Great Barrier Reef

We are considering a trip to Australia/New Zealand with a stop at the Reef, and have a few questions:

I have dived but do not have a dive card and my wife has never dived, so we will probably snorkel. Is that worthwhile? What is the depth of the water in the likely areas for snorkeling? Where is the best snorkeling? What is the water temp. in the December/January period?

Thanks for your help.

Sand

You must have your certification card to dive with a recognised company in Australia, Padi is the most popular. I have dived the reef as a certified diver however spent most my time waving to the snorklers above!!!

Snorkeling will give you a great experience of the Great Barrier Reef though I cant quite remember the depth (it was in 99) but from memory it was less the 15 ft at places.

Is it worth it????? Sure is, I have snorkelled/ dived all over the caribbean and it truly is a spectacular day out.

Two years ago we did a cruise around Australia on the Prisendam and one of our excursions was the snorkeling experience at the reef. I've only snorkeled a few times in my life (once at Sharm El Shiek -- then Israel but now Egypt) and my experience at the Great Barrier Reef was almost beyond description it was so amazing.

We boarded a small vessel from our cruise liner and they took us to a catamaran for the experience. The catamaran was like a small island!

Many people who took this excursion were not swimmers but the catamaran had a wonderful underwater viewing chamber and they even provided rides in a small submarine.

I know that many people like to book their own excurisons but we are not that adventurous, but this outing to the Great Barrier Reef was one of the travel highlights of my life.

Sand,

We stayed at Dunk Island on the Great Barrier Reef and did go diving without a dive certification. The dive master gave a quick lesson on the way out and we did 2 tank dives. It was well worth the money, you will enjoy yourselves. We were there in December and the water temp was warm. Have fun!