Our trip to the Great Barrier Reef had finally arrived!!

We were worried about rain, but our two-hour boat ride to the outer reef flew past the rain curtains and farther, to where the sun showed most of his face for us during our brief visit.  Around 11 we stopped at the first part of the reef, where the certified divers geared up and stepped off the boat, followed by the snorkelers.  Then it was time for the introductory divers.

As one of four signees for this intro dive, I was suited up (after a previous briefing on the procedures by "Harry Potter", one of the certified instructors on the boat) with my prescription goggles, snorkel, tank, regulator, weight belt, fins, etc., and I stepped off the boat into the briny sea.  It was slightly frightening as we ducked below the waves and cautiously felt our way down the thick rope, breathing slowly through our regulators, hand-over-hand, pinching our noses to equalize our ears every step of the way.  The water was thick blue-green, and the only way you could tell how far down you were was to look up, or to judge how badly your ears hurt.  Well, unfortunately (or not?) for me, I was having some trouble equalizing my ears, which hurt more as we descended,  so Harry Potter took me to the surface, said we'd give it one more try, and I sank below the waves once again. 

Still couldn't do it.

So, we went up to the surface, and I was advised to return to the boat, as my ears would just hurt all the more if I kept going down.  After I chucked off all the heavy gear, I was left with my mask and snorkel, and told that although they'd be serving lunch soon, I was welcome to snorkel.  "See over there, those dark shadows near the surface?  Yeah, that's the reef.  See there's a group of snorkelers over there."

I promptly ducked into the water and swam toward the shadows.

"First you were all like "whoa", and we were like "whoa", and you were like "whoa..."


You shove yourself off the boat, and plunge into the ocean.  The ocean.  So wide, you can't see land.  So deep, you can't see the bottom at your toes.  You are adrift in a huge, big, watery, expansive sea that extends so far that to get across it you have to fly.  Planes soar above you, clouds drift over you, searching for the mountains that are nowhere in sight.  You're sandwiched between sky and depth.  And below you, as you hang there suspended at the surface, your feet barely penetrating the dpeths that yawn below you and spread out for endless miles, are the giant creatures of the deep, the sharks, the rays, the turtles, swimming silently below you-and you hang there at the surface, a speck in this giant tank.

So I swam. I put my face into the water, and breathed. I could only see thick blue-green turbulence as I swam, buffeted by a slight current and choppy waves, small flecks of white and bubbles as I kicked and paddled with the fins on my feet.  Suddenly a dark shape appeared, and when I got closer, there was a floor, right below my feet, right near the surface-

and all over it darted flecks of color; rolled blobs of stripes and circles; slithered streaks of blue black and yellow; wiggled doorknobs of red; royal purple clams blinked at me; a sea of purple and yellow fish suddenly rose up out of the coral, surrounding me as they drifted aimlessly one minute, suspended by the rocking current- then darted away, those nearest to me jetting over to their purple chums still drifting on the outer boundaries of the school.  I kicked, my fins bumping the coral, and rolled around to swim over a dark chasm.  From below bubbles rose as the scuba divers crept along through the narrow space, breathing from their tanks in order to see at eye-level what I could only see from the surface above.  It was dark down there, the sea floor a blur of dark blue and grey and green; but I turned my head, and instantly beheld a myriad of patterns and colors.  Coral grew so thick and tight that it squeezed out the brain coral that bulged from the mats of patterned white star coral, purple spiky coral, and soft wavy anemones and their resident anemone fish.  Some anemones buzzed with roiling filaments that wildly waved about in the current.  Out of nowhere popped a small crocodilian-patterned fish, pecking about like his long-mouthed neighbor.  One of the first fish I saw was the black and white angelfish from- you guessed it- Finding Nemo, and I reached out my hand to touch him.  I was immediately distracted by parrotfish that seemed to be everywhere, chomping at bits of coral, their teeth clicking against the rocky substrate. 

 

I was in so much heaven that, aside from glancing up every so often to be sure the boat was still in sight, I kept my head in the water and conjectured that the absence of other snorkelers from my field of vision was probably due to their exploration of some other part of the reef, and I couldn't see them because of the waves.  I also reasoned that if they were going to be serving lunch soon, I'd be okay with everyone else eating while I snorkeled.  Suddenly my swim on the reef was interrupted by one of our crew in an inflatable boat, and I was told to hop on since we'd be heading off to another part of the reef.  Quite unperturbed, I was shuttled back to the boat, where Audrey promptly informed me that I had almost been left behind!




I wondered if I wouldn't have been okay with that for several more hours....

 And  you know, at the end of the day....

You'll just HAVE to go back!


**I have to credit all the amazing underwater photography to Monika, who couldn't have taken more beautiful photographs**