the sand and up the steep sandy "ski slope" north of the boat, then around the shallow sandy bommies around 30 feet. We found a couple little nudibranchs, a pretty anemone blowing in the current, a turtle cruising by, and a little white tip shark lounging in the sand. There was a lot of beautiful, healthy hard coral in the shallows too, making for a loverly dive. After breakfast, we did our final dive of the trip in the same spot. I went back to snap some more photos of a particularly pretty anemone, plus we found some flatworms, a shark, a pipefish, some nudibranchs, a blue-spotted stingray, and a strange frilly "weedfish" flopping around in the sand.


When everyone was back on board, it was full steam ahead back to Cairns, rinsing and sorting gear, packing bags, and filling out logbooks. Mid afternoon, we were back on solid ground, dropped off at our hotels, and saying goodbyes. What a wicked week it has been (well, five days...) out on the Great Barrier Reef! Taka was flawless - first class operations, dive safety, awesome staff, great food - zero complaints from us! We saw such a range of reef life, topography, big pelagics, tiny macro stuff, and everything in between. We met some awesome people too, and will definitely never forget our trip exploring the remote corners of the Great Barrier Reef.


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