Passions of Paradise: Corny Name, Brilliant Trip

I almost didn’t know where to start when researching snorkeling day trips in Cairns. It seems that there are hundreds of trips to search through, each of which offers a completely different style of boat and a completely different destination on the Great Barrier Reef. To begin with, both James and I were set on doing the “Reef Magic” trip, since they offered a free introductory dive (an “ value”) to any YHA members. However, after doing research into the trip, I found that it cost —much more than most other trips on the internet and all trips advertised on the street of Cairns—and that it only traveled to a floating platform on the reef. We wanted something a little more…natural and decided to continue searching.

I eventually stumbled upon the “Passions of Paradise” website (www.passions.com.au), even though I was tempted not to browse because of the corny (and rather Loveboat-sounding) name. As soon as I started looking seriously, I realized that it looked like a brilliant trip. Not only was the boat a 2005 Queensland Tourism award winner, but it was incredibly cheap (at least for the prices I’d been looking at) at + reef levy for an 8am-5pm snorkeling trip. Plus, instead of going to a man-made platform, the Passions stopped first at Paradise Reef and then at Michaelmas Cay, a beautiful sand cay absolutely surrounded by soft coral. Another added bonus was that introductory dives only cost —making the snorkel plus the dive nearly the same price as a snorkel alone at reef magic! It sounded too good to be true.

This boat truly offers what is advertised: a wonderful day trip to the Barrier Reef that you won’t forget. The two stops on the trip offer their own different wondrous environments. Paradise Reef is a much deeper reef of hard coral; the snorkeling here is good but diving gets you much closer to the actual reef, although there are some shallower sections. Michaelmas Cay, on the other hand, is a very shallow soft coral reef where in some places there was barely enough room for us to carefully glide over the reef! This is where we got a much more up-close-and-personal look at the reef and where my pictures came out much more colorful.

Quick Tips:

We booked our trip for the first day we would be in Cairns, mainly to save money by not renting a car until the following day. Unfortunately, our first day happened to be one of eight rainy days Cairns has a month in the dry season, and it was very much the ugliest weather of our trip. There was a notice on the website that was reiterated when we all got on the boat wearing glum faces: the rain normally keeps to the coast, where there are lots of mountains, and the weather nearly always clears up by the time the boat makes it to the reef.

Unfortunately, this warning didn’t apply to us. It truly was an ugly day, but since we spent most of it underwater and visibility was still a very good 20m, it didn’t ruin the day at all. It would have been nice to see the sun twinkling off the azure sea, showing us every nook & cranny of the reef below, or to see the contrast of Michaelmas’ white sand vs. the turquoise of the Pacific surrounding it, but I can’t complain much. We went to see the reef, and see the reef we definitely did. Plus, it’s just a motivation to come back again on a nicer day! Pretty much, this is my long winded way of saying don’t worry if the weather isn’t too great, because the trip will still be worth every penny.

When you first get to Marlin Jetty, the main jetty in Cairns where all dive trips leave from, don’t just make a beeline to the boat with the tallest mast. Even though that is the Passions, you actually have to check in first at the terminal building. This wasn’t written anywhere on our tickets—we found it out when everyone else had a boarding pass and we didn’t. Luckily, the skipper was nice enough to let James on board with all our stuff and let me go wait in line at the terminal! We had arrived in plenty of time though, since the boat starts boarding at 7.30 but you aren’t required to be on board until 8, and the line was fairly quick moving, so it wasn’t much of an inconvenience.

Don’t worry about taking food on board—a very filling, good lunch consisting partly of seafood is served between snorkeling trips.

Best Way To Get Around:

If you are staying in the centre of Cairns, check how far away the Marlin Jetty is from you. We thought that we would be fairly close but realized when we looked at a map later that we didn’t really want to do a 2.5km walk at 7 in the morning. Luckily, our hostel (Nomad Serpents, on Lake St and reviewed in my Cairns journal) offered a free shuttle service to the Jetty, but if this isn’t the case, Passions offers their own shuttle as well. This shuttle needs to be booked when you book your trip (although you can call and add it on later), and costs about a person. I think it’s worth the price to have piece of mind!

Speaking of money, you don’t pay when booking or checking in, but rather, on the way home from the reef. I am fairly certain they had EFTPOS (credit/debit)—they’d have to, with the price of the trip—but we found it much easier to get cash from an ATM beforehand. If you do this, make sure you have enough for all the extras— for an intro dive, for a second intro dive, for a wetsuit, for a shuttle trip, and various amounts of money for alcohol. Our trip ended up costing each. I wasn’t too worried about taking that much cash aboard, because there are plenty of places to stash carry-ons out of sight, and if you noticed money was missing it’s fairly certain the culprit would still be on board, since there are attendance checks after every stop on the reef.

