12 best places around Daintree Rainforest & Cape Tribulation
12 best places around Daintree Rainforest & Cape Tribulation
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After our diving tour with DiversDen in Cairns, we drove to Illies Beach in the north of Cairns and stayed on a little parking space near the ocean. Unfortunately, two rangers woke us up by knocking on our door. They told us if we stay longer then one hour we had to pay 250 AUS Dollar penalty. It was our first time that rangers threatened us. It is so complicated to find a free rest area near Cairns. Luckily the rangers were very friendly and there was another camper as well. But if you want to make sure everything´s alright, you have to choose an official free rest area in the wiki camps app.
I am happy that I can give you 12 great tips for the area Daintree Rainforest, Cape Tribulation and Atherton Tablelands:
- Palm trees in Thala Beach Nature Reserve
- Best view at Trinity Bay Lookout
- The best place to explore the rainforest: Mossman Gorge
- Take the ferry across the crocodile -Daintree River
- Best views in the jungle: Mount Alexandria Lookout, Thornton Beach, Mynel Beach
- Exploring Cape Tribulation
- The beautiful tea fields
- Overnight stay in Mossman Gorge
- Diving day tour in Port Douglas
- Beautiful Atherton Table Lands and 3 waterfalls
- Have you ever seen Platypus-animals?
- Wonderful Palm Cove beach
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Palm trees in Thala Beach Nature Reserve
2. Best view at Trinity Bay Lookout
We drove on to the Trinity Bay Lookout near Port Douglas. We had the best view of all the beautiful bays, palm trees, and mountains. I also recommend a walk through Port Douglas, it is such a cute and beautiful town!
3. The best place to explore the Daintree Rainforest: Mossman Gorge
From the parking space in front of Mossman Gorge, a beautiful trail leads to the info pavilion. Everything is designed beautifully, it is a project of Aborigines from the nearby village together with white people. You have to take the bus for 10 AUS Dollar per person to the beginning of the hiking trails through the Daintree Rainforest, the oldest rainforest in the whole world! From here there are several hiking trails passing a beautiful river. Most of the time it is allowed to bath in the river, the water is extremely clear and luckily there are no crocs in it ;). I dipped in my toes and climbed over the rocks. The temperature felt very tropical and the gigantic trees with the big aerial roots were stunning!
4. Take the ferry across the crocodile – Daintree River
If you like to explore Cape Tribulation in the north, you have to take a little car ferry, for 27 AUS Dollar to and back, across the Daintree River. There are lots of dangerous crocodiles up to 8 meters in the River, unfortunately, I couldn´t see one. There are some providers offering crocodile tours directly next to the river.
5. Best views at Mount Alexandria Lookout, Thornton Beach, and Mynel Beach
At first, we drove to the “Alexandria Lookout”, where we had a great view over the rainforest-mountain landscape and the connection of the Daintree River and the ocean. Afterward, we explored the beautiful “Thornton Beach”. You can definitely say: The jungle with all the palm trees meets the ocean. Everywhere we found signs warning of freshwater crocodiles in the ocean – Probably you should not swim here :). We explored all the beaches, for example, Mynel Beach, until we reached Cape Tribulation. Sometimes a wooden bridge leads through the jungle and across little rivers.
6. Exploring Cape Tribulation
We arrived at Cape Tribulation Beach. The roads towards Cape Tribulation were pretty small winding through the jungle. We saw lots of 4-wheel cars totally covered with red outback sand coming from the other direction. Probably they did a tour through the outback in the north of Australia. With a 2-wheel car, Cape Tribulation is the last destination to go in the north. The road continues with gravel path up to the northern point of Australia and the passage to Papua Neuginea. Again the jungle met the ocean – the beaches are fantastic!
7. The beautiful tea fields
If you are driving the road from the Daintree River back to Mossman, you will see some big fields with flaky green plants. This is tea!! They showed some old harvesting machines next to the fields.
8. Overnight Stay in Mossmann
On our way back we stayed on a little camping area for 20 AUS Dollar for the night. Together with another German couple, we were the only ones. The sanitary facilities were just rebuilt, however, in the morning a few frogs joined me in the bathroom :).
9. Diving day tour in Port Douglas to the Agincourt Reef
A special experience will be a diving day tour from the beautiful harbor of Port Douglas with DiversDen. In a beautiful white building, you will find all the operators. I highly recommend DiversDen, because they have access to 4 of the best Agincourt reefs in the Outer Reef, in contrast to other companies who could bring you to a reef with a bad view. You can decide if you only want to snorkel or if you try a first dive.
10. The beautiful Atherton Tablelands: Millaa Millaa Falls, Zillie Falls, and Ellinjaa Falls
We stayed on a free rest area shortly after Kairo near Atherton, together with a lot of other campers. Passing Atherton we drove along the number 01 Kennedy Highway to the Millaa Millaa Falls. The circle road combines all of the three waterfalls in the beautiful Atherton Tablelands. The waterfall looks like a Fairytale, isn´t it? It drops in a really consistently and smooth way. You can enjoy a bath, especially because you might be the only one there. The Zillie Falls were only visible from above, therefore we drove to the third waterfall Elinjaa Falls. We took a little trail down to the foot of the waterfall. All three waterfalls aren´t far away from the street. The whole circle is beautiful, you will drive through fields and jungle landscape next to wonderful looking hills.
11. Have you ever seen Platypus – animals? The Platypus Viewing Plattform
After that we drove back along the little streets, passing Jaggan, Malinda, Peeramon until we reached Yungaburra. Next to the bridge and the Platypus Viewing Plattform, you will find a trail under the bridge and along the river. We walked a few minutes and we actually saw three Platypus!! They came back to the surface after a few seconds, swam a few meters and disappeared again. Platypus are a mixture of duckbill and mammal, they are looking so cute with their big beak. They were a lot smaller than I imagined. There are only a few places in Australia where you have the possibility to see these animals. We were pretty lucky! We drove back to Cairns along “Lake Barren” and “Gadgarra” and. “Little Mulgrave”. The streets are extremely crazy. You have to drive all the serpentines on top of the mountains and down again. Driving one curve after the other you will have a beautiful view of the mountains and down the valley.
12. The beautiful Palm Cove, Cairns
Along the highway, we drove back to Cairns. In the north of Cairns, you will find the very popular “Palm Cove Beach”. It is a beautiful beach with loads of palm trees directly planted next to the beach and beautiful modern cafés. Palm Cove is a popular holiday destination and a relaxing place amongst locals and offers a lot of luxury hotels. However, there was a sign at the beach warning of crocodiles and jellyfish, but you can swim in a separate area. After this long 2-month road trip through Australia, we had to return our lovely campervan to Britz. Overall we drove a distance of 12.500km from Alice Springs, to Adelaide, Kangaroo Island, Melbourne, Sydney, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast until we reached the Great Barrier Reef in the north. We had a lot of fun traveling in our camper van. I highly recommend Britz for renting a camper, everything went perfect and we had no problems at all!
Do you have more time left? There are a few more things to do:
- Fitzroy Island is a beautiful island near Cairns with pristine beaches and the bluest water
- Babinda Boulders in the south of Cairns offers wonderful swimming holes between the rocks
- Mission Bay near Cairns is a beautiful and popular beach with lots of palm trees
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