He taught me to dive. Then we bought a house to keep the gear under.
I'm Kat. I came up from Geelong in 2010 for one wet season, got a job on the front desk of a hotel on the Esplanade, and never went home.
On my day off in 2012 I did a try-dive. The instructor was a very tall bloke from Mount Isa called Moose, who'd given up his job as a diesel fitter in the mines to teach diving. I did my Open Water with him the next week. We've been diving together ever since.
By 2019 Moose was tired of being one instructor among thirty on the big boats, and I knew how to run a front desk. We leased an old Queenslander on Draper Street, put the gear underneath, a coffee window out the front, and started teaching courses and fixing regs. Then 2020 happened. The locals and the coffee kept us going.
In 2022 we bought Mabel from a skipper retiring out of Port Douglas and named her after Moose's nan, who never saw the ocean. She takes 16 guests, and we've never wanted more.
Kat Delaney & Marcus "Moose" Kelleher
Who you'll meet
Kat
Bookings, the shop, the tenderRuns everything that isn't underwater. Will find you a spot on a full boat if anyone can.
Moose
Instructor & reg techTeaches the courses, skippers on Mondays and fixes everything under the house.
Kenji
English & 日本語Calm, funny, finds every turtle on the reef. Our Japanese guests ask for him by name.
Priya
Guide & photosGuides the certified divers and takes the photos you'll be sent that night.
Tommo
Mabel's skipperPicks the dive sites, reads the wind, and makes the banana bread. Don't ask for the recipe.
People were looking at this reef long before us
These two photos are from the Queensland State Archives, taken around 1931, when the trip out of Cairns was by ketch and the only way to see underwater was a glass-bottomed boat.
How we try to be good guests on the reef
- We tie up to public moorings, so no anchors on the coral
- Everyone gets the "no touching, no standing, no chasing turtles" talk on the way out
- We sell reef-safe sunscreen at cost
- Priya logs what we see for the reef monitoring folks
