The GBR needs no introduction. The world’s largest coral reef system; largest single structure on Earth that can be seen from space; over 3000 individual coral reefs. And despite the huge issues of coral bleaching, it is still world-class diving. Unfortunately, I did not have an underwater camera for this trip, so I just have some not terribly interesting above water pics, but my week of diving on the Spirit of Freedom was great. One highlight was a dive site with lots of swim-throughs (don’t recall the name). It was also memorable for an unfortunate reason: I tried to go through a tunnel that was borderline too small; I scoped it out, thought I could make it, but it was a little bit of a struggle and I had to contort my body and tank a little bit; I ended up kicking up a bunch of sand, making the visibility terrible; my dive partner, a lovely Chinese girl who barely spoke English, freaked out, thought I was stuck, and swam off to get help; but I eventually made it through, swam back around to the other side of the rock feature and was able to catch up to her and grabbed her fin. She was visibly shaken, but thankful I got out. Once back on the boat I apologized profusely and allowed her to lead the dives for the rest of the trip.
