Port Douglas

This morning, I woke late, and not having a clear plan in mind, we didn't hit the road until almost noon. We headed North with a rough idea of hit a beach somewhere, hopefully near a reef.  We drove for 15 minutes, stopping a few times, and deciding to move on, waiting for something better. The sun had been shining all morning, but dark clouds were quickly advancing from the South. We stopped at Thala Beach Lodge to grab a coffee, and ask the locals about a good place to swim.  While waiting for my latte, I wandered through the restaurant, and saw about 20 rainbow lorakeets squawking over some food in a tree just off the veranda.  The woman who took my order said that any accessible beach to the North was pretty good for swimming, but there weren't any nearby reefs within swimming range.   Undeterred, we got back on the road, but just past the entrance to Oak Beach, the road turned inland.  I pulled over so we could decide whether to go back to the last beach we passed, or to continue on to Port Douglas for lunch.  Henry and Ariel wanted to go back. JP and I wanted to go forward. William didn't want the responsibility of being the tie-breaker, so nature broke the stalemate. As we deliberated, it began to rain.  

We drove another 5 minutes, and arrived at the roundabout to Port Douglas. The town is built entirely on a tiny peninsula, and in many respects, is just a glitzier, and larger version of Palm Cove. It is advertised as the 'jumping off place' to explore the wonders of Far North Queensland.  The bottom of the peninsula is lined on both sides with expensive looking resorts, and the tip is, among other things, a giant shopping center.  I knew this going in, but still wanted to add it to our list of 'been-there' locations.  We drove through the shopping district, and managed to find a parking spot not too far from food.  By this time the rain had subsided, but the wind was kicking up.  We walked down the main sprawl, full of mostly cliché junk (except for Disco Buddha,) and settled on an outdoor restaurant/bar at the corner of Wharf Street and Macrossan, appropriately named, Wharf Street Bistro.

Kangaroo steak was on the menu, and since we had all enjoyed marsupial meat so much in Sydney, I ordered it again. This time though, it was much larger, a bit chewier, and covered in a pepper sauce that really didn't work for me.  Ariel thought the sauce was good, and JP confirmed the meat itself was not.  Ariel, Henry and JP all had burgers which they said were excellent, and William ordered a fried calamari, which looked amazing.  Unfortunately, I was a little premature in the picture taking department today, and only have a shot of us at the table before the food arrived. At least we'll always remember that we were order number 35.

After we ate, Henry found some weaver ants on a pole, and a gruff local warned, "careful, they bite." In 2006 outside 'the Outback Opal Mine', I'd learned that you could eat them, and he verified that the abdomen's tasted sweet like a grape, but again he warned that their bites hurt... I replied that it sounded like a reasonable response to getting your abdomen eaten, and that we were far too full from lunch to try one now.

We crossed Wharf street heading toward the beach, but it started to drizzle again, and so we took shelter under a pair of curtain fig trees. Years ago, other visitors had tied and braided the dangling roots, which had  since, fused together into natural ropes and swings. Naturally, the boys and I climbed right up.  On the second tree, William attempted a Tarzan swing, but the thin roots were too weak, and half-way out, the root snapped and he landed on his butt. I apologize profusely for lack of video of this event.

The drizzle subsided, and we continued on to a beautiful beach, where the tide had receded far enough to allow some amazing shell hunting. I found the-most-incredible shell of the trip, which someone before us had left in a pile of shells.  The boys found some nickel sized black sea-stars, and Henry caught a little black crab.  We uncovered a foot-long black sea slug, but I have no record of this either, because it was featureless and for the most part just looked like wet poo.  We walked under the pier, and on the other side, saw some young fig trees suspended three feet into the air by their long root system which mirrored in size and shape, sans leaves, the branches above.

On our way back under the pier, I found an orange piece of live coral about the size of a Twinkie.  I took a photo, because at this point I'm afraid that's this is the only coral reef we are apt to see this trip.  Walking back I snapped another shot of Ariel from the ground near some fig tree saplings. The angle of the shot made it look like she is a giant.  

We walked down the shopping center looking for souvenirs, but nobody's heart was really into it, and Henry really wanted to hit a beach on the way home, so after popping into a few shops, we decided to head back. 

The van's gas gauge was almost empty, and we needed to be back at the hotel at 5:00 to check out before the office closed. (We could stay in the room until 4:00AM, but Ariel needed to work out the bill)  We had about an hour and a half to get back, but this was no big deal since the drive back to Palm Cove only took half an hour.  We stopped at the first point South of Port Douglas where the road met the beach, and jumped out. The tide was still out, and the water had receded about 200 meters out.  We saw what looked like reef poking out of the water, so the boys grabbed their swim gear and we headed across the sand.  

What appeared to be empty sand, turned out to be an entire mini-eco-system, with piles of sand tubes everywhere from clams, tiny balls of sand from some type of creature, and starfish. Thousands of star-shaped divots in the sand contained little brown starfish, most of which were about 4 inches across. You literally couldn't walk more than three feet without seeing one. In the troughs where there were little pools of water, the starfish were crawling around, and in the packed sand, all one could see was the silhouette they left when they buried themselves.    

The boys reached the water, and dropped their gear in a pile, and waded in. The water was murky and brown like a latte. The boys walked 100 yards out, but the water was barely past their knees.  They headed back to drop off their flippers, which were making it hard to walk.  I walked up the shore a bit, and tried to get some scenic shots, but we all met back after JP stepped on some sharp rocks, and got some very minor cuts on his feet.

I dropped Ariel and the boys off in front of our hotel, and drove down to Clifton beach to fill up the van.  On the way back, just before the Palm Cove turn off, I noticed a large brown stuffed-animal looking thing on the side of the road. Someone had hit a kangaroo. 

I got back, and the boys were watching TV, and Ariel was booking our rental car for tomorrow in Sydney. I wanted to visit the city of Yorky's Knob, (and maybe get a t-shirt), but the consensus for dinner was 'something easy'. It looked like things were leaning towards pizza delivery, but I really didn't want to spend my last night in Cairns in front of the TV eating pizza, so I fired up the laptop and found a restaurant in Yorky's  Knob that had an online take-out menu. I phoned in our order using Skype on the netbook, and at 6:30pm on our last night in Cairns, JP and I drove 20 minutes South to Krokodillo's in Yorky's Knob to pick up a pair of Meat-Lover's pizzas and a 2-Liter of Coke.  By this point Cooks Highway have become second nature, and we zipped through the roundabouts like pros.

The restaurant was on the towns single main road, so we didn't need a map to find it. I parked, it was already dark out. There were a few locals mulling around outside, inside, Krokodillo's looked more like a hip café, it was small, and had some local artists work on the walls.    While waiting for food I walked over to a large black and white spiral piece that had caught my eye.  I'd assumed it was made with tile, but up close, I observed it was actually just strategically placed drops of enamel paint on brown canvas. The result was stunning.

No other pictures this day. We returned with food, and ate.  Ariel cleaned the shells we found, and then discovered that my "most-incredible shell" was still occupied by a hermit crab. Henry walked him out to the beach where he can hopefully make it to safety before getting harassed by some other unsuspecting tourists.

Everyone packed their stuff, and headed to bed around 9:00. We'll need to get up by 4:00AM to get to the Cairns airport on time.  If all goes according to plan, this marks the end of our time in Far-North Queensland.