We had the best day ever!!! We woke up and decided we wanted to go snorkelling so the guys at the hotel called their friend Tony who agreed to take us out. After bartering him down to an acceptable price for 3 stops we headed off to Manta Ray Point, Crystal Bay and Gamut Bay. We were joined by a very nice Ozzie couple. The boat ride out was breathtakingly beautiful and the weather was perfect.
Our first stop was Manta Ray Point and we were all gob smacked when we jumped into the water and saw these huge manta rays swimming around. They were so graceful and beautiful as they glided through the water. There were about 6 of them and one was absolutely huge. There was one who kept swimming really close to me as if it was playing so I decided to just hold my hand out and see what it did. It swam past me about 5 times, getting closer and closer eat time until finally it swam right up to my hand so I could give it a scratch. It was amazing. I was quite nervous as they have huge stingers at the back and after we got out Tony told us that a diver got stabbed by one a little while ago!! I think that diver must have done something to hurt or annoy the manta ray as they were really friendly and gentle with us. It was truly one of the best experiences of my life!
After an hour frolicking with the manta rays we climbed back on the boat and headed for our second stop – Crystal Bay. It was only about 10 minutes away and as the name suggests the water was crystal clear. We jumped in the water again and spent about 40 minutes snorkelling over beautiful coral reef with hundreds of fish of all colours and shapes. I recognised a few from my diving days, Angel fish, Parrot fish, Trigger fish, little clown fish and I even saw a couple of small barracuda.
We then drove about 15-20 mins further along to Gamut Bay. The snorkelling here was also beautiful. There were huge mushroom shaped coral and other strangely shaped coral on the reef and hundreds of fish. When I jumped in I saw a brown and white striped sea snake which was thankfully swimming the other direction. It was great to see so much marine life on the corals. We only snorkelled here for about 30 mins and we headed back.
I will never forget this day, it was such a special experience.
That evening we had an early dinner and an early night 🙂
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