Cairns to Cape Tribulation

A typical street view at Cairns

I left the Trailer Park at Cairns around 9.30 this morning, went to the local IGA store with some more goodies for the fridge and another 10 litres of drinking water to re-fill my water container. Yes, Cairns is a busy town, modern, with wide roads and lots of green space in between. The feeling I get is that its wide open, lots of light, well designed road ways, well built and maintained, most intersections being round-abouts of proper size that don't look like some of those tiny things that are called round-abouts in Sydney. It’s a joy to drive on roads like this, so good on you, Cairns and good on you Queensland!


The first stop was Port Douglas which is well known as a popular tourist spot for people down south in Sydney or Melbourne. There are many resort type places along the highway coming into town, everything looking well maintained and clean. The centre of town looks and feels a lot like Double Bay in Sydney, or shop-till-you-drop, everything seemingly geared to collect money off the tourists that have flown in from the south for a few days.



Street scenes in Mosman

Not surprisingly, the locals refer to Port Douglas as Plastic City. I stayed only long enough for a wander-around and a few photos and then drove on to Mosman to visit Mosman gorge in the rain forest. It was nice enough but I had expected something more spectacular…

A quick look at the Mosman Gorge

The drive north of Mosman to Cape Tribulation started with the obligatory cane fields either side of the road, but after a few kilometres the road came close to the coast, no more space for agriculture, following a winding pattern, the ocean to my right, the wide open panorama of the glittering sea. To my left large volcanic bolders or rockfaces, mostly basalt or sandstone of varying colours, but mostly near black to red brown, with lots of signs indicating "falling rocks". The road comes to an end about 20km south of Cape Tribulation, where a vehicle ferry takes me across the inlet so I can continue my travel at an even more leisurely pace along a narrow winding road through the rainforest, stopping only at a lookout point, presenting me with a grand view of the ocean facing south. The further north I get, the narrower the road becomes in many places, with many a "crocodile-back" speed humps (round boulders protruding from the concrete), that really slow you down, with the aim to help protect local wildlife, mostly Cassowary, crossing the road. Cape Trib only consists of a few houses, spread out along the road, some of them well hidden in the lush undergrowth and some shops, catering to tourist needs, as well as a campground about half a kilometre off the road by the beach, where I am staying tonight and also a great Restaurant called "Whet" where I had dinner tonight. It was no mistake, the food and the ambience were both excellent and I would recommend it to anyone.

The 'Local Store" at Cape Tribulation
Unfortunately in this part of Australia I have no Mobile phone coverage or Internet, so I am completely cut off from the world - strange, when I am so used to always having a connection with my friends and the rest of the world via my Mobile or my Internet connection. As a result, this story will have to wait to come on-line when I return to more "civilised" parts of the country where I can get onto the Internet again with my trusty "Next-G" device connected to my Laptop.

At this time of year it is peak season to travel in this part of Queensland, there are no moskitoes and the nights are cool with low humidity. Definitely the time of year to be here! Once the wet season starts again into summer it will not be pleasant to spend time up here and for this reason tourists will stay away. This is probably true for most of the country at this Latitude and I am well advised to be out of Darwin and Broome by September, which means that I have about 2 months to complete my explorations in the North before heading south into Perth and beyond.