Paradise

When we began planning our trip to the states we considering spending time on the Queensland coast on our way to the states and eventually decided to hit the beach on the way home to Alice Springs. As it turns out, that was a right decision.

We had a great time seeing friends and family in the states but 4 weeks of living in someone else’s home starts to wear on you. By the time our flight landed in Cairns, we’d been traveling for over 24 hours. After having traversed 3 major airports, sat on four flights for nearly 15,000 miles, my watch tells me it’s still Tuesday and 2 hours before I departed Denver but I know it was 24 hours ago. Don’t worry if that confuses you; I was confused, cantankerous and seriously in need of a shower. Dave can confirm my condition. My darling husband is a wonderful and smart man with finely tuned self preservation skills, when I asked him to make all the other people in the Cairns airport disappear, he asked if I wanted to claim our bags, head to the car rental counter or sit quietly in a chair. Having just sat for 24 hours I opted for standing by the baggage carousel and he delivered a baggage cart to me before heading to the Hertz counter. I don’t know if he was concerned about me or the safety of the people around me but I noticed him keeping a close watch on me from his place in line at the car rental counter.

Fortunately all our baggage arrived and the trip to the car pick up was a short walk and we were soon on our way to a place called Palm Cove. It’s only 30 minutes north of Cairns but it is a world away. Palm Cove is a tiny resort town with a couple of miles of amazing beach and all the peace and tranquility of which you have ever dreamed. For the next 10 days we called this magical place home.

This is main street in this town is delightfully un-busy!

Most mornings we walked on this amazing beach before breakfast.

There are VERY BIG palm trees in Queensland.

Next – day trips to the rainforest, the tablelands and the Great Barrier Reef.