The Great Barrier Reef, Cairns, Queensland, March 28

We’re enjoying our visit to Cairns but this is certainly the hottest and most humid location we’ve visited. The temperature is hovering in the low to mid-nineties with a humidity rate of near 100%. This is northern Australia’s tropical zone and we have arrived at the tail end of their summer, the wettest season of the year. It’s drizzled lightly on a few occasions but for the most part the moisture simply hangs heavily in the air. Cairns is located at the northeast corner of Australia, near the top of the country bordering on the Coral Sea. We’re near the equator and it is lush and tropical.

Early on our first full day in Cairns we boarded a catamaran that ferried us to Green Island, fifteen nautical miles offshore.  Green Island is part of the Great Barrier Reef rising above the sea.  

Green Island on the Inner Reef

The Great Barrier Reef extends more than fifteen hundred miles down the eastern coast of Australia.  Green Island was selected for reef viewing because it is considered relatively safe from predators. The “Salty” crocodiles do occupy the water, as do the deadly “Box jelly fish” and people are warned to remain alert. The water is safer on the island reef than on the shore of the mainland where signs are posted that warn of crocodile attacks and against venturing into the water. We donned snorkel gear provided after assurances that the danger level was low, and swam off the beach and out into deeper water to observe the world’s most famous coral reef up close. The Great Barrier Reef and the Great Wall of China are the only two objects on earth that can be viewed unaided from the moon. As we approached slightly deeper water we found ourselves swimming across beds of live coral as the white sandy ocean bottom dropped slowly away beneath us. Brian quickly spotted a large turtle just a few feet away and later was surprised to see a stingray appear just six feet away.  (That sucker was big too.)

Creatures identified as sea cucumbers were seen lying among the numerous colorful beds of coral. As we swam further from shore enormous rust colored brain coral slipped by only feet beneath the surface. Far spreading beds of long golden fern-like coral gently swayed back and forth with the ocean current. The coral is alive and touching it not only kills it but can result in serious skin abrasions, in places it is razor sharp.  Snorkelers were advised to enjoy it from a safe distance to protect themselves and the coral.

An option was available to go beneath the sea in a submersible craft that featured large windows completely surrounding the hull under the water line. That was too much for me to pass up so I enjoyed a thirty-minute breathtaking journey while Brian elected to continue snorkeling. From beneath the water the teeming sea life was right there in front of me, sometimes brushing against the window. 

The semi-submersible submarine

View from the semi-sub