The Tropical Queensland
CAIRNS
Up North in beautiful Queensland - the Sunshinestate - is tropical Cairns - the 'capital' of the far north, which serves as the gateway to e.g. Cape Tribulation, the unique tropical rainforrest next to the sea. It's also a centre for a lot of activities like reef trips, scuba diving and white wter rafting.
Though it lacks a beach it has beautiful sunsets
Cairns is one of Australia's most popular traveller destination, but unfortunately the rapid tourists growth har destroyed musch of the city's laid-back tropical atmosphere. It also lacks a beach, but there a some good further up north.
It's climatic best -and busiest - to visit from May to october; in summer the higth humidity can be draining.
At the promenade in Cairns
- July 1999
Yammy, a pizza in the park for dinner.
"Bin möd!"
Inland on the way to Cape Tribulation...
Getting away from tourist and party town, we're on the way to Cape Tribulation. On the way we're passing both through coastline with at pleasant seabreeze, but also dry and hot inland sceenery.The roads on our route are mostly gravel roads and there are not many people around.
Taking the inland road to Cape Tribulation, we're passing Cooktown, which claims to have been Australia's first british settlement.In 1874, before Cairns was even thought of, Cooktown was the second-biggest town in Queensland. At its peak there were no less than 94 pubs, almost as many brothels, and the population was over 30,000.
At black mountain - inland road before Cooktown
   
   
  Climate The Queensland seasons are more a case of hotter and wetter or cooler and drier than of summer and winter. November/December to April/may is the wetter, hotter half of the year, while the real Wet, particularly affecting northern coastal areas, is january to March.
Orchidee
Cairns usually gets about 1300mm of rain in theese 3 months, while daily temperature in the high 30s. This is also the seasons for cyclons, and if one hits, the main road north, Bruce Highway, can be blocked by the ensuing floods.
In the south, Brisbane and Pockhampton both get about 450mm of rain from january to March, and temperatures in Brisbane rarely drop below 20 degrees.
Queensland doesn't really get 'cold weather' except at night inland or upland from about may to September. Inland, of course, there's also a lot less rain thannear the coast.
 
Shortly before Cooktown, the road passes Black Mountain, apile of thousands of granite boulders. It's said that between the huge rocks there are ways which will take you under the hill from one side to the other, but people have died trying to find them. Black mountain is known to Aboriginal people as Kalcajagga -'Place of the Spears'. The colour comes not from the rocks, but from lichen growing on them.
Black Mountain - July 1999
...like paradies!

THE CAPE TRIBULATION AREA
After crossing th Daintree River by ferry there's another 34 km of (almost sealed) road, with a few hills and creeks crossing, to Cape Tribulation. The road is quite good and unless there has been exceptonal heavy rain, conventional vihicles can make it easily, with care to Cape Trib.
Cape Tribulation was named by Captian Cook. In the 70s, much of this coast was a seldon visited hippie outpost. These days Cape Trib is much more accessible and there's a steady stream of operators ferrying tourists up from Port Douglas and Cairns.

 
CAPE TRIBULATION

Remember, however,it's a rainforest, so you'll need to bring mosquito repellent.
It's no longer quite so isolated, but it's still an incredibly beautiful stretch of coast, and it's one of the few places in Australia where tropical rainforrest meets the sea.
At Cape Tribulation - The rainforrest next to the sea
...a bit cloudy,but still amazing.
AROUND CAIRNS
Arriving in Cairns again, we hired a car and drove along the coast from Cairns to Port Douglas. The coastline north of Cairns is fantastic scenery with some nice and beautiful beaches along the way.
Lars in our hired MX5
The beautiful coast north of Cairns
PORT DOUGLAS
In the early days of far north Queensland's development Port Douglas was a rival for Cairns, but when Cairns eventuallu got upperhand, Port Douglas became a sleepy backwater. in the mid 80s people, however, rediscovered the delightful little place.People placed a couple of million dollar resorts, golf courses and more, that all conduced to a retreat for the rich and fashionable. Yet, despit all this it has manged to keep a good deal of its original charm.		 At the beach promenade in Port Douglas
Though it has a rich and faschionable touch you still find some funny looking bars in Port, how it's locally known
The Beach at Port Douglas
The final stretch, Cook Highway, from Cairns to Port Douglas is a treat, because it run right alon the shore and there are some suberb beaches.
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North along the the Cook Highway are the Cairns northern beaches, which really are a string of suburbs. Some of them to mention are manchans, Holloways, Yorkeys Knob, trinity, Kewarra and Clifton beaches and Palm Cove.
Trinity is perhaps the best for a short rip out of Cairns. Palm Cove is an exclusive little resort town with fancy hotels, expensive boutiques and restaurants.
Trinity Beach
 
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Magnetic Island
Travelling down south but still at the North Coast next stop is Magnetic Island. Tourist came to teh island more than 100 years ago. Although popular, it remains a somewhat oldfashioned resort island, with teh main attractions being the fine beaches, excellent bushwalks, abudant wildlife as well as laid-back atmosphere. It's also cheap and easy to get to, being only 8 km offshore from Townsville.
 
