Our Cairns adventure...

I am blessed to do what I do. I know that and I am grateful for it every day. We're also lucky that my engineer husband works for an airline. His job opens up the world to our family for much less $$ than it would ordinarily cost. So far our fellas have been to 9 countries, which is pretty great.

In May I taught at the fabulous Pages 2 Scrap just north of beautiful Sydney. Fabulous store, fabulous people! While I was teaching, my fellas flew out to enjoy Sydney for a couple of days. When I was done, we flew up to Cairns to enjoy the Great Barrier Reef and Daintree Rainforest.

I've been to many places in this beautiful world, and the Great Barrier Reef is one of the absolute highlights of all of my traveling. We loved it so much that we are going to get our scuba certification and go back when my oldest fella is done with his mission. I just have to show it to him. I want him to experience it. We snorkeled on the reef and also did two introductory scuba dives. Our instructor, Russell, was spectacularly kind and patient, and took care of us expertly. I highly recommend the company we did the tour with, Passions of Paradise. The staff was exceptional, they truly made the day wonderful. Plus the company is ecologically friendly and they help monitor the health of the reef with their daily dives.

Here are a few pics from the trip...

Above: view from our apartment (Aquarius...expensive but worth it).

This gorgeous tree was a block from the apartment, and has some very special residents.

Huge fruit bats! Hundreds of them.

Cole is in the front of the above pic...when we were getting ready to snorkel.

Carter took all of the underwater pics (except for the last one of all of us, which Russell took). The pictures do not do justice to the beauty of the reef, or to the experience of being there.

Such a moving, outstanding experience. Save your money and GO.

We also saw the Daintree rainforest, which was very cool, too.

We enjoyed the rainforest, but didn't love the tour we went on. Next time we go we'll rent a car and drive ourselves to a few of the rainforest points (including the Skyline, which we didn't get to do this time since it was closed for three weeks).

Thanks for letting me share our little adventure.

June 07, 2014 | Permalink

Comments

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Sounds like you had a fabulous trip, lucky you! What a great experience for your boys. (and you, too of course!)

Posted by: Helen | June 07, 2014 at 02:15 PM

WOW - looks like a truly spectacular trip! Thanks for sharing the pix with us!

Posted by: ellen vargo | June 07, 2014 at 02:29 PM

I've dived the GBR and it is truly amazing. We saw several big sea turtles which were very cool. I liked everything about Australia and would have just stayed permanently if I could have. You're lucky to be able to travel that much.

Posted by: Leslie | June 07, 2014 at 02:47 PM

Glad you enjoyed our fabulous country. You need to come further south to Melbourne next time. Thanks for your inspirational art. Cheers

Posted by: Helen Yann | June 07, 2014 at 07:05 PM