Alice’s Gap Year Travels

Have been back in Cairns for a few days now staying at Nomads – Beach House which is good fun. Had a couple of big nights out and have basically been hanging out at the hostel with friends or going around the shops in the mall 🙂 There is a large Night Market here where they sell all kinds of things from jewellery and clothes to massages and chinese food! We’ve been a few times now and theres always something a bit different – men walk around with snakes sometimes, draping them on people and letting them go along the floor. We are not big fans of this! haha

Anyway, the best thing we’ve done in Cairns by far definately happened yesterday. Yesterday, was when we had our Ocean Freedom boat trip and scuba diving out on the Great Barrier Reef! We had to get down to the marina for 7.30am where we boarded the Ocean Freedom boat, met the wonderful crew and were asked to fill in some forms for health and safety etc. There were around 36 passengers in total, all different ages, from our age to probably around 60. We had a delicious breakfast of danish pastries and fresh fruit as the boat set off towards the reef and the crew did our safety and welcome talk.

On the way out to the reef it was very rocky and lots of people got really sea-sick (including holly!) and nobody was feeling great but that soon changed when they started our dive breifing 🙂 … some people went off on a glass bottom boat tour and some people went for a snorkle whilst the people who wanted to dive got ready. So, a stinger suit, mask, weights, tank and a pair of flippers later we’re pretty much ready to go.. they took us out in small groups and to make us more comfortable on our first dive – there was an instructor holding our hand the whole time, Matty was mine and Mikalea’s instructor and Holly was paired with a man and they went with a guy called Chris. Our first stop was at ‘The Drop Off’ and it was awsome, they taught us some basic skills before we went in and know the reef really well so were able to let us hold things like sea cucumbers and touch the velvety corals which aren’t poisonous (obviously!). On the first dive we saw a reef shark sleeping on the sea bed and a huuuuge sea turtle having a scratch on the coral 😀 and of course there were loads of tropical fish everywhere!

After the first dive we got dried off then had a yummy buffet lunch before arriving at our second stop of the day which was one f the most bizaarr things i’ve ever seen. They call it ‘The Island’ and it is basically a mound of sand in the middle of the ocean where it gets reall shallow for some reason arround the reef and so you can actually walk about in the middle of the sea!.. the water was crystal clear and we did a snorkle tour with Bec who was wicked fun and showed us not only a Nemo (clown fish) but a WEEMO, a baby one which is the size of your little fingernail! After this we headed back to the boat and got our gear back on for our second dive. This time they said we could have more freedom if we wanted and so Chris took all three of us down to sit on the bottom for a quick test of some skills under water to make sure we would be safe we were allowed to go it alone! We followed him under the boat where there was a big shaol of big fish.. then he sneakily got some chicken from lunch out of his vest and as we fed the fish they went wild darting all around us which was hilarious. Then we followed him around the corals, holding a big purple starfish and disturbing a stingray that was hiding in the sand! We had an underwater camera with us so were snapping away as we went 🙂

It was sooo much fun and we’ve all got the bug for scuba diving now, it’s just so cool actually being able to breath underwater! Back on the boat we started heading back and the crew brought around fruit, cheese and crackers and cake, yummmm. Infact talking of the crew they really were just the most lovely people and really made the day special. (cheesy yet true!)

Just getting ready to go out on the town…..again. Table tops in ‘The Woolshed’ here we come!

Over and Out XXXXXX

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