Who Cairns?

That’s the lively bar & restaurant that had a $10 meal deal, beer included. Which is a great deal in Australia, where a single beer (in any pub) can easily set you back $9.

We spent 5 days in Cairns, before we picked up the car to begin the epic roadtrip. The main draw of Cairns is the Great Barrier reef… so let’s start there.

Great Barrier Reef
The Great Barrier Reef is breath-taking… It’s the largest living thing on earth, and the only living thing that can be seen from space. We spent an unbelievable day going out to “the Pinnacles.” Once there, we had 4 hours to snorkel and to visit Green Island. Here’s the boat we were on (the smaller one in the foreground) -

I'M ON A BOAT! in a huge sun hat.

Here’s Green Island, where the boat was moored for the day, about 2 hours out to sea. It's an uninhabited sand island that has grown rainforest on it. It also has a pool in the middle of it, which is a little silly since the island is surrounded by clear, 80-degree water. We saw sea turtles there.

We don’t have an underwater camera, so I have to improvise with stock pictures of the Great Barrier reef. We saw thousands of colorful coral formations and thousands of colorful fish, including parrot fish & clown fish.

This was the view of the coastline on our way back to shore – gorgeous end to the day.

Cairns Royal Botanic Gardens
One glorious morning, we took a long walk around the Royal Botanic Gardens. Every city in Australia has amazing Royal Botanic Gardens that are free, unbelievably maintained, and simply spectacular.

There were lots of butterflies out that day - again, there's really colorful life in northeastern Australia.

Otherwise, we spent a lot of time in Cairns at the internet café, working on Tweets By Us and booking the next few weeks.

They had a Christmas tree in the center of town, which made me happy.