As for the transport that this trip provides, as I’ve already mentioned, it comes in the form of a 25m long catamaran. This cat is rated to hold 100 people, but with 80 on board the day we went it seemed a little squished. However, it was a rainy day with many less people outside than normal. Going out to the reef took a bit more than 2 hours—we left slightly late at around 8.15am and arrived at Paradise Reef around 10.30ish. We were under sail for awhile on the way home, going at a fair clip of 9 knots. This is one thing most other dive boats did not offer and was definitely a nice finishing touch on a great trip.

After two hours of chugging out to the Outer Barrier Reef, we arrived at Paradise Reef. This reef is used, from what we could see, only by the Passions of Paradise, so there was plenty of room for the 80 people on board to swim around without being too crowded.

Our briefing for snorkeling was mostly for people that had never done so before, so all we really had to know before tugging on wetsuits was how to clear our mask and snorkel. This was an easy skill to master and soon enough we were pouring de-fog on our masks and one by one, jumping in.

Unfortunately, as soon as I jumped in, I realized there was a bit of a problem. When I was swimming over to James, my mask half-filled with water and I inhaled a good amount of water. Choking, I came up, emptied my mask, and tried again, only to have the same result. This lasted for at least 5 minutes, during which I got very agitated because I thought that a) I was going to waste $120 on a trip where I wouldn’t even see the reef because I’m incapable of snorkeling b) I was going to disappoint James because if I couldn’t snorkel, how could I possibly dive, and c) I was going to drown because I’m incompetent. After holding on to the "snorkel rest centre"—essentially just a floating square to hold on to—for a bit, James convinced me to go on board and get another mask.

When I did so, it made a world of difference. I could actually see stuff through my mask and snorkel for as long as I wanted without filling up with water! I didn’t have a single problem after that. So, with James surely happy that I was not kicking up a fuss, we headed for the reef. Around the boat, the reef was very deep. While we could see it, it was all very blue and far away, even if we did dive down, which James did quite a bit of. However, when we moved further behind and to the right of the boat, the reef became much shallower and much more breathtaking. Everywhere, there were brilliant colors, with only a slight tinge of blue. We could see little anemones with clownfish poking out of them and parrotfish chasing each other around and through the coral formations. With every turn of the head, we could see different and exciting wildlife.

This entry is continued in Paradise Reef: Snorkeling, pt. 2.

This entry is a continuation of Paradise Reef: Snorkeling.

James likes to rub it in my face that when I was on the boat getting a new mask, he saw a sea turtle. I suppose it is a good thing to rub in my face, since I really wanted to see a turtle, since they are my favorite animals. Unfortunately, it was the only turtle spotted all day—perhaps they were all a little further out, playing in the EAC (you know, with all the other turtles that have "serious thrill issues, dude!"). A double d’oh to the fact that James didn’t have the camera when he saw it!  The camera we took was actually my digital, in a special "all-weather" (up to 3m of water) case. James really enjoyed following fish around, snapping shots and movies of the fish being completely not bothered by his presence. You can tell who took our pictures when going through a slideshow—I have lots of coral shots and he has lots of action shots!

Paradise Reef was one of two distinct types of reef we saw on our trip. It was mainly made up of hard coral, although fortunately, no fire coral. We’re pretty sure they would have warned us about fire coral, above and beyond the numerous warnings not to touch the coral because a) it destroys the wonderful ecosystem that’s been created and b) a lot of coral burns, scratches, or otherwise inflicts bodily harm that might not make the rest of the day so pleasant. The fish seemed fairly similar between the two reefs, though, with plenty of neon and otherwise striking ones to observe in awe.

After about thirty minutes of snorkeling, we were called back to the boat as part of intro dive group 3. By this point, I didn’t want to get out and face the rain and cold (for Cairns) air—I would have much preferred to just stay and swim around, looking. Once you get a glimpse of the reef, it’s hard to pull yourself away, regardless of whether you have turned into a human prune or not. However, the intro dive was well worth it, and I have chronicled it in Paradise Reef: The Intro Dive.

When I got out of the water from snorkeling, I was absolutely freezing. The rain was chilling against my already wet skin, and I actually ended up shivering. Fortunately, the preparation for the dive didn’t take overly long—we strapped on weights, followed by our tanks/floatation vests, tested how our masks fit/our ability to clear the mask and the regulator, and then we were back in the water.

I couldn’t believe how little preparation was actually involved in the dive, but that was mainly because we weren’t going to be going too deep and we were doing a guided tour. We had learned the main things during the dive briefing earlier in the trip, including things like hand signals. One of the important things was that the guide was controlling our floatation vests—we were told how to use them and then firmly told not to touch. While there wasn’t a whole lot to getting ready, I still felt completely safe and confident in their abilities. All of the relevant medical questions were asked in a questionnaire that we received at the terminal check-in desk (including the first reference I’d ever seen to a pneumothorax—my brother’s medical condition where your lung collapses spontaneously—other than in his medical records), and if we wrote down anything that even remotely looked like it could cause problems with diving, one of the instructors came over and chatted to us about it. James got asked about his asthma, which he hasn’t had a problem with since high school, and I got asked about my nausea medicine. Everyone on board was strictly warned that if they consumed any alcohol, they wouldn’t be diving.

