January 8 - Australia: Cairns

Has anyone seen a spaceship?:  Jon's run #42

What do I say about today's run?  I slept in by 30 minutes.  We've been on holiday for over 7 months now, and for 90% of the time I've set the alarm on my watch to wake me up in the morning.  Without fail the Ironman alarm has been sufficient to wake me, and according to Heidi that's no easy feat.  Somehow though, this morning the alarm didn't seem to be enough.  Granted the alarm was set for 4:15 but I fell asleep last night at 8:30 so I got almost 8 hours of sleep but still didn't hear the alarm.  Now every night before bed I'll have to wonder if I'll hear the alarm...

Anyway, I hustled through my morning routine and scurried out for my run.  I had wanted to increase my run times but decided that I'd already be late when I got home so opted to try this next week...The run?  I went through town and zigzagged through the shopping area, which is always fun to see so early in the morning.  I did decide that I hadn't seen a nice sunrise since New Years day.  I don't know why that is, maybe the sun is rising a bit later, maybe the storm clouds in the morning cover it up, or maybe aliens have stolen the sun...like I said, I haven't figured it out.  But if it's aliens then we should all be worried.

Dee and Ed - Back Again!

Jon and I spent part of the early-morning-boat-setup going back and forth about who was going to snorkel and who was going to do lookout.  We both wanted to do lookout and neither of us felt like getting wet.  Then, as we were greeting passengers and setting up their gear, Jon chuckled at me and said, "Guess what?  You're going to have to snorkel today!"  I looked up to see what he was talking about, and saw that we had repeat customers.  Dee - my panicked snorkeler from Jan 1 - and her family were back for another trip.  This meant that I would have to go with the snorkelers, because she knew me and would expect the extra assistance.  Oh well!

Snorkel #1: Norman Reef - Shark Mountain

I had a full group of snorkelers - 13 in all.  Luckily, none of them required high maintenance except for Dee.  There was another American family with two small children: Sean was 5 and MacKenzie was 3.  But their mother, Sam, assured me that they could swim like fish.  She wasn't kidding around.  I took Dee by the hand and led her around the reef, pointing out things as I could.  Despite the "work" required of holding her hand, the rest of the trip is relatively painless because she refuses to take her head out of the water once it's down.  I dunno.  It's part of the panic thing.  The only time she comes up is when she gets water in her mask and that's when she gives me the death grip.  But that rarely happens.  

Anyway, as I was towing Dee around the reef, I noticed that we kept running into young Sean.  A few times I tried to steer away from him because I didn't want Dee to be accidentally kicked.  But each time I turned around - he was right beside us again.  Next thing I knew, he reached for me and I suddenly had a young boy attached to my free hand.  So I had Dee on one side (who is about 70) and Sean on the other (who is five), and I figure we must have provided endless entertainment for the crew on the boat.  The three of us cruised around the reef and had a pretty good time.  Sean had multiple conversations with himself through his snorkel, and Dee just hung on and kept her head below water.  She had one minor panic attack, but that was all. 

We did see a turtle, which made Sean's day.  He let go of my hand so he could doggie-paddle around after it and got really excited when it came to the surface to breathe.  I had to hold him back so the turtle could get air, but he still thought it was the "coolest" thing he'd seen in a while.

Over lunch, I chatted with Sean's parents, Sam and John.  They are actually both Irish have lived in New Jersey for many years.  Sam told me that Sean is crazy about sharks, snakes and other boy-like things.  So when it was time for us to suit-up for the second snorkel, Sean was a bit hesitant to come with me again because he wanted to be with his mom.  But she needed to have her hands free with 3-year old MacKenzine.  So I said, "Well Sean.  You probably should go with your Mom.  I'm going to go shark hunting, and you probably don't want to see any sharks."  He was sold.  In fact, so was MacKenzie who didn't want to be left out.

Snorkel #2: Saxon Reef - Twin Peaks

Dee had a private instructor for the second trip, who was going to take her down on a second dive.  So she decided to pass on the snorkel.  This left me free to hang out with Sean for the entire trip.  It was a good thing, too, because the current was really strong and I don't think I could have maneuvered with the two of them.  Unfortunately, we didn't get to see any sharks.  We did say a moray eel swimming from one coral to another.  That was pretty cool.  But it was at the beginning of the trip and Sean - who was thrilled by it - had forgotten all about it five minutes later.  He was convinced that we'd find shark in the shallow parts of the reef and didn't want to go to the deeper parts.  And he didn't believe me when I told him that shark like the depth.  But we still had a good time together.  During our trip back to Cairns, I brought him one of the fish slates and he and I found pictures and names for the different fish we saw today.  Then MacKenzie wanted to see the slate so she could show me what she saw today as well.  It was so cute!

Jon's Dives

I led two dives and saw three sharks on the first dive.  At the beginning of the first dive one of the divers lost their mask and I dove down which took a few minutes (at my discretion) so I turned it into my third dive.  On the second dive saw a nice ray and the Brit couple was terrorized by a triggerfish.

More Tips!

Sean's dad - John - gave me $10 (Aus) for watching Sean all day - which was a very nice thing for him to do.  And not five minutes later, Dee stuck $20 (Aus) into my hand for helping her through her first snorkel.  She told me that I should take Jon out to dinner with it.  Little did she know that that's pretty much what we did.  After we'd finished our post-trip boat-cleaning duties, we stopped by the grocery story and bought milk, chicken, and another box of cereal.  All that for $18 (Aus).  

It was a good day!