Julian Rocks located in Byron Bay. The image shows two large rocky islands jutting out of the blue ocean water. — The rock in the bay

If you’ve ever been to Byron Bay, you know Julian Rocks as the little stony island off in the distance when you’re staring out to sea from the bayside beaches (The Pass, Main Beach, Belongil). It looks like you could almost swim out there, but you probably can’t and definitely shouldn't try. You’re probably best jumping in a kayak with a mate. That’s what I did after a few years of anticipation last Sunday morning.

Conditions were so perfect. No swell, no wind, clear sky without being scorching hot and the water clarity was sparkling. We could see the bottom nearly the entire way out on the 15-minute paddle out. When we arrived at the mooring buoy 20 metres off the rocks, there were a handful of boats finishing up scuba diving tours. The first obstacle we hit was trying to get the hatch off the back of the kayak that had all our snorkel gear inside. After both trying for too long, we chased down a kayak that was just leaving and borrowed a diving knife to successfully pry it open.

The scariest part was swimming from the deep water where we moored over to the rocks. The same swim back to the boat was much less frightening. After a couple of hours underwater, we were accustomed to the faint but nagging fear of seeing the big pointy-toothed shadows. Once we made it to the relative safety of the reef and I’d adjusted to the strange sensation of snorkel breathing, which is really just overcoming the mild fear you’re about to breathe in a lungful of water any moment, I was stuck by childish excitement.

Have you been snorkelling lately? It begs the question, why would you want to fly to Mars when you can drive to the beach, put on some goggles and fly over an insane Seussian world with the most incredible procession of alien fish? It’s certainly cheaper. You can’t even swim on Mars. Has anyone taken Elon snorkelling? The altered perspective you enter is mesmerising. Calming too. The miniature forests made of seaweed and tiny desert plains of coral and sand punctuated with roving schools of fish create such a mind-bending landscape. It’s easy to forget how delightfully absurd it all looks. It really does look like a different planet. And the fish are breathing water? Madness. Make it make sense.

When was the last time you remembered we’re all just one breath away from death? Think about the next breath you take. There’s no guarantee another will follow. Even though it feels like that next breath is a certainty, it’s not. Another friendly reminder that death comes for us all, everyone you know and love will die. Taking a few deep breaths and then diving down deeper into the sea makes you appreciate breath as a privilege, temporarily suspended. The promise of fresh air twinkles at the end of a short spell taking in the camouflage skin of a sleeping Wobbegong Shark and a flurry of kicks back to the surface.

There’s a narrow gap between the rocks you can swim between if it’s calm. We gave it a go and as soon as we kicked into the narrow channel, a set rolled through and washed us our like Incy Wincy. I had my mask ripped off and fended off some rabid barnacles with my right knee but made it out, humbled once again by the sea. And I lost my snorkel. There’s a sentence you can’t say without sounding like a child. ‘Daaaaaad! I lost my snorkel.’ It was in such a narrow little channel we tried looking for it. Amazing how well a black snorkel can camouflage into sand and a scattering of seaweed. Third dive lucky, we found it and kicked on.

Wobegongs are barely sharks in the traditional fear for your life sense. In that regard they’re closer to cats. All but one of the Wobegongs we saw were peacefully sleeping, nestled in a little nook of the reef. The one that was swimming around was moving slo slowly and peacefully it could’ve been sleep walking. The fattest Wobegong we saw was shacked up with an ancient sea turtle that was so completely covered in barnacles – even its flippers – it wasn’t until our second dive down for a closer look that we realised it wasn’t a boulder.

Towards the end of our dive, a shape big enough to make my heart flutter appeared from the distance. It wasn’t big enough to spark the ‘oh shit, shark!’ fear, more just pure excitement. Like when you unexpectedly see a dog. It was a beautiful big Leopard Shark. It moved with the same laconic grace as a snake that hasn’t seen you yet. Effortless, slow swipes of its tail side to side had it gliding along in no rush at all. It cruised along the contours of the reef, moving along the channels, up over a rise and down into the next. Simon waved me over and pointed at the most beautiful polka dot kite I’d ever seen – a Spotted Eagle Ray, a little over half a metre wide with a tail easily double that. It cruised off into the blue haze and then, it was time to go.

We kicked back to the boat, the last 20 metres no longer scary. The earlier overthinking had been completely calmed by two hours of silently exploring this underwater world. There’s something so comprehensively calming and grounding about snorkelling. Between the intermittent breath holds, inescapable mindfulness as you take in the fascinating details floating past beneath you, and the child-like thrill of seeing sharks and rays, I climbed into the boat in a awestruck stupor.

‘Probably time for that Portuguese Tart,’ Simon said. I’d completely forgotten about it. As it happens, the only way you can improve a Portuguese tart is with a hint of salt dripped on by sea-wrinkled fingers. The paddle back was a little slower, conversation kept returning to what we saw. Back on land, after a toasty and a couple of coffees, more excitement as I waited to see if any photos worked out. I held my breath.