Port Douglas Paradise

If you're holidaying in Port Douglas, there are a few ways you can go about it:

1. Total relaxation - This option requires you to do nothing but sit on the beach, read the paper, have lunch at a different restaurant each day and drink coffee at the many cool little cafes around town.

2. Adventure plus - This next option means you won't have time to pull up a towel at the beach because you'll be too busy exploring the amazing rainforest and lookouts and bushwalks in and around the place. This option includes a day trip to Cape Tribulation and the Daintree because, hey, what's another 40km up the road?

3. Kombi Combo - This option would be the one Luke and I created just for us and comes highly recommended - it's a mixture of both options 1 and 2, with a few coffee stops, lunch out at a pub, beach walks but also some more serious bush walks and drives to really check this place out. But where to begin?

Why not check out Mossman Gorge on your way further north just up from Port Douglas - it has some lovely rainforest walks and you can swim in the gorge too, if it's not too chilly (like it was the day we visited). Spot a bush turkey or a Cassowary if you can!

The next stop is the town of Daintree, which to tell you the truth, is kinda random and not what you expect. It's basically just a really small town at the foot of the mountains, with no walks into the rainforest or anything... but it is the place to go if you want to catch a boat tour up the Daintree River and maybe spot some crocs along the way!

From the town of Daintree, you may as well keep going up and jump on the car ferry to Cape Tribulation, the highest town that you can drive to on the QLD coast along sealed roads. The ferry is $18.00 return and takes about 2 minutes each way to cross - it runs from 6am until 12 midnight as well, so you can spend a good day across the water or even camp in Cape Trib and come back a few days later!

Now the drive to Cape Tribulation is a pretty special one. The lush rainforest will have you feeling like you're on some exotic tropical island (Duh... like Australia?) and you will be peering through your binoculars like Luke and I, trying to see Tarzan swing from a nearby vine.

And make sure you stop at all the boardwalk rainforest walks - they will take you even deeper into the rainforest where you can see all types of trees and vines and animals unique to this part of the world.


The actual town of Cape Tribulation isn't that big but there are some nice little cafes and restaurants for lunch, just in case you forgot your tin of vegetable soup, unlike us. And you must stop on the way back to the ferry and wander down to the beach, where you can get a bigger taste for just how beautiful this World Heritage listed region is. The rainforest literally spills into the ocean. I bet if we had seen this place on a cloudless sunny day, we might not have returned at all!

Trip highlight? The Daintree Ice Cream Company. Pure. Heaven. You drive past a bunch of unusual fruit trees on the way in and this is where the ice cream flavours come from! For $5 you get a bowl of ice cream with four different flavours to sample - ours included Black Sapote (chocolate pudding fruit), Yellow Sapote (caramel flavoured), Wattleseed (cappuccino flavour) and Coconut. The flavours were just gorgeous and they make all the ice cream on site!

Back in to town and the next day was our 'lazy' day in Port Douglas, where we pretended that we were staying at the Hilton and not the Big 4 caravan park. The lookout over Port Douglas will give you a nice little introduction to the town - the tropical gardens and coconut trees will instantly make you feel like you're in holiday mode.

Then head down to the sand and soak up the sun before...

...choosing a cool cafe or pub to enjoy a lazy beer and yummy lunch. We had humongous hamburgers at this lovely pub below in the main street and dreamed about owning a house with an outdoor entertaining area somewhat similar to where we sat...

And if all of these activities don't leave you tired and in need of a holiday, you can also head out to the Great Barrier Reef for a tour or snorkel. We decided to pass, after spending a couple of weeks checking out the reef in W.A. and also because our bank balance doesn't seem to be quite as healthy as our appetite for homemade ice cream.

Yours in the great outdoors,

Odette