Cairns...

The desert part of our two week trip was over and we were looking forward to the next stage of our adventures in tropical north Queensland. Cairns seemed like the perfect starting point. It has easy acess to the Great Barrier Reef, great beaches, restraunts, and weather. It is very close to the Daintree and Cape Tribulation, which are areas of lush tropical rainforests that we wanted to see. The are really only two seasons - the wet and the dry. The dry season is during the winter- it is the busiest time for tourism and the weather is warm but not to humid or hot. We had two days to check out the city. There is a great esplanade downtown and the city has some great beaches.



View of Carins from the air as we make our landing approach.




One of the many nice beaches we went to just north of Cairns near Yorkies Knob. We liked the surf rescue sign on the waveboard.



The beach front esplanade with fancy hotels, nice places to eat, and pubs. You definetly won't die of thirst in Cairns. There are pubs and bars on every street corner. The pubs also stay open until 5AM in the morning! Although Cairns is considered by many to be a wild party town, we had a nice quiet relaxing stay there.



Here is the foreshore downtown promendade. It is a fairly new 4000 square meter saltwater swimming lagoon that sits on the beach- the was so relaxing after spending a week in the dry dusty outback! We went to a great market and arts fair right alongside the esplanade. Interestingly upon opening of the lagoon, there was local and media intrest regarding the issue of topless bathing (apparently the unoffical rule seems to now allow it, but discourages running while topless).



Boats lined up at the downtown pier ready to head out to the reef and tropical islands. We took a day trip out to Fitzroy Island.