The Great Barrier Reef!

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What an awesome 5 days!

It started on Friday, 7am pick up to start my Open water scuba course to get me qualified in the open water, aka THE GREAT BARRIER REEF. Two days of theory / classroom work later (won't bore you all with that bit) then Sunday arrived.

0615: Hostel pick up then to dive shop to pick up scuba gear - then to the boat. 3 days / 2 nights. We were on board by 9am a quick bite to eat then in we go. Legs shaking ( with adrenaline i think). One hand on my mask and regulator and one on the weight belt and in i jump!

As soon as we got in you looked to your feet and all you can see is colours! Evey colour imaginable and more! Fish all over, big buggers too!

The first day was two dives, one at 1030am then one at around 4pm. After a bit of early evening snorkling and some food (every time you get out of the water they feed you) a few beers then of to bed. A cabin, bunk beds and you get rocked to sleep by the waves! Doesn't get much better!

That is till the early morning wake up call! We dove the next day 4 times, the first was at around 630- best way to wake up ever! After the next dive we would be certified. Out on our own in the water just you and a buddy! Took the camera out and got some good photos! Including the turtle ones! He was wicked really well hidden feeding on the coral! Then came the night dive, didn't see much new on this but the experience of diving at night is something i will always remember! AWESOME! Scary but awesome!

Then came the final day of diving. Having decided the night before to take my course to the next level i was going on the adventure course! This included a 30 m dive, having previously only gone to 17.5 it would be interesting to see the changes that happen as you go deeper! Nitrogen narcosis! When you dive the nitrogen bulids up in the blood, this can cause you to act a bit crazy sometimes, nothing bad but just a bit silly! Stories of losing concentration, following fish when you're supposed to be concentrating on your instructor and offering a passing fish you air supply / giggling etc! All i did was chase a sticky label off the apple that our instructor was carrying!

After going down on the deep section of the dive we started heading up, this was to be the most amazing next 10 mins of my life! As we started ascending round the coral wall Chris the instructor was showing the rest of the group a nemo family which was hiding in amongst some coral, i was lagging a bit behind due to the label chasing. I came up to see the Nemos and above Chris i saw a huge shadow at first i thought it was our boat. Looked again and it was moving. It was huge! It was on the surface. We were 7-8m under. It was a minky whale! I went mental blowing bubbles everywhere waving my hands kicking my feet anything to get Chris attention. I got it. Pointed at the minky. Chris was off and we weren't far behind! We were in chase! We caught up with him just as he caught up with not one but two more whales! This was unbelievable! 3 whales swimming only around 5m away!

After we swam with them for a while and signaled the boat that they were around we started heading back to the boat. With our snorkels in we couldn't believe our luck when one of the minky came swimming right under us! Being so close to that was awesome! After getting back to the boat i asked Chris when he last saw a minky diving. He hadn't. Ever. So to see 3 on only my 7th dive!? Awesome!

So thats it from me for now. I'm safely back on stable ground again, feel pretty damn wobbly though- got my sea legs on!. Going for a bite to eat and a few beers with everyone from the boat tonight, then prob going to jump on a bus down the coast. So i'll update you next chance i get. Hope you've all enjoyed, i know i did!

bye for now!

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