Partly because of my previous problems with snorkeling (caused by the mask, but still enough to put the wind up me) and partially because I wasn’t convinced I would be able to do the dive with so little training, I got a little bit scared. I was convinced I was going to dive under and have my mask fill up with water. I’m sure the guide was quite used to this, and he let me stay on the top for a little bit longer than the others, whose vests he deflated a little bit so they were a couple feet underwater. Once he had made sure they could clear their masks and regulator underwater, he deflated my vest and I was underwater. I realized quickly that it wasn’t going to be nearly as difficult as I was making it out to be, and successfully cleared my mask and regulator. When he asked the question "Are you OK to go diving?" (using hand signals, of course), I said yes and he gave me a high-five. Then, our group was off.

This entry is continued in Paradise Reef: The Intro Dive, pt. 2.

This entry is a continuation of Paradise Reef: The Intro Dive, pt. 1.

The guide:diver ratio was really quite good—we only had 4 people in our group, counting the guide. Paradise Reef was definitely the right choice for the dive, rather than Michaelmas—the reef was deep enough to merit diving without being so deep that we couldn’t reach it. Rather than observing from above, we were up close and personal with the marine life—giant anemones with families of clownfish in them, huge coral formations, and massive clams buried in the ocean floor, with only their "lips" sticking out. The guide pointed out to us what we could touch—not a lot, as we wanted to leave the reef the same way we found it—but it was cool to feel the roughness of the coral and contrast it to the silky smoothness of the clam.

We went down to around 8m and went in amongst the reef and along the outside, where there was a very big dropoff. It was truly amazing how you could either look at what the guide was pointing to—generally something pretty cool and worth looking at—or you could look the completely opposite way (provided we weren’t swimming along the dropoff) and still see something awesome. The Reef really is an amazing piece of wildlife and truly one of the seven natural wonders of the world. It’s a shame that it is shrinking—to the point that it could disappear in the not-too-distant future. I cannot say enough how amazing it was and how happy I was that I had James and the guide to calm me down enough that I could see everything up close.

We were swimming around for at least 30 minutes before we were unwillingly led back to the boat. It was a wonderful taste of diving—enough to definitely make me want to go back and get my license. James enjoyed it so much that he’s decided to go be a dive instructor in Cairns once he graduates! The only problems we encountered at all on the trip weren’t really problems at all. James wanted to have less guidance and be able to swim around on his own, which obviously wasn’t allowed. He kept slowly creeping away, and because of this the guide thought that his vest wasn’t inflated enough—so James ended up with a vest slightly too inflated so he had to fight to stay down with the rest of us. My only problem was getting a bit too close to the coral and trying to wiggle away—not as easy as with snorkeling, given the large, inflexible tank on your back—without touching anything. And really, if that’s all I have to complain about, I think it was a very good trip indeed!

After we finished our good, freshly-prepared-on-board lunch and had given it enough time to digest (essentially, the time it took to unzip our wetsuits from the railing outside and struggle back into its cold fingertips), it was time to jump back in the water. We had traveled a short distance from our morning destination, Paradise Reef, to a small sand cay named Michaelmas Cay. This cay is one of the largest bird sanctuaries in the Great Barrier Reef, and is home to birds like the ruddy turnstone (oddly named because it likes to turn stones over when searching for food). Only two or three boats per day have permits to allow people onto the beach, and fortunately, the Passions of Paradise is one of these boats. Even from the distance we stopped at—a fair way out from the cay because of the very shallow waters surrounding it—we could see black specks flying everywhere.

Again, we went through the preparation of putting on fins and picking out a mask and de-fogging it. While we were doing so, we were asked about doing a second intro dive. Not many people took them up on it, possibly because the reef looked so much shallower here. I think it was a very good idea to just go snorkeling—it involved less time out of the water and we couldn’t have been much closer to the coral anyway! We were then told about the fish feeding—lots of huge batfish cluster around the boat at the cay—that would happen once everyone was out of the water. Once this announcement was made, one of the dive instructors asked me if I wanted to see Nemo. I’d already seen Nemo and his brothers and sisters at Paradise Reef, but who could mind seeing more clownfish? I told her yes and she pointed out, nearly directly behind the boat, and told me that there was a big anemone right there with lots of Nemos living in it.

