Who would have thought it?

I've always wondered why people could go to a resort somewhere, spend a week, not set foot outside the resort, not mix it up with the locals and experience the culture, ie eat the food. After the past 12 months, all I've wanted, surprisingly, is just that! So we've booked 4 nights on Fitzroy Island, just off the Queensland coast, near Cairns, 2 nights prior in Cairns and one night on the return. Chillaxing, here we come!!!

Photos to follow.

Saturday 23^rd August 2014.

We’ve been waiting for this day for a while now. It’s time to go north and veg out on a tropical island!

An uneventful drive to Newcastle Airport, checked in and not so far to walk on the tarmac to the plane due to building work. The plane is full and we’re in for a bumpy flight, no hot drinks will be served on this leg to Brisbane. We gladly farewell the grey skies and once we’re at altitude it’s bright sunshine but can’t see a thing below.

We’d eaten 2^nd breakfast at the airport and weren’t hungry on this flight, so kept the sandwiches we’d bought at the airport for the next leg. There was a young family behind us and it was quite entertaining listening to the conversations. Turns out that the Mum is the cousin of the husband of someone I know at work. Six degrees of separation doesn’t apply on the Central Coast, even though this family is actually from Newcastle. They’re headed for Port Douglas so they’ll be on our next flight as well.

Flight 2 for the day, Brisbane (still miserably wet) to Cairns is not as full. I’d changed our seats when I checked in to get us away from the wing and as it turned out, we had the back 6 or so rows to ourselves. The only other person back with us was the spare pilot. At least he wasn’t like the blow up auto pilot from ‘Flying High’! Ha ha! Actually, I think he was repositioning, from what the cabin crew were saying to him. I wondered why he didn’t get an upgrade to Business. Must have been full. So, if you’re not right up the front, you’re right down the back! The poor guy across the aisle from us was a very nervous Nellie, I felt sorry for him, grabbing the armrest in a vice-grip at every bump.

Cairns did not disappoint us, it was comfortingly warm as soon as we left the plane. Didn’t take long to get our bags and find our lift into town, with an orientation tour thrown in for free. I think the driver forgot where we were going and we went all around town first. Not that we minded, and we scored a pretty good room at the Holiday Inn. We’d asked for a high floor with an ocean view and we got the top floor with half ocean, half town view, looking towards the marina. Best of both worlds really, we got the pretty night lights view.

Gosford Council could take a page out of Cairns Council’s book. The boardwalk along the waterfront is fabulous, and between the road and the water is all grass, paths and gardens, with a few memorial features to pause at. And then there’s the ‘lagoon’, a free, public swimming area that’s massive and graded from a trickle to about 1.5m deep. If you’ve been to Cairns, you’ll know there’s no beach there in town, only mudflats, so to have this wonderful swimming area combined with large grassed areas, bbqs and picnic tables, is a real drawcard.