Milln Reef Liveaboard Diving

Liveaboard Diving in Milln Reef

What To Expect On A Milln Reef Liveaboard

Liveaboards to Milln Reef are the best way to visit this area, which is situated around 60 kilometers off the coast of Queensland on the Great Barrier Reef. Milln Reef offers excellent diving with several stunning sites to suit all levels of diving. The Queensland government has designated this beautiful reef a 'green zone Marine National Park', meaning that only limited fishing is allowed, enabling it to thrive and remain as a true underwater treasure. The water here is crystal clear, with visibility commonly between 15 and 20 meters, and can reach 40 meters, giving divers an unspoiled view of the huge range of marine life on the show - with turtles, sharks, and barracudas, to name a few.

Australian liveaboards to Milln Reef usually depart from Cairns. Diving trips commonly last 3 days/2 nights, allowing you to explore all the best diving on offer while giving you enough time for sailing and relaxing. The sites where liveaboard tours visit are all exclusive and non-populated and include Swimming Pools I, Swimming Pools II, Petaj Mooring, Whale Bommie, and the Three Sisters. The crew will likely arrange some night dives if this interests you, as Milln Reef is a great place to view various sleeping animals at night.

What You Can See

Milln Reef has several fun swims and wall dives, with large numbers of small fish joining dive groups and gliding through the water. The Three Sisters are a series of three huge bommies rising from the depths, where common residents see schools of fusiliers, snappers, and barracuda. In the sandy areas, Whitetip Reef Sharks often rest, accompanied by Blue Spotted Stingrays. Looking up, you're likely to spot schools of sweetlips, more sharks, and turtles effortlessly gliding through the blue - make sure you've not left your camera on the boat!

Due to some shallower areas, Milln Reef is a great place to do a night dive, allowing you to experience and witness the magical underwater world from a different light (no pun intended!). It's likely your liveaboard crew will have incorporated a night dive or two into the itinerary, but if not, ask the crew, and they'll be more than happy to accommodate your requests. Of course, conditions and diver experience are dependent. Sleeping turtles, reef crabs, and painted lobsters are frequently encountered at night. It's fascinating to see the colors of the corals at this time and how different they can look from what you may have seen diving earlier during the daytime. Again - ensure someone in your group has been designated to take the photos!

Getting to Milln Reef

The best way to experience Milln Reef is via an Australian liveaboard diving tour departing from Cairns, allowing you to spend a good few days diving the reef. Liveaboards here generally last for around 3 days/2 nights and often incorporate several other pristine reefs in the trip. Cairns is a popular tourist town in the northeast corner of Queensland, with a good mix of accommodations from high-spec hotels to trendy backpacker hostels.

Its international airport is small, but as this is the most common place for departing trips to the GBR, it is served by a wide variety of big international airlines, flying eager reef seekers directly in from all over the globe. If (unlikely) you cannot fly directly to Cairns, it's easy enough to catch one of the many daily flights from Brisbane, Sydney, or Melbourne. Most liveaboard operators will pick you up, and drop you off, to and from your accommodation.