REES & SOME OF THE SPEARED FISH

Rees is always in his element when he's diving & will stay in the water for hours, regardless of whether or not he's spearing something or not. Thankfully, Brian loves to snorkel around with him so if I'm not there, Rees always has company which is great.
When we first began diving on Cairns Reef, the first thing I saw when I jumped into the water, was a reef shark & although it initially didn't bother me, I didn't like the fact that it circled us a few times before disappearing from our outer vision. I think he wanted an easy feed with what Rees had just speared but because we always tow the tender along behind us, the coral trout was quickly thrown into that so it was out of the water.

After 4 wonderful days at the reef & with a forecasted change in the weather, we are now at Cooktown. We hadn't really planned for a stopover in Cooktown, but after days of motoring we decided that it'd be a good idea to top up the fuel tanks before getting into more isolated areas. From here, we're heading to Cape Bedford, a hop, step & jump along the mainland to where we know we can gather black-lipped oysters, another favourite of Rees's. Then we'll head to Lizard Island, where we've heard that many of the rally's yachts are at anchor, resting up before the big trip across the top to Darwin. Lizard, here we come!