Gorgeous Great Barrier Reef

Day One:

We took a very large Catamaran to a Pontoon type of vessel with sundecks, scuba/snorkel tours, submergible boats, glass bottom boats, a water slide etc. It’s a permanent fixture way out at Knuckle Reef. There’s a guy who lives there 12 days at a time. It took about an hour and a half to arrive to the Pontoon.

Joan was able to squeeze in two dives while we were there. She was so excited. The first dive was great as she saw a variety of fish and coral.

On her second dive she saw a 8 foot shark sleeping under a rock, and then decided to wake up and go for a swim towards her. The good news is that he wanted nothing to do with her, and was harmless.

Carol went snorkeling and saw some incredible colored coral and a variety of fish along with a huge blue/green fish.

 Day Two:

Joan went on her second day of diving and was able to get another two dives in during her trip. She was a little disappointed as it wasn’t as bright as her first day but did do a few “dive through’s” which is when you go under a thin passageway of coral.

Carol went for a Sea Plane adventure. The Sea Plane was a small plane capable of landing and taking off from the water. Pretty cool!! The views of the Reef from above were amazing.

We landed near a boat where we boarded and drove to the Reef where we snorkeled. The coral was amazing. The colors were fluorescent (bright yellows, greens, blue, orange, salmon) with such a variety of shapes and sizes. The favorite thing was the very large sea clams that had a wavy edge that had a vibrant purple middle. It was so cool to see it open and shut. The very best snorkel experience ever!!

We boarded the plane again and headed to Whitehaven Beach with was a white sand beach tucked away between several islands and covered miles of shoreline. Unfortunately when we landed it began to rain, so walking the beach as we planned didn’t happen. It still was very pretty.

The weather hasn’t cooperated like we hoped, but still Hayman Island is a beautiful place and we’ve enjoyed this very luxury resort very much.