Seeing the Great Barrier Reef on TV looks spectacular, but seeing it for real is really unexplainable. It's the most amazing natural sight and to think that this is all living plant life that has been around for millions of years. We've seen the Barrier Reef in two places now. Once as part of the Whitsundays tour but we've now gone out to the Outer Barrier Reef, leaving from Cairns. We spent over an hour travelling on a boat getting there and it was worth the every minute of the trip. I thought that in seeing the reef we would be several metres (maybe more) above the reef itself, but it is so shallow and so close its really hard to describe. That couple with the marine life around it. We were able to see an amazing array of fish include stingrays. Quite simply one of the most spectacular sights we've ever seen.