Agincourt Ribbon Reefs diving……

From our digs in Cairns we drove up the coast about 45 minutes to a place called Port Douglas. When we turned off the main highway towards the Marina was a nice palm tree tree lined road. I said to Maija “this looks like were driving into Princeville on Kauai”. If you’ve ever been there, gives you an idea of the kinda place we’re hanging out. Real nice and tropical and touristy!!!!!

So we signed up to go out on a boat called Poseidon. There were about 50 people, only 13 of which are divers, so 2 small groups. The nice thing about diving the reef, is that’s all shallow diving about 60 feet was max depth. Our first dive we drop in, swim around the backside of this pinnicle we see 4 white tip reef sharks!!! Spectacular!!! We look off toward the open ocean and there sitting on the sandy bottom was a MANTA RAY!!!! Dive master says he only sees 1 every 3 months. I was so excited that I sucked all my air, and only got 43 minutes out of the dive. This was the best dive I’ve ever been on, tons of fish, great colorful heathly coral, crystal clear water. If you’re a diver, put the GBR on your list of must see places and make sure you go to the Agincourt Ribbon Reefs.

Here are the pics...although they don’t do justice to the size of the Ray or sharks due to distance, but it was 12-15 feet across.

J

We are now proud owners of Australian property.......

No, we did not buy a time share (Sherry). We are currently at the northeast corner of Australia in a place called Cape Tribulation. As we were driving home from a day at the reef yesterday we had a flat tire. (more to come on the reef in a later blog). Luckily, James' farm upbringing came in handy and he whipped the tire off, put the spare on and had us on our way in 5 minutes (literally). We had to get the tire fixed today. As part the the deal here when you "hire a car" (Aussie way of saying rent a car) is that you have to fix the flat if you didn't purchase extra insurance (we didn't). So we found a tire shop (spelled tyre here) and they told us that they couldn't fix it...so we had to buy a new tire. Thus, we are now proud owners of Australian property.

We will catch up on the last couple of days in another blog and upload pics, hopefully tomorrow from Darwin. Internet is not so great up here. We are in a remote place...in fact, our hotel room tonight has a completely outdoor bathroom/shower. It's crazy, but pretty cool.

Smurfs diving at the Great Barrier Reef!!!!

Yesterday we went diving at the Great Barrier Reef. We booked ourselves on a smaller boat called the SeaStar that only takes 30 people (most boats here take 75 people). We wanted to experience the reef without 75 other divers in the water with us. We were not disappointed as we were the only two divers on the boat so we had a dive guide all to ourselves. It is “stinger” (jellyfish) season here so we had to where stinger suits to protect us from the nearly invisible but deadly jellyfish. The suits are blue from head to and including attached mittens and a hood. We looked like two smurfs.

We did three dives at two different sites. The reef was spectacular and we saw incredible coral, fish, and all other types of sea creatures. We went to a place called the fishbowl and saw 3 foot bumperhead parrot fish. They had a white beak that looked kind of like two front teeth. We saw clown fish (nemo), butterfly fish, trumpet fish, coral cod, anemone and numerous other amazing fish. The coral gardens were spectacular and had many types, sizes, varieties and colors of coral. Some of the coral was gigantic.

We were lucky enough to see a white tipped reef shark. And no, it wasn’t scary. It scampered off the minute it noticed us.


Our guide was very knowledgeable and showed us the soft coral that we could touch. We were also able to touch/hold two different types of sea cucumber and a purple sea star.





We saw giant clams that would snap closed when we touched them.


One of my favorites was a three foot giant maori wrasse that they called “Wally” who hangs out everyday at the end of the boat. Wally was very gentle and would let you touch him and almost hug him.


The water here is very clear with good visibility for diving. This is a view of Michealmas Cay and part of the reef .



It is really almost impossible to explain how amazing the Great Barrier Reef really is. Everyone should experience this for themselves…..

Hei….Are you Finnish?

So you all know Maija is half Finnish, right? And she’s a Finn magnet. It doesn’t matter where we go she will find a Finn. A year ago on our honeymoon, we went scuba diving and the first people we met were a Finnish couple on holiday, we go to church, the first lady Maija meets is Finnish, we change wards in Seattle….yep another Finn. Today, we took a train ride up the mountain to Karunda, a touristy artist community. We’re standing on the platform to board and yep…..a Finnish couple chatting it up!!!!



Karunda is a rainforest community about 25km west of Cairns, we took a train ride up the mountain then returned via a sky rail tram, which had great views of the coastline. There are several aboriginal tribes around this area,. They have a unique style of painting, which had seen on a documentary back home. We had decided before we came that this would be something that we’ld like to purchase as our Australian souvenir. Today we found one that we both really liked. I hope we don’t find something we like better or cheaper elsewhere on our trip.

Here is a picture depicting the art style, as a mural on the wall outside of the art gallery.



PS. Maija successfully drove us to town tonight, it wasn't too scary...:)

PSS. We ate kangaroo for dinner and it was very good, could hardly tell it wasn't beef.

PSSS. The local news reported that they caught a croc on the beach inside the stinger net....the protective barrier for swimming.......YA RIGHT!!!!!!!!

Which Side of the Road?????

We have finally arrived in Australia. We are in Cairns and ready to start vacation living...but only after a good nights sleep. 33 hours of traveling has left us a bit tired. We arrived this afternoon to great weather, 80 degrees and sunny with a nice sea breeze. The most challenging thing so far has been learning to drive on the wrong side of the road....while trying to use a manual transmission. James has done a great job. I'm gonna wait until tomorrow to try it and hopefully I won't wreck. It's weird to be driving on the wrong side of the car, wrong side of the road and then trying to shift with the opposite hand. I've gotta wait for more sleep before trying it. Pics are James in the car (it's nice and roomy huh!) one of me at the beach where they post big signs about the "stingers"...they even provide vinegar just in case (YIKES!!!) and one of us in Cairns after eating dinner.

1/2 way there

We've arrived in Seoul Korea, a very nice 11 hour flight. This airport rivals the amsterdam airport, which is one of our favorites. I don't remember if I saw this on my last stopover in Seoul, flying home from Hong Kong in 2005. But in this airport they have free showers, walking to our next gate we saw the "transfer desk" w/ shower and massage.....Which we took full advantage of. The shower was free but the hand towel and toiletries was $3. Best $3 bucks I ever spent between 12 hour flights.

We're off to our next gate, gonna try and find some food....NO Kimchi as it's 1:45am.

-J

The time has come.....

Tomorrow morning we are heading out on our long journey across the world. We have 33 hours of traveling in front of us. 12 hour flight from Seattle to Seoul, 2 hour layover in Seoul then a second 12 hour flight from Seoul to Brisbane. In Brisbane we have a 3 hour layover before a 3 hour flight up to Cairns where we will stay for 6 days. Total of approximately 33 hours of traveling start to finish. Doesn't that sound fun? It will be long and grueling but we think it's worth it. We are trading in the Seattle rain for Australian sun, it should be 85-90 degrees and sunny.

And the best part...we are landing in Australia on our one year anniversary!!!