Greet the Koalas!
Let's have a coco for dinner!...-hard work for Lars in the garden at "Forresthaven"...
Overlooking Geoffrey Bay
Magnetic Island is one of the largest reef islands (52 sq km) and about half of it is national park. The island is surrounded by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, so there are restrictions on fishing and collecting in some areas.
Bremner Point at Alma Bay  
"What a view!"  
 
  A Koalas sitting sleepy in the gum trees
 
A lonely rosala in the garden at "Forresthaven"
There are several smal towns along the coast and the island has a quite different atmosphere to the purely resort island along the Reef. It's almost an outer suburb of Townsville, with many of the 2500 residents commuting to the mainland by ferry.
The Bob...Blackboy palmtree.
While bushwalking you meet many of them on the way.
Snorkelling at Alma Bay
- a very pleasant and beautiful beach.
Islands at the Great Barrier Reef The true coral islands, or cays, are on the outer reef or isolated between it and the mainland. Green Island near Cairns, the Low Isles near Port Douglas, and Heron Island off Gladstone are all cays. Cays are formed when a reef is above sea level, even at high tide. Dead coral is ground down by water action to form sand and, in some cases, vegetation eventually take root. Coral cays are low-lying, unlike the often hilly islands closer to the coast. There are about 300 cays on the reef, and 69 are vegetated.
The islands are extremely variable so don't let the catchword 'reef island' suck you in. Most of the popular resort islands are actually continental islands and some are well south of the Barrier Reef. Manu continental islands have fringing reefs as well as other attrations for which a tiny dot-on-the-map coral cay is simply too small; there may be hills to climb, bushwalks to explore and secluded beaches.
Still at Alma Bay
Goodday Mate!
 
"Forresthaven"- Our Residens for the time on the Island...a very nice and cosy place,eventhough the Guide said the opposite...
Rosalas everywhere
 
Whitsundays Coast
The Whitsunday Islands, which lie just off the coast between Mackay and Bowen, are famous for their clear, aqua-blue waters and forested islands. This is one of the most beutiful parts of the coast, and there's an extensive range of activities to choose from, including dive courses, cruises to and around the island, snorkelling and much more. Mackay is a major regional centre, while the main access point for the islands is Airlie Beach,which is a very popular travellers' hangout, mainly because many companies offering dive courses and boat trips to the islands operate from here.
Airlie Beach, 25 km north-west of Proserpine off the Bruce Highway, is the gateway to the Whitsunday Islands. It's small but lively centre that grown phenomenally since the mid 1980s. The whole town revolves around tourism and pleasure boating, and it attracts adiverse bunch of boaties, backpackers and other tourists. It has and excellent range of budget to mid range accommodation, plenty of good eateries and a lively nightlife.
The Beach at Airlie Beach- view from a nice American restaurant.
Airlie Beach also has the reputation as a centre for learning to scuba dice. A wide assortment of travel agents and tour operators are based here. Whale watching boat trips are also posible between July and September. Despite all of the recent development, Airlie Beach is stil amll place that has managed to retain something of its relaxed air.
Sunset at Airlie Beach
Whitsundays Curiously, the Whitsundays are misnamed - Captain Cook didn't really sail through them on Whit Sunday. When he returned to England, it was found that his meticulously kept log was a day out because he had not allowed for crossing the international date line! As he sailed through the Whitsundays and further north, Cook was unaware of the existence of the Great barrier Reef, although he realised that something to the east of his ship was making the water unusually calm. It wasn't until he ran aground on the Endeavour Reef, near Cooktown, that he finally found out about the reef.
In the Early morning just offshore Hook Island...
...whales
 

The Great Barrier Reef The Great Barrier Reef is 2000 km in length. It starts slightly south of the Tropic of Capricorn, somewhere out from Bundaberg or Gladstone, and ends in Torres Strait, just south of Papua New Guinea. it is not only the most extensive reef system in the world, but the biggest structure made by living organism. At the southern end the reef is up to 300 km from the mainland, while at the northern end it runs nearer the coast, is much less broken and can be up to 80km wide.
In the 'lagoon' between the outer reef and teh coast, the waters are dotted with smaller reefs, cays and islands. Drilling on the reef has indicated that the coral may be more than 500m thick. Most of the reef is about two million years old, but there are sections dating back 18 million years.

