The Most Amazing Day of My Life!

Sunday April 25, 2010 will go down in history as the most amazing day of my whole 24 years of existence. This is the day that I spent four hours snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef! I still cannot believe that I have done such a thing. Me little ol’ Jessica Moreeeny from rural Nova Scotia was swimming with the fishes on the Great Barrier Reef. After the cruise out there on the boat and the briefing about snorkeling we were off. I strapped on my fins and mask and jumped into the water. The first time I put my face under the water I am pretty sure that I stopped breathing for a few seconds. I think that it actually took my breath away. I just could not believe the life under the sea. I couldn’t believe the fish, the coral, the colors, the clearness of the water, everything amazed me. I buddied up with a very cool German girl named Bridgitte and her and I spent the day together exploring the reef. We would periodically come up, take the snorkel out of our mouths and just say, “Amazing! Just amazing!” We were both awestruck by the sights we saw under the water.

I had rented an underwater camera from a shop I found on Saturday in Cairns. The deal was that it cost $45 for the day and I could take up to 500 pictures and videos. After my trip the guy at the shop would burn them all onto a CD for me to have. I thought that it would be worth the money and I was soon proved to be right about that! The guy at the camera place said “Make sure you take a good number of pictures and videos, you know, make it worth the money.” Obviously this man had never met the likes of me before. I told him rest assured I would be making it worth them money. In the end the count was 256 pictures and videos. I think that might be a new daily record for me. When I took the camera back to get the photos onto a CD I told the guy that I had little idea of what was actually on the camera because I just never stopped clicking the button. I was like a Japanese tourist underwater. Those fish didn’t even see it coming until their little bulgy eyes were assaulted with flashes of light here and there. I knew some of the pictures would be blurry but I got a lot of great photos out of the deal. The only thing that sucked about going on a day when it was smashing down rain is that I didn’t get the light of the sun to illuminate the colors of the corals and fish, but hey, I cannot complain about this trip.

A saw so many different fish. Fish I had never seen or heard of before. Fish I had never seen outside of the pet store and soooooo many coral formations. It was just incredible the sights that I saw in just that one day! I even got to see a shark! Bridgitte and I were the only ones in our group to see it, and I even got a not too bad picture of it, but we saw a white tipped reef shark. It swam right below us! It was crazy! At first I was excited and took a picture and thought it was really cool. It was an afterthought that it was actually a shark that might kill me. I also saw a stingray. I tried so hard to get a picture of him before he slipped under the coral, but he was too quick for me. I got a picture of his tail. We went to two different parts of the reef, and at our second location there was a huge fish that they called Wally. Wally was a very friendly fish that swam around at the base of the boat. He swam up and let all the divers and snorkelers give him a pet. It was very very cool. Plus there was a huge school of colorful fish that accompanied Wally. The second location had parts of the reef that were so close to the surface of the water that we couldn’t swim over them for fear of being cut by the corals. It was all so awesome!

The cruise I went with was wonderful as well. I was really impressed with everything they put on. We had morning tea, a big buffet Aussie BBQ for lunch and wine and cheese in the afternoon. It was a great atmosphere that encouraged socializing and a good time. Earlier in the day I had been talking to two guys from Georgia in the states. I picked up immediately that they were from the southern states from the sentence “I couldn’t even get a beer.” Anyways one of them asked where I was from and I said Canada. He said “I was just listening to Joni Mitchell, she is Canadian isn’t she?” We both agreed that it was a pretty random statement but yes in fact she was Canadian. Anyhow, later on in the afternoon when we had wine and cheese they provided us with live entertainment. They had a guy singing and playing the guitar. He was quite good. He sang one song then he said that the next one was for all the Canadians on the boat (the three of us on there, and one was from Quebec so he doesn’t really count anyway). Then he said that if anyone could guess who wrote the song they would win a prize. Well I’d be damned if he didn’t play a Joni Mitchell song! Some girl in the back yelled it out before I could (well I said it from the bar, but I don’t think he heard me) but it was too bad the fellow from Georgia was upstairs at the time. It was very ironic tho. He also said he was going to sing a French song then he just strummed his guitar and sang a random bunch of French words, it was really funny. So we chilled out since we were exhausted from two hours of snorkeling, drank wine, ate cheese and listened to some pretty decent music. I couldn’t think of a more perfect way to end the day.

On the boat Bridgitte asked if I wanted to go out with her and ‘make party.’ Why is it the German girls that always try to get me in trouble? They love to make party :). Well since I had made party on Friday night by myself and booked a tour to Kuranda I didn’t really have the money to make party. So I agreed to go out for a few drinks with her, but had to call it quits pretty early. I invited some other girls from my hostel to join us but the only on that took me up on the offer was Lorraine. Lorraine is awesome! She is from England and couldn’t go home because of the volcano. She is over 50, I never found out hold old she actually was but she did say over 50. She was livin it up in Cairns and loving every minute of it! It was great to see someone that hasn’t given up on life with age. So often you see people as they get older give up and settle into their mundane daily routines. All her kids were grown and she was branching out. Lorraine, if you are reading this, I am proud of you girl! So Bridgitte, Lorraine and I sat and chatted about travels and things before calling it an early night. It was such an awesome day that I think it will be awfully hard to top!This day was filled with awe and adventure below the ocean and the next was destined to be filled with awe and adventure in the tree tops of the rainforest!