The Great Barrier Reef, I believe, was the
ultimate bucket-list experience before the term “bucket list” was invented.
Snorkeling on the Reef, or diving if scuba is your thing, is something you
really should do before you die. People know this. In Cancer in Two Voices, one of the things that co-authors Barbara
Rosenblum and Sandy Butler do when they realize Barbara is going to die, is to
go and snorkel on the Great Barrier Reef.
The Reef extends from Bundaberg, the rum
capital in central Queensland, north to the coast of Papua New Guinea. The
coral reefs of the Queensland continental shelf extend up to 220 miles into the
Pacific Ocean. The present reef, grown over hundreds of meters of ancient reefs
from previous falls in sea level, is between six and eighteen thousand years old.
Corals (more than four hundred species of them) are, of course, animals that
behave somewhat weirdly like plants. Trillions of them make up the largest
living thing ever. It is like no place on earth.
So although we’d snorkeled on fringing reef
in the Whitsundays, and had a glimpse of the tropical fish and corals, nothing
could compare to the moment I first donned mask and fins and slipped off the
ramp from the rear deck into the sea. The waters around Thetford Reef were
filled with color and natural wonders, and although I’m very nearsighted, what
I wanted to see was close to the surface, or swimming right in front of my
mask. “Some nondivers may wonder if it’s really worth going to the Great
Barrier Reef ‘just to snorkel,’” says the Lonely Planet guide to Australia.
“The answer is a resounding yes. Much of the rich, colourful coral lies just
underneath the surface (as coral needs bright sunlight to flourish)”.
They say you could snorkel different parts
of the Reef all your life and never see everything. I find myself coming up
with only bathetic comparisons—certainly no photographs could capture it, as
I’m not an underwater photographer. It was like swimming in the tropical fish
tank at my pediatricians’. It’s a wonderworld. For all that, though, I can’t
say that Airlie Beach and the nearby islands aren’t still where I’d go back on
vacation. And the Grand Canyon (once we were finally reunited at the traumatic
end of a long hike) is still the pitch-black place in which I’ve seen the most
amazing star-filled sky.
Because the Reef is wild and natural. Such
an experience has to accept that we have no control over either weather or
wildlife. There is no guarantee of clear weather or smooth sailing, especially
in the wet tropics. Nor can sea turtles or Ulysses butterflies be made to
appear. A clear night on the Reef with sunset or stars was not to be. Never
take any experience for granted.
We began in Cairns, eating locally caught
barramundi—such fresh fish. The moment our small ship set out we were on the
top deck, the “sun” deck, sitting around the spa. Quickly the bumping around
began and sloshed water from the spa all over us, so we figured we might as
well get into our swimsuits and sit in it. This was to be as much as we’d enjoy
the spa in three days!
The first snorkel, at Thetford Reef (an
atoll reef), the song running through my head constantly was “2 Kool 2 Be
4-Gotten.” And it was. Whatever people say to describe the glorious coral and
fish of the Reef, there’s nothing like actually floating over it for the first
time. Elephant-ear coral, black surgeon fish, brilliantly colored parrot fish
crunching away at the coral’s surface, and more other species than I could ever
count, let alone name. The marine biologist told us more about some of what we
were seeing in the glass-bottomed boat later, which led to T. sharing this
Doris Day gem:
“The glass-bottomed boat, you will agree/
Gives you the secrets of the deep blue sea”
Everybody we ate with, even when extra
people came and went, was British. Ten thousand miles I came to be surrounded
by English people—well, there was a single Scot. So I learned a lot at dinner
about English places and sports. I also learned more Australian lessons, such
as, that I don’t get the point of oysters, nor do I like Moreton Bay Bugs
(crayfish)—and why would I?
So there we were: a whole load of Brits, an
Austrian, German, and New Zealand family (one each), an American couple who
were older than everybody else but game for anything—and me. At dinner the Scotsman
sat on the other side of T. and, as there was another man beside me and a
heterosexual couple, the server put two and two together. Or didn’t. She
assumed T. would pay for Scottie’s drinks. T. pointed to me and said, “I’m with
her—not him!”
What we essentially did was go down the
coast of north Queensland the same way we’d just come up, only on the sea side.
So we sailed through Hinchinbrook Channel, of which an old sailor’s adage was
quoted: “No one can sail through the Hinchinbrook Channel and not believe in
God.” He must have been there on a sunny day; if I didn’t believe in God I’m
not sure Hinchinbrook Island would convince me. It’s the rainiest place in
Australia. No barbecue on the beach for us. Most of the Palm Islands are either
national park or Aboriginal land, but we went to Pelorus Island, which is
neither. Our nature walk showed us golden orb spiders, green ants, casuarina
trees like those planted around Raffles Hotel in Singapore, and
Moses-in-a-Basket rhododendron; but the only other wildlife we saw was the
wickedly invasive cane toad. Again, it was the marine environment that was the
star, with giant clams. We snorkeled again around Yanks Jetty, on Orpheus
Island, where there was a really nice beach. By “really nice” I mean that it
was sand, not coral rock, and that the sun came out for a bit. To be fair, it
doesn’t much matter when it rains while you’re snorkeling.
From the sea side we now saw the
impressively long (5.7-km) jetty at Lucinda, Queensland, which is used for
sugar cane. And we came to Dunk Island, last seen from the land side at
Wongaling Beach, where we saw the water taxi leaving from the beach. Wongaling
is part of the community of Mission Beach, which takes its name from the
ill-fated “mission” to the Djiru people. Decimated by malaria and cyclone, they
were further removed to Great Palm Island, which is why the Palm Islands
(except Orpheus and Pelorus) are still Aboriginal lands today.
I saw intricate pink and purple lipstick
clams, which open and close like, well, lips. Thousands of little fish swimming
right along with me. Strange birdsong and not even being able to see the birds
was my experience of Dunk Island (Coonanglebah, “the island of peace and
plenty,” in Djiru). Well, we did see a few plants and butterflies, and a
rainbow over the nearby “desert” island. Back on the sun deck, the sun rapidly
gave way to rain; at least being under 80% canopy cover made us feel part of
the rainforest itself.
It’s safe to say I preferred the underwater
to the rainforest environment. For a native of a landlocked state, who never
saw an ocean until I was fourteen, I sure have been spending a lot of time at
sea lately. The one sunny morning we had time to doze on the sun lounges, the
sun was endurable because of the great wind tossing the ship up and down. What
a relief to arrive at Nathan Reef, which was the best snorkeling experience
yet—the coral gardens more spectacular, the fish more varied, and the sea swell
greater!
The final morning it was raining so hard
when we woke up I thought there was no way we were going to Fitzroy Island, or
Gabarra as it’s called in Gungandji. In 1877 this island was used to quarantine
Chinese workers on their way to the goldfields, and of course, many died of the
squalid conditions. Seems there’s a bad story behind every place.
But amazingly, the weather cleared up long
enough for us to snorkel one more time off the coral rock beach. Not even any
injuries this time (they’ve healed wondrously—thanks, intern pharmacist at
Airlie Beach!) We enjoyed seeing many more fish, including species I hadn’t
previously seen, along this fringing reef. The sun came out again, briefly, just
long enough for us to snap a group photo on the deck. Then just before we
docked at Cairns, would you believe we saw dolphins on the starboard side. Not
close enough to get a picture, but just seeing them was enough.
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