2 Day 1 Night Dive Trip!

We met at the dive shop early Saturday morning and got transferred to the marina to get on the boat "Sea Quest". It was an hour and a half boat trip to the reef, which was pretty choppy! Then we were able to begin our dives. We first went to Norman Reef. We decided to do our first two dives with a guide, as we weren't too sure on navigating our way back to the boat. On our very first dive we were lucky enough to see a White Tip Reef Shark. It was rather exciting! Also, the first place we stopped they have a 'resident fish' named "wally" who swims really close to everyone and poses for photos - pretty sure they feed him. But he's a massive fish that acts a bit like a dog, its rather bizarre. On dive number 2 we were starting to get a bit annoyed as we were sat at the bottom of the ocean waiting for another girl to join us as she was having major buoyancy issues when we spotted a sting ray! They bury themselves in the sand so its not always that easy to find them. We also saw sea cucumbers, starfish and loads more! From there the boat we were on drove up close to a bigger boat "TAKA". They tied the two boats together and passed us and all our belongings from one to another. TAKA was where we were going to spend the night. We drove to a new location - Playground. We did another dive, we decided this time we could work out the navigation and attempted it without a guide. We were successful as we managed to get back onto the boat. Our next dive was the night dive! As neither of us had done one before they made us go with a Guide. Which was good as it was pretty scary. They had a spotlight at the back of the boat so that we knew where to come back to and it attracted LOADS of fish and Gray Reef Sharks! There were so many!!! On the night dive we each had a torch. So you can see where peoples torches are but everything else is pitch black! It really gets your nerves going. There were a lot of Giant Tervallys which are big black fish that follow you around, we had three that followed us on our dive. They use your torch light to catch their fish. Tom, our guide, made one crash nose fish into the coral, but then he let him catch a fish. So that was pretty interesting to see. On our way back to the boat we got caught up with all the fish and the sharks swimming in the spotlight. It was a really good experience. After that we got pudding and then it was an early night as we were shattered from 4 dives in one day and all the excitement! We had a little room with a bunk bed in. it was rather comfy but a bit rocky. We got a 6.50am wake up call for a bit of breakie and then it was straight into the water again! We did two dives before lunch. There was loads of fish at this spot - "clipper". The second dive we did we got dropped off in a little boat and had to fall backwards to get into the water. Then we had to make our own way back to the big boat. It was a really good dive. There was loads to see and we spotted another sting ray. I think it was a really good dive and gave us a sense of achievement being able to find the boat again! Not that it was very hard as we just had to follow the wall of the reef till we got to the mooring blocks. We then had lunch and did our last dive. Before we were passed back onto the other boat to come back to Cairns. The trip was really good and definitely worth it. We did a total of 7 dives (6 Day dives and 1 Night dive). There was so much to see. The coral was beautiful although there was a lot more of it damaged than I thought there would be. And the fish were so colourful. It was absolutely amazing! The crew ad dive staff were so nice too. It was extremely tiring and full on but we had an amazing couple of days and saw some wonderful things!