Botanic Gardens and Fitzroy Island

We ended our 6 night stay at Palm Cove yesterday by celebrating in style over a slap up breakfast with David at Nu Nu Restaurant, in one of the most beautiful beachfront locations along the Palm Cove esplanade .... 

I loved my spanner crab omelette (with a ginger infused broth). The friendly staff were struck that none of us had ordered the ubiquitous smashed avocado with any of our dishes .....

We moved to Ro's house in Smithfield, north of Cairns, after check out, a wonderful chance to experience more of this part of FNQ like a local!

While David attended to some chores (and Ro was away on work matters) we spent the afternoon at Cairn's beautiful Botanical Gardens ....

Once again we were impressed with the quality of the infrastructure and the level of upkeep at the gardens. The stylish Visitor Centre is completely faced with mirrored panels - which looked stunning in this setting - and its cafe served great lunches. 

This morning we were up early and on our way to Cairns Harbour, in plenty of time (so we thought) to catch our Fitzroy Island cruise boat at 8.30am. But unfortunately there was a fire emergency on the highway so traffic had to be diverted through Redlynch - with major hold ups along the way. We only just made it to the boat on time in the end! 

Departing Cairns ........

This was our first glimpse of Fitzroy Island (in the distance), just under 30 klm east of Cairns Harbour.

Approaching Fitzroy Island .... I like this pic because we walked up to the highest point of this island today - and this pic really shows how high it is!!!

It was warm today (28oC) and we set out walking to the island's old lighthouse first thing - well over 2klm from where we landed and all uphill! We were pleased to make it there!

But then we still had another 750metre climb from the lighthouse to get to the summit lookout.

This was one of the few times that Rob got ahead of us on the summit walk .......

We were all pleased to make it to the highest point on the island and know the rest of the way was all downhill.

But the views from here were spectacular - and made the climb all worthwhile .....

We enjoyed a l-o-n-g drink and a slow lunch at Foxy's Bar afterwards, leaving us enough time for an  snorkel along the beachside reefs - all part of the World Heritage Listed Great Barrier Reef. It was easy going for us in these shallow tropical waters and Rob and I scored the jackpot by getting in just about touching distance with a giant sea turtle, feeding amongst the coral close to shore. There were hundreds of fish too - all different types, some brilliantly coloured and beautiful corals too although there was much that was no longer alive! 

Our last glimpses of Welcome Bay, Fitzroy Island after we set off for the return trip to Cairns after an absolutely stunning day...........

Breakfast at Hartley Creek Falls FNQ

Ro and David picked us up early this morning so we could do the 7 klm Hartleys Creek Falls walk together. The start of the track was about 17klm north of Palm Cove in the Macalister Range National Park, just off the main Captain Cook highway.

It was a beautiful morning for a walk up the gorge along the fast running Hartleys Creek.

 

At the end of the walk we came across a deep waterhole and the rather spectacular Hartley Creek Falls. Here, David and Ro set out a lovely surprise breakfast spread for us, picnic style. There was even freshly brewed coffee as part of the menu!

We thought this was the most beautiful waterfall walk we'd done in our visits to this part of FNQ. We're lucky to know some locals who know about these very special places.

After breakfast in this most beautiful setting we walked back to the Flat Rock swimming hole (about halfway back to the start of the walk) where we enjoyed the pristine swimming conditions - and perfect solitude in this most beautiful place in the world!

We loved this walk, and David and Ro's company but we were hot and and tired by the time we got back to the resort. It was nice to spend the afternoon relaxing and flopping around in the pool. We ended off the day with a beer/Guinness at O'Donnells on the Esplanade ........

and a beautiful meal and a bottle of wine from the Peloponnese at El Grekos Greek restaurant in the middle of the village.

Palm Cove to Kewarra Beach

We didn't venture out in the car today; instead we set out walking this morning along this palm fringed path, via Clifton Beach and then on to Kewarra Beach, around 4.5 klms from our starting point at Palm Cove. I do love a long, shady walk under palm trees with the sound of waves gently lapping the beach beside me. 

The beautiful Balinese inspired Kewarra Beach Resort and Spa was our destination, for a well deserved coffee and breakfast, served beautifully in this open air pavillion facing the sea. We were very happy with ourselves here this morning!

It wasn't hard to imagine where the inspiration for this resort came from - we felt like we were back in Bali (almost!). They'd done well with the pool area too ........

We walked along the beach on the way home for about a kilometre - until it got too much like hard work (soft sand)!

Double Island and Haycock Island are always in view from these beaches around Trinity Bay. Ro told us last night that the locals refer to Haycock Island as "Scout Hat" - for obvious reasons.

Our 9 klm walk and leisurely breakfast took a few hours today so we didn't do too much this afternoon other than relax around our resort's pool. Its quite lovely, and today the trees overhead were filled with constant bird song

A day in FNQ

Yesterday we headed due south from Palm Cove into the Barron Gorge National Park. It was only about a 30 minute drive from Palm Cove to the start of the Crystal Cascades walk, along Freshwater Creek which eventually spills out into the Barron River. 

It was an easy walk for us along a wide concrete path with a very gentle climb over 1.2klm of walking track. Freshwater Creek was running fast after a season of rain and there were a few swimming holes along the way... a very enjoyable scenic walk, to the constant sound of tumbling gushing water.

The path ends at the Crystal Cascades waterfall and swimming hole (although no swimming advised today because of the volume of water flowing at this point!).

After this lovely gentle walk we thought we'd tackle the much more challenging Fairy Falls walk along the nearby Dowah Creek .....

This walk proved to be quite an adventure for us as it was a wild walk with no maintained trail and many parts of it required us to scramble over rocks and tree roots, sometimes perilously close to the steep banks of the fast running creek. We are not including pics of us on all fours inching our way over the worst parts of this track!

However, we were super careful and felt quite chuffed to make it to the very picturesque Fairy Falls (waterfall) all in one piece .....

Being so wild we didn't expect a crowd here, but of course the challenge, and the opportunity to swim in a large croc free pool makes it an appealing adventure for all the young things too, so we weren't able to enjoy the scene in solitude!

We were just as careful going back down the creek too on the return jouney.

From there we drove into Cairns, to Rusty's Markets, the indoor farmers market in Grafton Street in the city. We always enjoy a good food market and we found this one really interesting, full of exotic (to us) local fruit and vegies, and street food stalls, a feast for the senses  .....

with a very strong SE Asian influence and presence ......

Rob was pleased to find some German bratwurst - meaning our market visit was not in vain. Unfortunately we were late getting to the market so many of the small food stalls had run out of their lunch offerings, but we certainly did not have to starve on this occasion.

We were intrigued by the Rollinia (in the custard-apple family - tastes like lemon meringue pie apparently)...

Last night we met up with David and Ro at Trinity Beach (about a 10 minute drive south from Palm Cove). They were able to pull up in David's customary style now the Merc has arrived in FNQ.

As opposed to our slightly more down market hire car style ......

We started with a walk along the beach and caught a beautiful sunset from the rocky headland at the south end of the beach....

We enjoyed dinner at L'Unico, an Italian restaurant on the esplanade at Trinity Beach, sharing plates of baked brie, scallops, calamari and eggplant scallopini as we covered so many topics of conversations between us. Ro has the best stories of her amazing work with the CSIRO over the years (involving work with some of Australia's most remote communities). One story we hadn't heard about before was the three days she spent guiding Gough Whitlam!!! over the FNQ Wet Tropics Region prior to the case being made to UNESCO for its World Heritage listing (by then Gough was Australia's Ambassador to UNESCO and an elected member of the UNESCO Executive Board) amazing!!