Once we jumped in, James and I figured we would never actually find what she was pointing out, but we swam in that general direction because even if we didn’t find Nemo (ha ha), we could still tell from the abrupt change in water color from aquamarine to aquamarine-coated brown that there was plenty of reef to be seen there. Soon, we approached an extremely shallow reef—at points, it would be generous to say there was a foot of water between coral and surface. James started swimming off a bit to my left when I looked down and saw…a large anemone with four clownfish staring out at me! Excited, I snapped a couple pictures before swimming over and dragging James back. He did one better than me and dove down, extremely close to the anemone, and got a brilliant shot of the clownfish family and its home.

This entry is continued in Michaelmas Reef & Cay: Up Close & Personal (pt 2).

This entry is a continuation of Michaelmas Reef: We Found Nemo!

From there, we swam to whatever looked cool. James spent a lot of time following fish around with the camera and got some great videos of parrotfish and clams opening and closing. Some of the coral at this reef was similar to Paradise, but a lot of it was soft, wavy coral—the type you can just sit and watch as it sways back and forth. The colors also seemed to be a lot more brilliant—there were purples, oranges, and pinks all around us, and that’s not including the fish, which ranged from a boring black to the multi colors of the parrotfish to the blinding neon blue of a school of tiny fish whisking by.

I can’t say enough how amazed I was at the depth (or lack thereof) of the coral. More than a few times, I found myself unable to swim—rather, having to wiggle by with minimum use of the fins for fear of accidentally damaging the coral. I could literally—and did a few times—take macro pictures of parts of the coral, because they were within the 8cm or so range of the macro setting! Fish swam by just in front of my mask and wound around my feet. As we got closer to the cay, I got a bit worried that we actually wouldn’t be able to approach it from the angle we were at because the coral was ever creeping closer, but then, all of a sudden, it disappeared and gave way to sand.

On the cay itself, there is a rope marking where people can go. Everything else is birds-only and if you step outside the boundary, you face a very large fine. We came up onto shore pretty much just on the left-hand boundary and were quickly reminded by a dive instructor to stay within the ropes. Leaving our gear on the shores, we walked up the small slope to the sign telling us about the birds and the island. Unfortunately, the sign wasn’t very readable, because it looked like every bird that had ever lived on the island had used it as their own personal toilet. White clumps were caked all over it. Indeed, I felt the sand was only 50% sand, with the other 50 parts consisting of bird dung. It sure caked to your feet like it!

The birds were deafeningly loud and many of them decided on a whim to start flying in place. They were flapping away, but going absolutely nowhere. We stood and videoed them for awhile, but after a few minutes decided that we were at the reef for underwater, rather than aviary, wildlife, and bid them goodbye.

This entry is continued in Michaelmas Reef: The Final Snorkel.

This entry is a continuation of Michaelmas Reef & Cay: Up Close & Personal.

It’s a shame it was such an ugly day, because the cay would have been striking, like the island Jack Sparrow and Elizabeth end up on in “Pirates of the Caribbean 2”. It’s also a shame that there was a glob of sand on my underwater lens that is in all my pictures I was planning to piece together as a panorama from the island.

We were quickly back in the water and enjoying the sealife spectacle around us. The direction we took away from the cay led us into slightly deeper reef, and James got me diving under a few times, which was pretty cool. We seemed to see a lot bigger fish on this side of the reef—including two very large, spotted cod—which gave James an even bigger kick out of filming them. He was sad he wasn’t allowed to catch some of the fish, because he thought the parrotfish looked especially tasty (leave it to him to think something looks tasty when I’m admiring how pretty it looks!).

Someone had just waved us over and pointed out the massive spotted cod that we later misidentified as a potato cod when the inflatable rescue boat came over and told us it was time to head back to the boat. We swam around a little more, while trying not to look too much like we were loitering, before sadly making our way back to the boat. Underneath the boat, there really were huge numbers of giant batfish, which look like massive angelfish. We assume they had already fed them, since we were the last two people on board—but we were much happier playing on the reef than watching large, rather boringly-colored (white and grey) fish getting fed.

I felt a mix of elation and sadness as I was pulling off my wetsuit for the last time. I was so excited about everything I was just seen, and so happy I had done it, yet sad that it was over so quickly. The trip home was partly under sail, which was pretty cool. James enjoyed this, being a sailor. A lot of people were crammed inside, since the weather was a bit chilly, rainy, and generally wet outside, and since we were last we ended up in the middle, nowhere near a window. I ended up feeling slightly sick and conveniently went outside just in time to see a whale’s blow in the distance.

Overall, our trip on the Passions was an absolutely amazing experience. Going out on the reef is something anyone visiting Australia should do, regardless of whether you can swim or not—for the people that didn’t want to snorkel, the Passions offered a glass bottom boat tour around Michaelmas. Everyone says that this reef is spectacular, but it is something that truly needs to be seen to appreciate the true wonder of it all.