Photos of Cooktown to Cairns, Far North Queensland Coast, Australia

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Cooktown to Cairns, Far North Queensland Coast

North of the city of Cairns, in Queensland’s tropical north, is a beautiful region of unspoiled beaches, fast-flowing rivers and rain forests. The Captain Cook Highway offers great views of Trinity Bay between Cairns and Port Douglas, 60 kilometres north. The fashionable resort town of Port Douglas was already a busy port in 1880 and serviced the gold and tin mines and the sugar fields in the region. However, when the railway reached Cairns, its significance declined until it developed into today’s international resort. The sugar town of Mossman, further north, was founded in the 1890s. Nearby, the Mossman River flows through Mossman Gorge, easily accessible and a wonderful place for a picnic, a swim and walks through the forest.

Cooktown from Grassy Hill
 
Endeavour River from Grassy Hill
 
Endeavour River mouth, Cooktown
 
Cooktown waterfront
 
Cannon and monument
 
Captain Cook's statue
 
Captain Cook's statue
 
James Cook museum
 
Mick the Miner
 
Shop veranda, Cooktown
 
Heritage buildings, Cooktown
 
Cooktown architecture
 
Hotels, Cooktown
 
Cooktown Hotel
 
Shop on Charlotte Street
 
Milbi Wall
 
Milbi Wall, Cooktown
 
Walker Bay
 
Black Mountain
 
Black Mountain or Kalkajaka
 
Annan River waterfall
 
Little Annan River
 
Lions Den Hotel
 
Lions Den Hotel
 
Emmagen Creek crossing
 
Cape Tribulation
 
Cape Tribulation view
 
Beach at Cape Tribulation
 
Mangroves
 
Myall Beach
 
Myall Creek
 
Little Cooper River
 
Boardwalk in Daintree NP
 
A fan palm
 
Fan palms boardwalk
 
Fan palm canopy
 
Strangler fig tree
 
View to Daintree River
 
Cape Kimberley
 
Daintree River ferry
 
Daintree
 
Red Mill House
 
Tourist boats
 
Daintree River
 
Saltwater Crocodile
 
Cassowary Falls
 
Wonga Beach
 
Front Street, Mossman
 
Mossman Gorge
 
Buttress roots
 
In Mossman Gorge
 
Mossman Gorge in the dry
 
Boardwalk, Mossman Gorge
 
Rex Creek, Mossman Gorge
 
Port Douglas
 
Beach, Port Douglas
 
Four Mile Beach, Port Douglas
 
Yule Point
 
Rex Lookout
 
Ellis Beach and Double Island
 

Further north, on the way to the Daintree region, is the village of Wonga, with a seemingly endless beach leading to the mouth of the Daintree River. Cape Kimberley and Snapper Island are near here. On the river with the same name, the village of Daintree is the gateway to Daintree National Park; on the other side of the river, a car ferry takes you across. The bitumen road goes as far as Cape Tribulation, “where the rainforest meets the reef”. On the way, you cross Myall Creek, flowing past the wide sandflats of South Myall Beach into the sea. Beyond Cape Tribulation, the road becomes a dirt track: protests against developing this area with its last stands of tropical rain forests resulted in its preservation as a United Nations Heritage Area. It is possible to continue by four-wheel-drive along the Bloomfield Track, a steep winding road to Cooktown. On the way is Kalkajaka or Black Mountain, an enormous heap of loose granite, about 470 metres high, stained black by algae, 30 kilometres south of Cooktown and Walker Bay, just south of the town, in Mount Cook National Park.

Cooktown is the site where Captain Cook ran on a reef with his ship “Endeavour” in 1770 and had to beach it to get it repaired. He and his crew spent seven weeks here while they fixed the stricken vessel. A town came into existence here in the early 1870s to serve as a port for the goldfields at Palmer River and was first known as Cook’s Town. The goldfields declined, but the town remained important as the first port of call for mail steamers sailing to India and as a trading port with the Pacific Islands. Cooktown now caters for tourists visiting Cape York and the scenery on the way to the Daintree.