First trip to Cairns

[svs]

I booked my first trip to Cairns, Australia for February 2018.

I found lots of useful information reading previous posts but I still have few questions. If my 30 hours trip from US will go as scheduled I will have 2 full days in Cairns before 4 days trip with SOF. I would like to visit rain forest for a day. I am not much into ziplines or ATVs which are advertised on most local travel sites. Have anybody been on a day long rainforest trip which actually involved some walking through the forest? I am not asking for a full day hiking but I do not like tours which drive you from place to place to let you out of the car only at the attraction sites. I do not want to rent a car to drive on a wrong side of the road either. Do travel agencies pick up customers from the hotels in Cairns? My understanding is that rain forest is a couple of hours drive from Cairns.

What is the best way to get from the airport to the hotel?

I looked through some hotels. THE BAY VILLAGE RESORT looks decent and it sounds like SOF will pick up people from this hotel at the day of departure. Any other suggestions for inexpensive/mid range hotel not far from ocean and SOF office?

Diving: I will not bring my dive stuff with me but rent it from SOF. Do people pick up rental stuff before local flight at the office or at the boat location (there are some weight limits for local flight)? Are dives with SOF guided or buddy pairs? I signed for nitrox. How are dives arranged based on nitrox/air consumption?

I will also have free afternoon on a last day before my flight out of Cairns the next morning. Any suggestion, to rent hotel for the last night in Cairns or at the airport (5:30am flight). Is any place to store luggage in Cairns (e.g SOF office) for a day so I do not have to carry it around with me.

 

[Damselfish]

We did the rain forest gondola and rail trip - Skyrail - which is somewhat of a touristy thing but enjoyable and unique. It's not a serious hike in the jungle, but there is a boardwalk in the forest to check out with labeled plants and informational stuff. You do need to make reservations, they book up and the train or gondola didn't run every single day, shutting down for maintenance or whatever on some seemingly random days, so definitely need to plan ahead. You can drive or they will pickup in Cairns. I expect all their bus transfers stop in the Kuranda village (which is definitely a touristy thing, but fine as those sorts of places go.) I think we mostly ate ice cream and people watched.

The boat we were on would store stuff in the office for you. SOF is way nicer so I would expect they would, and their website mentions they do. Their website also does make it sound like the rentals are on board, which would make way more sense then flying the stuff back and forth on weight limited planes, but I'm sure they would be good about filling in any details. I don't recall if we actually stored things with the op or at our hotel, as we returned to the same hotel at the end of the liveaboard. (Sofitel Reef in our case, but I think it's now Pullman Reef. There was a zoo on the roof, which was better than it sounds. Easy walking to lots of things from there.)

I will say checking out and getting to the airport for an early morning flight shouldn't be a problem from any reasonably good hotel in Cairns. They're used to flights leaving at horrible hours and I think it's just SOP for anyplace tourism related there to deal with it.

 

[svs]

Thank you Damselfish. What is the best transportation from/to airport? Cab?

 

[WetPup]

Taxi into the city will cost about $30AUD. There is also an airport shuttle bus (minivan), but it's inconvenient.

You get rental gear on board the boat.

You'll get buddied up with someone of roughly the same experience level. One of the DM's on board will occasionally jump in for a dive and you can follow them around, but the dives aren't really "guided" as such unless you pay for a private guide. The briefings are comprehensive given this fact. Dive schedule is the same regardless of your use of air or nitrox - I've done the trips using both at various points. You just dive within your particular NDL and make sure you're back on the boat with 20-30 bar in your tank.

The airport is not open 24/7, so on your last night, I recommend getting a hotel. The airport opens at 4am, so you'd be stuck outside the terminal until then otherwise. Given the weather at that time of year can be unpredictable, I'd rather be inside. I like the Cairns Plaza Hotel for a budget stay in the city.

 

[Damselfish]

They called a cab for us when we left early in the am. I don't recall on the way there, but I think we took some kind of airport shuttle - don't recall if it was an airport thing or hotel thing.

 

[RyanT]

I went to Cairns about this time two years ago so I was there just before the back-to-back El Nino bleaching events. I'd love to hear about your experience after you return.

We ended up staying at a couple of different hotels in Cairns, they were all pretty average - Holiday Inn-esque. On our last night we stayed at the Lilybank Bed and breakfast. It was about 20 minutes from the airport, but the host brought us to the airport to catch our early morning flight. It's in a kind of residential neighborhood, but there was a restaurant down the street that we walked to.

As for a rainforest experience, if you want to get away from he touristy thing, don't do the skyrail/Kuranda village. It's actually not bad, but definitely touristy. To see real rainforest, you'll want to go up to the Daintree. It's probably 2 or more hours from Cairns, so you'll probably need a car. I was a little reluctant to rent a car and drive on the wrong side of the road, but it actually wasn't bad. As long as you keep thinking about driving it's fine. I found the minute I went into "auto drive" mode, I started making mistakes. But, I only did that a couple of times and then started paying attention. It's seriously less scary than I thought it would be. Give it a try.

 

[svs]

Thank you Ryan. Yes, Daintree forest is what I have in mind. Is renting a car is the only option to get there? When you are in Daintree, can you explore on your own or you need a guide?

 

[WetPup]

In the Daintree there's well trodden trails that you need to stay on - it's a world heritage area and they don't want people wandering off on their own. So no, you definitely don't need a guide, but you do need to stay on the trails.

 

[Spudlet]

I did this last time in Cairns, lovely place hidden gem, great swimming holes with tortoises and jungle perch fish
Cairns Attractions | Crystal Cascades

less of a drive for you also

 

[RyanT]

I seem to recall that you can book a tour of the Daintree from Cairns, where they provide the transportation, a guided walk, etc. That kind of stuff just isn't my cup of tea, so we opted to rent a car.