Cairns, Australia
February 21, 2024 - There are not words that can describe how great our day was in Cairns - specifically snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef! We docked — at a Pier — in Cairns and took a 15 minute bus ride from the pier to a marina where we boarded a boat to begin our excursion to the Great Barrier Reef. There were about 200 people on our 8.5 hour trip. We were advised in the port talk 2 days before that the 90 minute boat ride (each way) on this excursion would be rough, so anyone prone to sea sickness should definitely take medication before embarking on this trip. We thought the ride was fine, and sat for most of the time on the outside deck — just seeking cover the few times it rained. It was a cloudy and occasionally rainy day, but that didn’t dampen the experience at all.
The boat took us to a pontoon, basically a floating dock, where we spent the day. When we arrived everyone rushed to get off the boat and to done the provided snorkeling equipment. Because we prefer to avoid the rush, and because we realized it would be crowded in the snorkeling area that was roped off, we held back and took advantage of the other options from the pontoon, which included an underwater observatory, a glass bottom boat ride and a semi-submersible boat ride. From these vantage points we saw a lot of colorful fish, a wide variety of coral and even a sea turtle. It was amazing. The pictures were through glass, so not as vivid as we would have liked, so again we just sat back and enjoyed the view. After lunch, when many others had finished snorkeling, we put on our gear and got into the water. And it was awesome!
It is jellyfish season in Australia, so in addition to the snorkel mask, vest and fins, we had to wear a full body lycra suit. The biggest challenge of the day for everyone was getting those suits on — and even more so getting them off! Neither of us had an underwater camera — and we didn’t bother with the plastic cases many people had for their smartphones, so we didn’t take pictures while snorkeling. But they did have a photographer underwater who took professional pictures of us and of the fish/coral. They didn’t take Cathy’s picture but they did take Ann Marie’s. Given we were all in the suits, it didn’t seem worth it to buy the pictures because you really couldn’t tell one person from the next. But one of our fellow guest, Steve from MN, did buy the picture package which included the pictures of him as well as all the reef pictures the photographer took. And he kindly shared those pictures with us, so we have the best of all worlds — our own experience and the professional pictures.
While we were on the pontoon, it only rained once, and it was while we were in the semi-submersible boat, so we didn’t even know it. It rained again a few times on the trip back, but again, we didn’t mind at all. In hindsight, while more sunshine would have made the visibility of the coral even better, a bright sunny day likely would have made the time on the pontoon and in the lycra suits quite unpleasant.
Once we made it back to Viking Sky, we quickly cleaned up and took advantage our our late “back on board” time of 11 PM, to walk around the town of Cairns and to have dinner. We walked past a placed call “The Lagoon”, which at first looked like a park with a water fountain that kids were running in — like you would see in many city parks in the US, but as we got closer we realized that it started as that but opened up directly into the harbour where there were a lot of people swimming. We wished we had our swimsuits on still! We found a little place to have a simple dinner — grilled chicken & pineapple sandwiches. We got back onboard and probably slept better than any other night after a truly incredible day. It was one of the experiences we were most looking forward to and it did not disappoint!