Whitsunday Islands The 74 Whitsunday Islands are probably the best-known Queensland Islands, and one of Australia's pleasure-boating capitals. The Islands are most continental islands - the tips of underwater mountains - but many og them have fringing coral reefs. The actual Great Barrier Reef is at least 60km out from Shute Harbour; Hook Reef is the nearest part of it.
View from the habour at Airlie Beach to the Whitsunday Islands
 
   
The islands - mostly hilly and wooded - and the passages between them are certainly beautiful, and while a few are developed with tourists resorts, most are uninhabited and several offer the chance of some back-to-nature beach camping and bushwalking. All but four of the Whitsundays are either predominantly or completely national park.. The exceptions are Dent Island, and the resort islands of Hamilton, Daydream and Hayman. The other main resorts are on South Molle, Lindeman, Long and Hook Islands.
We went on an organized boat cruise to Whitsunday Island and Hook Island,where we stop at Whitehaven Beach, camped on Hook Island,watched the Whales in the early morning and went diving and snorkelling at the Reef
The pictureous Whitehaven Beach

Whitsunday Island The largest of the Whitsundays, this island covers 109 sq km and rises to 438m at Whitsunday Peak. There's no resort, but 6km-lon Whitehaven Beach on the south-east coast is the longest and finest beach in the group, with good snorkelling off its southern end.

Hook Island Second largest of the Whitsundays, Hook Island is 53 sq km and rises to a relatively high 450m at hook Peak. There is a number of beaches dotted around the island. it's mainly national park, with camping area.
Snorkelling...
... and diving near Hook Island
...playing with big reef fish...
What is it? Coral is formed by a small, primitive animal, a marine polyp. Some polyps, known as a hard corals, form a hard surface by excreting lime. When they die, the hard 'skeletons' remain and these gradually build up the reef. New polyps grow on their dead predecessors and continually add to the reef. the skeletons of hard corals are white; the colours of reefs come from living polyps.
Coral needs a number of preconditions for healthy growth. The water temperature must not drop below 17,5 degrees - thus the reef does not continue farther south into cooler waters- and not exceed more than 2-3 degrees.
Fraser Coast The focal point of this stretch of coast is the majestetic Fraser Island- at 120 km long it's the world's largest sand island. Hervey Bay, the major access point for the island, has grown into a busy tourists centre, while the southern access point is the sleepy and attractive Rainbow Beach.
 
Fraser Island Thing to keep in mind about Fraser Island is that it's all sand.There's no soil, no clay and only two or three small rocky outcrops. It's one gigantic, 120km by 15km foliated sand bar - the world's largest, and it was inscribed as such on the World Heritage List i 1993. The northern half of the island is protected as the Great Sandy National Park.
 
Lake Mckenzie  
There are also about 200 lakes, some of them superb for swimming - which is just as well since the sea is definite no-go; there are lethal undertows as well as the odd man-eating shark or ten. Other wildlife is in abudance, including 40 different mammal species and more insects and reptiles than you want to know about. You can camp on Fraser or stay in accomodation. The island is sparsely populated and although more than 20,000 vehicles a year pile on to it, it remains wild. A network of sandy tracks crisscrosses the island and you can drive along great stretches of beach - but it's 4WD only; there are no paved roads.
Fraser Island is a delight for those who love fishing, walking, exploring by 4WD or for those who simply enjoy nature. Some of the sand blows (larg drifting dunes) are magnificent, while much of the island is densely forested with an amazing variety of tree and plant types, many of hich are only to be found on Fraser.
Lars at an oriental house at the Riverside
Brisbane
Since playing host to a string of major international events in the 1980s, including the Commeonwealrh Games and the Expo88,
Lars and Natascha at the Brisbane River
For many years Brisbane was viewed by its larger southern cousins as something of a hickville, an overblown country town. But it certainly isn't today.
View over Brisbanes Centre from the roof

Brisbane has developed into a lively, cosmopolitan city with several interesting districts, a good street-cafe scene, a great park, a busy cultural calender and a decent nightlife - though you'll need to do some work to find it. Several of Queensland's major attractions can be reached on day trips from Brisbane. the Gold and Sunshine coasts and their mountainous hinterlands are short bus rides from the city.

Although close to the coast, Brisbane is very much a river city. It's a scenic place, surrounded by hills and fine lookouts, with several impressive bridges spanning the Brisbane River. It also enjoys an excellent climate.