Our Family Holiday in Cape Tribulation
Recently my hubby and I decided a break was required. It had been a very long few months, packed full of hurdles and ups and downs, so a short 4 day escape was in order. The only mandatories were as follows:
- It had to be warm – shorts and swimming weather! Winter in Sydney has been too long
- Somewhere new – we wanted to experience somewhere we hadn’t been before
- Kid-friendly – with a 2½ year old and another on the way an adults only resort or long-distance hiking trip weren’t on the agenda
- No camping – now don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-camping, but for 4 days I just wanted to end up somewhere and not have to pitch a tent!
- Not too expensive – It goes without saying that money doesn’t grow on trees, especially in our house, so the ever-dreamed of 5 star all-inclusive resort was out of the question
With this in mind I set about looking up locations… Darwin, Cairns, Gold Coast etc. Then someone suggested Cape Tribulation. I did a little research… warm, in the beautiful Daintree Rainforest, somewhere new… it ticked all our boxes.
So I booked it!!
2 weeks later, and bursting at the seams to tell my hubby (I had decided to keep the destination a surprise) we caught the red-eye from Sydney to Cairns. We arrived at 9am and hired a car for a drive up North. While we enjoyed the stunning coast road (we’ve been on many and this was definitely one of the best!), our daughter enjoyed the back of her eyelids, if only she’d done this on the plane we could all have caught up!
From Cairns, the drive was about 2.5 hours, so we stopped at Port Douglas for lunch and to check out the town, it was our first time here. While there, we stocked up on a few necessities… food, drinks, hot pink sunglasses (!), before pushing on to Cape Tribulation.
We reached the Daintree River, where we boarded a car ferry to get into the Cape. The drive through the rainforest was just beautiful; plenty to look at and the beautiful scent of truly fresh air and perfect Northern weather.
For our accommodation I had booked a holiday house; Thornton Beach House, just 10 minutes drive South of Cape Tribulation village. It was perfect… 2 bedrooms, plenty of space, all the amenities, open and airy with that lovely tropical feeling and right in the middle of the Daintree Rainforest! And, it was right across the road from beautiful Thornton Beach, and a great little café from which we regularly enjoyed ‘take-away’ fresh prawns and home made burgers from.
We spent the next 3 days exploring the local area, including swimming at the fantastic (croc-free!!) natural waterholes, doing the rainforest walk, sampling the local food and delicacies, a Daintree River croc tour (for my hubby!) and checking out the local beaches and villages. There was mixed advice about swimming in the beaches due to the crocs, and given that it was mating season we opted for the safer, no swimming option!
Cape Tribulation village was smaller than we had expected it to be and the area all runs on solar power (with no TV reception), so we had to be much more environmentally conscious than normal. This wasn’t an issue at all, in fact the ‘back to nature’ experience meant it really was a complete holiday… we actually sat back and relaxed, and enjoyed each other as a family for the first time in a long time. While I admit it did take me a couple of days to wind down, as a family we got far more benefit out of the 4 day break than a longer holiday in a more built up area would have provided.
On the final day, due to fly out from Cairns at 5pm, we headed off from Cape Trib early and spent the day in Port Douglas. We enjoyed the morning playing golf at the Sea Temple golf resort, complete with buggy. My daughter had an absolute ball - running around on the course between hits and ‘driving’ the buggy with mummy and daddy. We even received ‘true local’ hospitality with a 3 metre croc near the 9th hole… adding a whole new meaning to water hazard!
After golf, we headed to Seven mile beach for some beach action… the water was beautiful and we soaked it up. We knew the day was a hit with the shrieks and squeals coming from our daughter. After a couple of hours we hit the road for the drive to Cairns airport and flight home.
Some of the highlights of our trip included seeing a Cassowary bird cross the road in front of us, swimming at Mason’s waterhole, our daughter 'be-friending' a green tree frog, dinner at Whet Café restaurant and Cape Tribulation resort restaurant (both very kid-friendly) and simply relaxing in deck chairs on the verandah at Thornton Beach House.
Overall, the holiday was just fantastic, by the end of it we really felt like we had reconnected as a family. It’s very easy to forget the important things when you’re working, being parents, paying bills and just running normal life so being in Cape Tribulation, really away from it all, allowed us to stop, take a breath and really relax. I would highly recommend this location to anyone, just make sure you give yourselves at least 4 days to wind back and enjoy the Cape Trib pace of life and all it has to offer!
You can find more details on Cape Tribulation and Thornton beach House here:
