When coral dies, the waves crush it into a fine sand which then collects to make islands.  On Days 3 and 7 we were lucky enough to be able to go out to Green Island, an island made completely out of crushed coral.

We said good bye to Cairns and headed out to open sea,

and arrived to beautiful Green Island on the Great Barrier Reef.

This picture is looking to the left of the dock,

and this is looking to the right.

This picture is from day 7.  Our last time coming to Green Island

More than one time we were able to spot sea turtles from off the dock... Awesome!



Both times we were on the island we went out on a glass bottom boat.

The boys loved it!

We saw turtles (sorry no pictures turned out),

Coral,

Fish

and more fish!

We also watched the tour guide feed the fish.

The touristy part of Green Island is really cute.  I love the board walk with the trees growing out of it.

Forest for some reason loved the headless manikin and insisted I take a picture.

On Day 3 we walked around the whole of green island.

The boys had a blast zooming along,

and posed like this for about 5 minutes.  They thought it was a great pose.

While on our walk Bridger found a coconut

and tried to open it, but no success.

After our walk we headed out to the sea for a fun day of snorkeling and playing in the sand

Westly played so hard he crashed at about 2 in the afternoon.



On day 3 it rained on us for the latter half of the day but it didn't stop us from playing on the beach and snorkeling until our boat arrived at 4.

Me heading out to snorkel on day 3.

When I got back from snorkeling the rain had stopped and there was a rainbow - beautiful!

Before leaving for the day we were able to get this cute picture of our family.

Day 7 was MUCH better weather.  It was warm and there was not a cloud in the sky.

We all had another great day playing on the beach.

and had a blast going out to swim.

Forest is so brave and swam out without any help.

The following pictures are of our snorkeling finds.  Unfortunately without a flash it is hard to see all the beautiful colors of the great barrier reef and of the fish.

We saw multiple clown fish. 

For their size, clown fish are surprisingly aggressive.

The fish below is my favorite and fish and they were all over the place! (Trigger fish)

The following fish are also trigger fish, related to the above, but are more rare.  I didn't see them, only Bridger was able to.

It is hard to tell from the pictures but when out swimming you are surrounded by hundreds of fish. Everywhere you look there are more fish.  It was amazing!

these fish had longish sword like noses

Butterfly fish

crazy looking long skinny fish

I believe this is a batfish (or relative)

this rainbow coloured parrot fish was actually totally huge (They are called parrot fish because they have a beak).

look the fish from finding nemo!

a leopard fish also really large

Sometimes you really have to be paying attention or you could miss fish, like this slightly clear fish.

okay this picture did not turn out well at all, but that hard to see fish is a giant sting ray - wow!

a giant clam - awesome!

The following pictures are of some of the coral.

Here is a picture of coral mixed in with some greyish coral.

this is a brain coral

One of the amazing things about swimming in the great barrier reef is that in a lot of places it is really shallow.  You could swim out a kilometer from green island and still be able to stand up.

During low tide it became hard to swim out because your tummy would bump against the coral, it made me feel slightly claustrophobic.

this is such a beautiful coral.

a boulder coral

this is a better photo of the coral giving it some actual color.

The highlight of Bridger's trip was spotting this turtle in the spaghetti coral

Bridger swam with the turtle for quite a ways

and captured some great photos.

bye bye turtle

Snorkeling in the great barrier reef was one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had.  It is probably the most beautiful place I have ever been. I feel so blessed to be able to live here in Australia and be experiencing some truly great adventures.

We were sad to say good bye on Day 7 knowing that we weren't coming back.

 One of our last glimpses of Green Island.  Awww so beautiful!