KathleenPort Douglas, Cape Tribulation & Cairns, Australia
May 19-25, 2016
Driving North out of Cairns just over an hour, you come to a lovely little beach town called Port Douglas which is sitting on a peninsula jutting into the sea. This is a small but lively town with the main street between the two ends of the peninsula being where all the action is. There were plenty of shops if you were in the mood and lots of restaurants and watering holes. The highlight, however, was the beautiful beach which was just a block from our little guest house. It was a lovely white beach with palm trees and beautiful views. We enjoyed sitting on the beach in the evening and watching the sunset.
After a couple of nights in Port Douglas, we headed up to the rainforest and Cape Tribulation. This place was not very far from Port Douglas, but neccessitated a river crossing via ferry. Amazingly, on the other side it seemed like a completely different world and we had stepped into the rainforest. As beautiful as the rainforest was, it did what it does best during the three days we were there, which is rain. It was a shame because the beach here was even more amazing than the one at Port Douglas, but the weather did not inspire sunbathing. We did get to take a night walk tour to see creatures in the rainforest at night which was pretty cool as well as another trip out to the barrier reef, which was really amazing. Another thing we really enjoyed was seeing the big bats come out and fly over the beach at dusk. The rain seemed to let up about this time of day and we were able to view bats all three days.
Back in Cairns, we had one night to walk around the city and grab dinner at a lovely Balinese restaurant. Cairns is pretty small and seems to be almost entirely focused on tourism related to the reef and the Northeast Coast. It is a friendly town, but not all that memorable.
