Cairns travel guide
Cairns is the pulsating visitor centre of tropical north Queensland, but until the 1980s it was a sleepy provincial backwater wallowing in a swamp.
Not much had changed since it was founded just over a century before, on some not very picturesque mangrove flats, to service the gold and tin fields further inland. Then the tourism boom hit.
Cairns today
There’s still a core of old-style tropical charm in the languid pubs and distinctively Queensland-style porches, but today Cairns, with a population of 164,000, has a modern international airport, bustling shopping malls, the lovely Esplanade, the Cairns Historical Museum and Regional Art Gallery, and a vast variety of restaurants. Almost any sporting activity – diving trips to the Reef, bungy jumping, whitewater rafting, tandem parachuting, hiking the Atherton Tableland – can be arranged.
Places to visit in Cairns
The Esplanade - the heart of Cairns
The focus of Cairns remains the Esplanade. The waterfront is lined by high-rise hotels and backpacker accommodation, and there’s always an array of picnicking locals beneath the Moreton Bay figs and palms. Its centrepiece is a huge landscaped swimming lagoon, classic red-and-yellow-garbed lifeguards in attendance, its lawns carpeted with minimally clad sunbathers. A leisure and shopping centre, the Pier is still struggling to impose itself, but weekend markets, and a marina for the region’s marlin fishing fleet and pleasure boats, give verve to the waterfront.
Learn the history of the city at Cairns Historical Museum
Corner Lake and Shields streets
tel: 07-4051 5582
This museum has exhibits on the more rough-and-ready past of the area.
See Queensland art at the Regional Art Gallery
Corner Abbot and Shields streets
tel: 07-4046 4800
www.cairnsregionalgallery.com.au
This elegant space has local artists’ work on display as well as visiting exhibitions.
Discover more of Cairns
Read more from the travel guide to Australia
