We’ve been on a little slice of paradise on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia known as Lizard Island for the past three days. Transport here was from Cairns by way of a single engine prop plane. The journey was kinda fun. We had a flight from Sydney to Cairns and in Cairns we transferred to general aviation. The weight restrictions were light and strict for the small single engine propeller plane, a total of 25 kg per person. My camera and electronics gear alone weighs 12 kg all packed up, that’s pretty lean for a complete kit but still too heavy. Our solution was to pare everything down and combine our clothing into one suitcase and leave the extra suitcase, clothing, and some of our camera gear secured in the manager’s office at the general aviation operator. Even still, we were a few kilos over weight.
As global travelers, we travel very light, so this was an interesting exercise. We found the weight limits for carry on luggage in Australia to be absurdly low at 7 kg per person for commercial travel. This is the lowest we’ve seen anywhere in the world. Even in the notoriously strict Turkmenistan, the weight limit was 12 kg so we’ve been using that as the gold standard. The sources of the carry on weight restrictions are two fold. The first is the size of the overhead bins, their mechanical integrity and robustness of their latching system. The second has to do with how much weight the flight attendants are willing or able to lift without perceived risk of hurting themselves and also their fear of dropping bags onto the heads of passengers. The “trick” to get around these carry on weight restrictions is to carry the extra weight on your person because your luggage will be weighed and counted against the limit, you will not be weighed, so unpack and carry your goodies.
Pockets full and camera around my neck, I followed Christy onto our little airplane and we strapped in for the flight to Lizard Island. I have mixed emotions about small aircraft and that is because like small watercraft, you are more closely connected to your environment. You are connected to the conditions in all their subtle variations. It takes a little getting used to. The flight however, was calm and smooth, the sky was clear with fluffy white clouds and we could see the vast Great Barrier Reef stretched out in shapes and shadows beneath us. Travel time was about an hour and as we made our approach we could see the Lizard Island was a fairly small, sparsely inhabited, hilly sandstone island covered in small trees, shrubs and grasses. The beaches were powdery white and the water purest blue. Paradise.
The resort consists of an open lodge and common area, dive shack, seaside pub and several beach bungalows for guests. The staff was super friendly and accommodating. The atmosphere laid back and comfortable, casual in a knowing way and because it is small there is an intimacy to the place. Lovely calm Anchor Bay greats you as you look to the sea, small water craft, a dive boat, fishing trawler and a mast or two gently float at their buoys. The beach, wide and sandy. More beaches, almost all secluded and private stretch along the coastline, accessible by a short walk or dinghy ride. Our home was the Pavilion, perched on a small hill with sweeping panoramic ocean views and a sunset deck.
This was the Great Barrier Reef and we were here to relax, have fun and scuba dive. Because neither of us had dived in a few years, we did a check out dive and skills check with one of the instructors, Billie, she was terrific, then made our arrangements to dive the Great Barrier Reef. Yay! We brought along some fun little Fujifilm waterproof cameras to use on the dives and put them to good use. I’ll be publishing a complete field test of those cameras in a few days.
Diving the reef was exciting and we saw schools of fish, Barracuda, spiny lobster, sea cucumbers, octopus, sting ray and a Tawny shark. The coral was beautiful and the water was warm enough to dive in just a bathing suit although many people opted for dive skins or stinger suits for protection against little nasties. We dove in bathing suits with no issues. Our initial dive was 45 minutes bottom time with a maximum depth of 15 meters. When I surfaced next to the dive boat, I took off and handed up my fins, climbed the ladder, removed my BCD and mask and declared the dive a success.
On the second day I had trouble clearing one of my ears as we descended so I retired to the boat and Christy buddied up with one of the instructors and had a great dive along a wall. In the boat I had a nice chat with the skipper and we told big fish stories. He told me about sharks and crocodiles and I told him about my adventures with sea lions and hammer heads. We had some good laughs but always there was respect for the wildlife, conditions and love of the sea.
