My life under the reef

LAUREN ALEXANDER / THE EAGLE

Is your life just like Nemo’s? Well, I’m sorry to hear you say no…mine is. If there is one thing you think about Australia – it’s probably either the Outback or The Great Barrier Reef. For my 2 week spring break, I headed out to the great city of Cairns. The city, located in the tropical Northern part of Queensland, is home to much of the Great Barrier Reef, rainforests, and a great night life. While there is a university in Cairns, most of the people there are tourists…and most of them are my age too.

PHOTO COURTESY OF WHITEHAVEN XPRESS

We woke up bright and early to adventure into the Great Barrier Reef. We hoped on our sweet boat, got some free breakfast, and signed up to…scuba dive. YEP. This was not part of our original itinerary, but we thought, why not? I mean, how many times can you say you went scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef? My point exactly. So we signed our life away on a form and listened to an awesome marine bio presentation about the wildlife 15 meters below sea level. We strapped on our tanks, or jet packs, and practiced breathing underwater. It was such a strange sensation…and took heaps of focus. But I got it. We shimmied down into the water and down we went. We went 15 meters in 20 minutes but boy, oh boy was it worth it! I touched the coral and swam amongst sea turtles, sharks, a school of squid, and heaps of other amazing fish. The coral was neon and incredible and the clams were purple and so soft. There is actually no way to put into words what I saw, and no underwater camera could do it justice. Finding Nemo was pretty spot on. When I was down there I was in complete awe, I kept looking behind me and above me and all around and still couldn’t believe where I was.

We sailed around some more, got some lunch, tanned a bit, and went snorkeling. I held a sea cucumber and it was nasty. They are alive, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at it or holding it. It was like a big seaweed wrap filled with sand. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck.

The rest of my time in Cairns was super relaxing – just a bit of skydiving, tanning, and ice cream. I’m on the search for the best gelato – and the flavors here are amazing! The most popular flavors are passionfruit and honeycomb. Delish.