Semester Break - Port Douglas - Part One

Almost exactly 10 years ago when Shannon and I were living over here in Australia, we headed up to far north Queensland from (freezing cold) Melbourne for some fun and adventure!  We ended up staying in Port Douglas for a month, living in the Port Douglas Motel (for free) and cleaning it by morning, going to the beach all afternoon, then washing dishes at our respective restaurants by night! (Which I might add payed $20/hr and this was 10 years ago!)  It was awesome living there...

So when Andrew and I moved over to Australia, I knew we had to make it up to Port Douglas so I could show him and Charlie one of my favourite places!  Andrews semester break seemed like the perfect opportunity because we only have Charlie and he's still considered a lap baby (even though he's huge and that would have been a nightmare - luckily on both flights we had the row to ourselves and they even gave him breakfast on the way there! Bonus!)  We left on Saturday morning super early (our flight left at 7am so Andrew and I had to wake up at 4am! gross) and flew into Cairns where we were going to rent a car, but at the last minute decided just to take a bus up from Cairns and not worry about going and doing too much while we were up there - Andrew and I both just wanted to relax!  But since we hadn't planned on taking the bus we had to wait around in the airport for almost 3 hours!  Oh dear.... luckily Charlie didn't mind at all and just had fun running around and exploring.

Charlie on an airplane!  Even though he's been on a ton of airplanes before, this is the first one where he kinda understood what was going on!  Whenever we talk about airplanes or helicopters or see them in the sky Charlie does this high up motion with his hand and then brings it down like his hand is the plane... you'd have to see it but its so cute!  He makes the noises too!  This is at the beginning before he didn't want to be cooped up and spilt juice everywhere!

Of course Charlie fell asleep on the decent!  He would only transfer into his stroller like this!  He eventually almost slipped out and that really woke him up!

So we arrived into Port Douglas at about 2pm - perfect for check in time!  I forgot to mention before that we were staying at the Port Douglas Motel where Shan and I worked 10 years ago!  Back then it was kinda run down, and I can remember seeing a guests postcard to someone detailing how crappy of a place it was!  But it's been totally renovated and under new management and it's pretty nice now!  The owner thought it was so interesting that I had worked there so long ago, and apparently it went from a motel to a hostel to a motel again in that time.  We unpacked our stuff and went off to explore!  The nice thing about where we were staying is that it was right in town, 2 minutes from all the shops!  So we got some groceries and cheap pizza from Dominos and just let Charlie be wild.... and wild he was - knocking the pizza onto the ground... we were so hungry we ate it anyways!

With no church in Port Douglas we were forced to do something else instead... namely the Sunday Markets!  And the circle of palm trees...

Charlie and Andrew at the markets trying some sugarcane juice with ginger and lime - so good!

At the circle of palm trees park - Charlie spotted a boat!

He was so excited about seeing boats on water instead of just in books!

This is the coolest tree ever!  And I regret that I didn't get a full shot of it, but it has tons of roots or branches or whatever that make it the perfect climbing tree!

Charlie loved being up high - he's definitely not afraid of heights!

There were some cool little tunnel areas too!  This tree is like an umbrella tree, with a HUGE canopy!

Swings with daddy!  Charlie was so excited to have Andrew around the whole time - he wanted nothing to do with me for the most part and just wanted to play with dada - he's going to be really sad when Andrew goes back to school!

It was pretty cloudy the whole time we were there, which was ok with us!  It was sunny the very last day and we got burnt despite only being outside for 2 hours and having sunscreen on!  So it's a good thing it wasn't sunny the whole time!

After Charlie's afternoon nap we headed over to the beach.  It was like a whole new experience for Charlie even though he's been to the beach heaps!  I love four-mile beach, its got great sand and its lined with plan trees - very tropical!

He is obsessed with digging!

Not afraid of the ocean at all!

Even when the first wave knocked him right over!  He definitely wasn't expecting it, but it never happened again!

Charlie especially loved holes filled with water that he could splash in!

After the beach we checked out the pool at the motel.  It had a little ledge perfect for Charlie to walk along!  I didn't get a picture of it, but there is an outdoor kitchen area right next to the pool when we did some of our cooking!

Well I think that is enough for one blog post!  If I make them smaller maybe I'll do them more often cause they'll be more manageable... maybe?