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There are several natural wonders of the world and the Great Barrier Reef in Australia is probably the most well known of them all.
It is a huge marine wilderness which was "world heritage" listed in 1981when it was recognised as a truly magnificent nature reserve, unlike anything else. It a series of 2100 individual reefs stretching for more than 2000 kilometers from Papua New Guinea in the north down the Queensland coast to Lady Elliott Island 400 kilometers north of Brisbane, the capital city of the state. In addition to all of these reefs, there are some 500 islands which were once part of the mainland but became separated when the sea level rose tens of thousands of years ago. There are numerous ways that you can explore this amazing place from aircraft flyover�s, helicopter trips, sailing boats and the general tourist type look and see trips, but the only way to really experience this wonderland is to see first hand and that is from under the water. If you think you have dived in some amazing places in the world, as the saying goes, "you ain�t seen nothing yet"
Lets tell you a little about the different parts of the reef. Remember, it is over 2000 kilometers long so if you go to the area that you do not want, then it takes a fair while to get somewhere else.
The Northern Reef section is considered the area from Papua New Guinea to Townsville. North of Cooktown, although a magnificent wilderness area and certainly worth exploring, there are very few charter boats that venture to the reef. (We will talk about the adventure type options that are available here later in this text.). It is huge area with several main resort islands and many wilderness islands. This area, from Port Douglas down to Townsville contains the easiest access to the reef and probably gives the biggest range of options and operators. There are over 400 species of coral, 1500 species of fish, 400 species of mollusc, 500 species of seaweed and 200 species of birds within this magical place. This region is considered the epitome of marine wilderness simply
because of its limited accessibility. Access to the large areas of the reef north of Lizard Island is possible only on a multi day cruise.
There are several of these available working from either Port Douglas or Cairns. For those who wish to be based on the mainland there is a huge number of day trips that depart from all of the centres from Port Douglas down as far as Townsville. There are also two day three day and longer trips if required. All are run by very competent operators and the rules and regulations that govern these operators make diving the Great Barrier Reef the safest diving location in the world. The greatest difficulty for the visitor is trying to decide which trip is the most suitable for what you wish to achieve. We hope that we can answer any questions that you have regarding this fabulous experience that you are to depart on, so that you can get exactly what you want.
When making a choice, and in particular on day trips, you will spend the majority of your time travelling to the selected location of the
operators choice. Remember though, the further out you go, the less likelihood of you running into any crowds, or for that matter, any other people at all.
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We are a diving information and booking service run by divers for divers. This site is managed by three divers, Rick, Bernie and Tom, who between have over 75 years experience as divers. Each of us are NAUI Instructors/ Course Directors, two of us are also PADI Diver Instructors. At one point in time we have all lived and taught diving in Cairns and are familiar with the Great Barrier Dive sites from Lizard Island down to Brisbane.
We also have extensive experience with diving throughout the rest of Australia and New Zealand and can assist you with a dive trip anywhere in our region.
