What a noisy night! We have room on the back of the building yet I can hear all of the street noise! Are walls made of paper here? Every truck passing by made the air conditioner vibrate, and then a damn rubbish truck came at 6am, and even had a bloody reverse beep on! WTF?!
Grumpy and underslept, I had something for breakfast, and we set off to Port Douglas to swim and snorkel. We picked up Charlie’s sister Elysia an the way, she came to join us for a couple days. Eva was driving so I had some time to wake up. The road was quite nice, winding north through the coast.
We got there with plenty time, checked in for our boat, had some Golden Gaytime, and soon we were ready to board the ship. In just over an hour it took us (and some 50 other people) to the nearby Low Islands which are a part of the Great Barrier Reef. The ride itself was a treat – just chilling on the deck in the sun was perfect. Also, turns out I don’t get sea sick and quite like skipping around while the boat is on the waves. As we got there, smaller boats ferried us to the tiny island. Not one palm tiny, but about two minutes to run around tiny. It has a small lighthouse in the middle, which is very disturbing for me – the lighthouse is not a good place in the Southern Reach books I’m reading now…
I was expecting snorkeling to be fun, but wow, it really was great! We got our gear including full body wetsuits to protect us from deadly jellyfish stings (didn’t even meet any in the end though). First, a 45 minute long guided tour with a marine biologist. She showed us different types of coral, some massive clams, rainbow fish, butterfly fish, and loads of other fish the name of which I don’t remember, and then an eel sneakily hidden under a coral waiting for prey. It was useful to be part of the tour, but having so many people swimming close to one another was quite difficult and scared many fish. So we were looking forward to more snorkeling on our own. But the 45 minutes are quite tiring, so we first went back to the boat for some lunch – a neat seafood buffet. It got quite cloudy and being right out of the water I was rather cold – the others were laughing at me and my lack of natural thermal padding.
Soon we were back on the beach. From the shuttle boat we’ve seen a turtle and a couple small sharks, too! I still didn’t warm up properly, so I did a quick run around the island. Running in deep sand with loads of crushed dead coral isn’t easy, but it was fun and definitely did the job. Now you know how I know how big the island is!
Back in the water. Swimming on our own was excellent! So much better without all the other people. We ended up diving a bit as well, just a metre or two down, but it’s a completely different experience. So exhilarating! And a bit scary. The snorkeling masks make everything look a bit bigger, so it’s really hard to judge distance when you’re diving, and since I really don’t want to damage the coral, I probably ended up being overcautious and more stressed than necessary. I’d love to try some diving one day though! In the end we’ve seen more of the same as before, but also a lot of different fish which now weren’t hiding from the large group of paddling people, including the poor famous clown anemonefish, which, after Finding Nemo is horribly harassed by all the tourists. We left it in peace. But soon after, we found a few sea cucumbers, some massive slugs, a coral trout, a small school of barracudas, and a cuttlefish! It was sitting on top of a coral, quite well masked, waiting to flay our minds… We escaped unscathed, I hope.
Now the sad part. Most of the coral here is, just as you’d expect, dead. Bleaching caused by global warming. Quite depressing. It’s covered with grey sea bottom matter, and there are only small pockets of live, colourful beauty. It must have been stunning when all of this was alive. The marine biologist said she always talks to people about global warming, but sometimes gets climate change deniers who even here, seeing the effects with their own eyes, are stubbornly clinging to their ignorance. Humans never cease to disappoint.
All too quickly it was time to go and we shuttled back to the boat. The sail back was most pleasant, I spent most of it just basking in the sun on the deck while the others were hiding in the shade. Such joy! Back in port, we had some ice cream and set off to the four mile beach on the other side of town. The beach was in the shade with the tide encroaching, Charlie and Dee decided to read, Eva was just chilling and walking, Elysia went for a walk, but I didn’t know any of that, because I was already in the water. It was wonderful just frolicking around in the sea, getting covered in sand, playing with the waves. Compulsory photos of wave jumping for my grandpa taken.
Around six we packed and went back to Cairns. Dropped off Eva and Dee at home, Elysia at her hostel, and Charlie and I went to town to have an anniversary evening – seven years, it’s been! We had a great dinner, with Charlie’s favourite prawns and sea bugs, and some kangaroo and crocodile steaks for me. We visited a cool park with loads of bats dropping fruit on our heads (I think I also saw a possum fighting them), walked along the esplanade, had good chats, and a generally wonderful time. Love you, Charlie!
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