Spirit of Freedom - TRIP Gallery

Thu 9th June 2011 - Mon 13th June 2011

We started the trip with 2 dives at Monolith. The water was crystal clear with plenty of things to see. During the 2 dives we saw turtle, cuttlefish, huge barracuda, cleaner shrimp, 3 pipe fish in twinned together, white tip reef sharks and purple and yellow sea squirts. As one diver explained, "there was so much to see, everything is on steroids, and they're just so huge. The small things we great to see too." It was a fantastic start to the trip. After dinner we set voyage for Osprey Reef.

We awoke at Osprey Reef for an action packed day of diving. Everyone was excited for what awaited. As one experienced diver put it "Osprey Reef has some of the healthiest coral coverage I have ever seen." During the day we saw plenty of sharks, which included the white tip reef shark, black tip reef shark, and a few huge grey reef sharks. We also had a 3m+ hammerhead come nice and close to a bunch of divers, circled around us then headed back into the deep, he then came back for another look before taking off for good into the dark abyss. What an experience! Moray eels, nudibranchs, feather stars, dogtooth tuna, giant trevally and dart fish were also spotted throughout the dives. Other interesting marine life sighted through out the day included turtles, cuttlefish, feather stars, coral polyps feeding, box fish, gobies, blennies, hawkfish and much more. During the night dive we spotted many shrimp, sharks, parrotfish, crabs, giant trevally and red bass. After a huge day of diving we enjoyed dinner followed by Sanctum the movie.

Our first dives the following day were at the world famous North Horn. Many classified these 2 dives as their favourite with a plethora of marine life to be seen. Some of the highlights included a few colourful nudibranchs, huge grouper, scorpion fish, and of course the shark feed. During the shark feed we had about 25+ sharks come into join the feeding frenzy. The species included the white tip reef shark, the black tip reef shark, the grey reef shark and the much larger silver reef tip. The feed was unreal with many photo opportunities. Once the feed was finished all the divers got to experience swimming in and around our once again peaceful shark friends. Other marine life sighted throughout the day included napoleon wrasse, potato cod, sea fans, sea whips, vibrant soft coral, hawkfish, anthias, parrotfish, bannerfish and whip gobies.

Overnight we steamed back to the ribbon reefs. Throughout the next day we saw schools of blue lined snapper and big eyed trevally, chromis, various nudibranchs, flatworms, sea cucumbers, mantis shrimp, scorpion fish and angel fish. We also saw over 5 stonefish one of which was getting cleaned by a toby fish, which I thought was about to become his lunch. Definitely the major highlight of the day included diving with the dwarf minke whales. This was a fantastic experience to see these creatures up close. What better way to finish such an unreal trip then an aussie BBQ and a few drinks. The conversation flowed as we steamed into the horizon back for Cairns.

Thanks everyone for making this a very memorable trip.
Keep on diving, Chris Haslam (Trip Director)

Phone :	+61 (0) 7 4047 9150
Fax :	+61 (0) 7 4047 9110
Email :
PO Box 1276, Cairns QLD 4870 Australia

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Spirit of Freedom - TRIP Gallery

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