Cairns and Port Douglas

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I really really miss Cairns, having spend so much time there as a child... Anyways, after our Western Australia adventure, I went back to Melbourne for a few days to get things organised for the East Coast trip... This trip consisted of me, Martin, Alexandra and Cat...

The flights from Melbourne to Cairns takes about 4 hours, Jetstar is probably the cheapest, you can get a ticket for $189 (I am not advertising for them though...), from Cairns airport it takes about 15 minutes to get to the CBD, mainly along Sheridan st and Apline st...

The first thing I want to do in Cairns is SCUBBBBAAA... I really miss scuba diving, when I first got certified PADI OW, I managed 60 dives in 3 months... but since moving to Melbourne, I did only 2 dives in the swimming pool, right Penny?? Many people use Cairns as a starting point for their trip, it is not uncommon to hire a car with friends to drive up to Port Douglas for few days, then go down the coast, passing Mission Beach, Townsville, Magnetic Island, to Airlie beach for the Whitsundays cruise... You can get all that stuff organised while in Cairns, just go to one of the tourist shops and they will be able to sort out a Cairns reef diving day trip or PADI course on the outer reef, followed by a Whitsunday 3 day cruise and perhaps even a Fraser Island trip... The important thing here is to shop around to get the best prices, we shopped around for abit, used up the whole morning, got them to compete against each others prices, finally settle with HAPPY TRAVEL, they are pretty cool, we paid $125 (day trip to reef, including 2 guided dives), $325 for the 2 day and 1 night Whitsundays cruise... So thanks Happy Travel and they also invited us to their free Pizza and drinks night at Woolshed... Woolshed is a pretty cool place to hang out for few drinks with other backpackers...

Port Douglas is about 65km from Cairns up Captain Cook high way, feels alittle bit like the tropical version of the Great Ocean Road, really great views along the way... Port Douglas is an expenisve resort town, we didn't even bother to ask for accommodation... backpacker budget is not for this place... The marina is full of expensive yachts... Maybe one day I will have one... The beach is called 4 Mile beach, nice sandy beach with palm tree as the background, so gives a really tropical feel... The water in Port Douglas is full of jelly fish, you can swim only in the protected netted areas... There is a free shower and change room just behind the beach car park, so if you haven't showered for a while, there will be the place to go.

Went back to Cairns the same day, because free Pizza and drinks was at 7pm... Met some cool people at the drinks... Julie and Charlotte, hope your trips are going well, shame we didn't have 2 more places in the cars, but in hindsight, you guys could have travelled with Alejandro and Stephanie or even Nina and Julie, then we could have all been in the Whitsundays the same time and on the same boat, all 10 of us! Oh well, we will stay in touch... By the way, really liked your diving photos, they were cool!

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Photos

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Port Douglas