In September 2004 we made a second trip from Cairns, this time to Green Island. Green Island is one of the largest coral islands in the world. It is surrounded by beautiful, but shallow reefs. The island itself has stunning beaches and is covered in palm trees. Green Island is located not to far away from the harbour of Cairns on the inner barrier reef, at about an hour and a half away when you go sailing.

Ocean Free

We booked a sailing trip with the ship Ocean Free. It is a decent sized, comfortable boat with a superb crew. There are very experienced dive leaders and expert marine biologists on board. Most people book a trip like this to enjoy the sailing and visit Green Island itself to stay a day on the beaches and go snorkelling there.

This was our initial intention too, but since we were the only certified divers on board for the day, the crew took a special interest in us. To be honest, it did not take them too much effort to talk us into going for a couple of dives.

Dive conditions

The waters near Green Island are shallow and warm (again 25-26 degrees Celsius) all year round. The visibility is good, generally more than 15 metres. The dive site is no deeper than about 10 metres, but that does not mean that there is less to see here than in other places. It just means that you have more time to stay under water en take everything in.

On the day we encountered: giant guitar fish, kuhl’s ray, star puffer, yellow goby, juvenile batfish, a Chinaman fish (called Oscar), flute fish, red emperors, a white-tip reef shark, a green turtle, remorays and a giant school of marr’s fusiliers.

Cleaning stations

One of the most interesting aspects of the reefs around Green Island is that there are massive cleaning stations located here. We saw a star puffer of nearly 90 centimetres long that patiently waited underneath a large coral fan until the tiny cleaning wrasses had cleaned him. Other species of fish were waiting in line for their turn.

The surface interval can be used to snorkel and enjoy the shallowest parts of the reef, because the Ocean Free is not moved in between dives. You will just swim to a different part of the reef for different dives.

Indo Pacific humpback river dolphins

On the way back to Cairns, you can spot very rare and unusual marine animals, namely Indo Pacific humpback river dolphins, which try to keep up with the speed of the boat. All in all, this is a fantastic dive spot if you are interested in marine biology and a large variety of unusual marine life.