Silverswift Cairns Dive Review

Silverswift Dive Review on Flynn Reef, part of the Great Barrier Reef

Silverswift Cairns visits 3 reef sites daily and provides you with up to 5 hours at the reef. Where they go is weather dependent, but they have moorings at Flynn, Milln, Thetford and Pellowe Reefs. When we traveled with them (in November 2023) we went to Flynn Reef, which is classified as an Outer Great Barrier Reef destination. Flynn Reef is close to the edge of the continental shelf and is suitable for divers and snorkelers. It has coral walls which descend around 25m to the sandy sea floor below, and coral gardens which rise to within a few meters of the surface. For certified scuba divers, water entry is giant stride off the side of the boat. For snorkelers, there is a platform lowered into the sea with easy access steps. The crew manage the dive deck so that divers are getting into the water, while snorkelers have a briefing inside the boat. This means there is maximum space and comfort for divers and snorkelers, when they head out into the sea to explore the amazing Great Barrier Reef.

“All scuba diving on Silverswift is guided, and you would usually have the same guide throughout the day. As our group included our son Ethan – a certified Junior Open Water diver who is limited to a maximum depth of 12m – we had 2 different dive guides. Paul took us on our first dive and then we joined Marcus’ group for the other 2 dives of the day. While their dive styles differed – Paul wanted to cover as much territory as possible, while Marcus was more relaxed, allowing time for underwater photographs – they were both good guides. November is a great time of year to scuba dive from Cairns, the water is warming up (around 25 degrees Celsius) and underwater visibility is good – it varied between 15-25m on our day with Silverswift. Our diving highlight of the day was seeing a cascading ‘wall’ of golden lettuce coral which had a school of blue striped snapper floating above it – just beautiful – the colours and composition, so striking – we loved it!” – Julie Johnston

Diving the Great Barrier Reef With Silverswift From Cairns

Silverswift’s Great Barrier Reef day tour from Cairns commences with check-in from 7.30am, inside the Reef Fleet Terminal. Once you have your tickets, you make your way over to the boat, which starts boarding guests at 8.15am for an 8.30am departure. Certified divers are allocated tables on the top deck, where we completed our paperwork and had a dive briefing on the way to the reef. We were also assigned a dive guide. There was complimentary tea, coffee and muffins available on boarding, and it was a fast and comfortable, 90-minute transfer from Cairns to Flynn Reef on Silverswift. During this time, we were allocated our dive and snorkel equipment, and were free to stay in the air-conditioned interiors, or relax on the outside sundecks. Our first dive of the day started at 10.25am on a site called Lincks. During this 45-minute dive with Paul, we explored a maze of coral gardens and bommies and saw an array of marine life, including large schools of scissortail sergeant fish (they always make me smile on the inside, their black and white stripes make them look like the little prisoners of the reef – although their name puts them on the right side of the law), striped and yellow tailed fusiliers, eyestripe surgeonfish, emperor angelfish, coral beauty, giant clams, a cuttlefish and so much more.

It was a short surface interval between dive 1 and 2, as Silverswift moved to its second site of the day, which was Gordon’s Mooring (Flynn Reef). This was another vibrant dive site with a diversity of reef residents and coral. During our 47-minute guided dive with Marcus, we saw spine cheek and pink anemonefish, flame angelfish, barracudas, blue-spotted stingrays, coral trout, giant squirrelfish, fairy basslets (so pretty!), hundreds of striped fusiliers streaming around the reef and so much more. This was a lovely dive which included a swim-through, much to Ethan’s delight. It started at 11.53am and ended at 12.40pm. Between dives 2 and 3, we had lunch while Silverswift moved to its third reef site for the day. Lunch was a hot and cold buffet, which included curry dishes, chicken drumsticks, cold meats, a selection of salads, breads and vegetarian options. We ate this on the top deck in the sunshine, enjoying the stunning views of the crystal-clear blue waters.

Dive Review Of Flynn Reef The Great Barrier Reef

Flynn Reef is an excellent reef to dive, for experienced and new scuba divers. Its maximum depth is generally 25m, but with lots of highlights in the first 15m – including swim throughs, coral bommies and wall dives. Our final dive for the day on Silverswift was at Coral Gardens at Flynn Reef, which is where we saw the cascading ‘wall’ of golden lettuce coral, made picture perfect with the addition of a large school of blue striped snapper, which were floating above it in the clear blue waters. While that was our highlight for the day, we also saw some of our favourite reef fish at Coral Gardens, including diagonal-banded sweetlips, yellow tailed fusiliers, dotted sweetlips, two types of anemonefish (black and clark’s), and a magnificent blue koran angelfish. Thanks to the expert eyes of dive guide Marcus, we also saw 3 nudibranchs – the minor notodoris (very unassuming name, for what is quite the impressive nudibranch – we’ve never seen one of these before, so that was very cool), celestial phyllidia and inornate chelidonura. This dive was from 2pm to 2.45pm, and as we took off our dive gear and got changed, the crew prepared the boat for departure and conducted the final headcount. During the journey back to Cairns, there was a complimentary afternoon tea of cheese and biscuits and cake slices, which we enjoyed with a well-deserved wine, beer and soft drink purchased from the bar. We completed the dive log on the way home and arrived back into Cairns around 4.30pm.

Our Cairns diving day with Silverswift at Flynn Reef, was awesome. The dive crew were friendly and helpful. The guided dives ensured everyone could just enjoy their dive time, without having to worry about navigation and ‘finding the boat’ at the end of the dive. The 3 Flynn Reef sites we visited had great coral cover and an abundance of life. We met some lovely people on the boat – the guests were a mixture of international (USA, Spain and Korea) and domestic tourists – explored some beautiful coral gardens and as always, were astounded at the beauty and diversity of marine life on the Great Barrier Reef. This really is paradise and is just another reason why, we love Cairns!