The Great Barrier Reef (Part I of II)

Another day so fantastic we need two blog entries to tell you about it!

On March 9, 2019 we visited one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, the Great Barrier Reef, located off the coast of Cairns (pronounced “Cans”), Australia. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park is the largest living organism on the Earth. It is 16,000 miles long – the equivalent of 70 MILLION football fields! It occupies 214,00 square miles of ocean floor. The Reef itself accounts for only 7% of the park; the rest consists of underwater islands, cays and grasses. There are 2900 individual reefs, 900 of which can be seen from space. There are 1,625 different kinds of fish in the Reef, 600 varieties of coral, 133 types of sharks and rays, and 16 types of turtles. It’s easy to understand why the Reef is considered the most complex ecosystem on the planet, an ecosystem whose origins began more than 20 million years ago. At its most shallow the Reef is 115 feet deep; at its deepest more than 6,500.

We began our day by boarding a catamaran directly off our own ship, just like we would a tender. It was raining when we left, but as we bounced across the water toward the diving platform, clouds began to part, and the sun began to shine. An hour and a half later we reached our destination – a large platform complete with a dive/snorkeling supply area, a staging area with metal picnic tables, an underwater viewing room, a Sea Walk platform (more on that in Part II), a dive platform, and a water slide/swimming area. They pretty much thought of everything!

We shared the cost of an underwater camera with our friends Richard and Kathy (we left the camera behind and took a photo card with us when we left), and Ken got some great pictures while he snorkeled. Pam went on a Sea Walk (see Post II of II), and we took a short voyage on a semi-submarine vessel to explore a little further away from the platform. We hope you’ll enjoy the pictures as much as we enjoyed the day!