Cairns Botanic Gardens and Northern Beaches

On Monday after our Great Barrier Reef experience, we visited more attractions in Cairns. However, these were not located in the city, but a bit outside. First, we went to the botanical gardens. They are huge and consist of several gardens. The Flecker Garden is the centerpiece and that's where we started after a short visit to the information center to get a map. There were beautiful flowers and rainforest plants to admire. There was also an area where various plants used by the Aboriginal people for various purposes were displayed, as well as a section with spice plants like vanilla and pepper. In the center of the garden, there was a greenhouse with carnivorous plants, orchids, a pond, and butterflies. Very beautifully done.

After the garden, we went to the Gondwanan Heritage Garden, where the formation of today's rainforest plants was explained in 6 stations through the forest. It was quite interesting, but not earth-shattering :D After that, we went to the Rainforest Boardwalk, which leads through the rainforest to the Centenary Lakes. We really liked the rainforest. Only at the beginning, we got a little shock when I noticed a large spiderweb with a huge spider in it right above our heads. The other spiders we saw along the way were not as big and that one was right above the boardwalk. I know some people who definitely wouldn't have continued walking :D

At the freshwater lake of the Centenary Lakes, there was a small Chinese house because of a Chinese sister city. We looked at it and then had our sandwiches for lunch on a bench by the lake. This time we had cheese with cucumber. After that, we walked back to the boardwalk on the other side of the lake and back to our car.

After the Botanic Gardens, we drove north along the coast because that's where the Northern Beaches are located. This is a series of beaches that are among Cairns' attractions. However, we didn't visit all of them, just Yorkeys Knob and Palm Cove. On the one hand, we thought that the beaches are probably all the same anyway, and on the other hand, the weather was pretty stormy and unsuitable for swimming. Yorkeys Knob was more of a harbor than a beach and we could admire some ships from the yacht club. There were some nice stones at the water where we sat down and I had a little, unintentional photoshoot with Andi. I felt like it and we took some nice pictures :) I was also inspired because a wedding couple was taking photos on the small beach at that time. The tide was slowly coming in, so we had to leave our spot on the rocks soon, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to leave there with dry feet :D

After Yorkeys Knob, we went to Palm Cove. It's a real little village and we spent the night at the campsite there. There are no free campsites within a radius of 50km around Cairns, so we always had to go somewhere where we paid around $30. But the place was quite nice, not busy at all, and we just had to cross the street to get to the beach. After setting up the bed, we went to a jetty on the beach to watch the wild sea. There were some anglers there and they were struggling to prevent seagulls from eating their bait. We saw a fisherman holding a seagull in his hand, trying to cut off the fish on the hook in the bird's beak so that the bird wouldn't swallow the hook and line. Thank goodness everything worked out and the seagull was free again. Really crazy birds.

In the evening, we made a delicious dinner out of our salsa ground beef and bean leftovers and rice, and then went to bed soon after. The next day, we had a trip planned to Hartley's Crocodile Adventures Park and we wanted to leave early. The park was recommended to us by both Karo and Matze as well as the lady at the shop of the Regional Art Gallery, so we thought it would definitely be worth it. I will make a separate entry for the day at the park :)