North Queensland Itinerary, Tips and Travel Ideas

We planned our North Queensland Trip for 3 nights 4 days!

At the end of the blog you will be able to see the rough budget for these 3 nights. Warn you it is not really budget friendly :(

Tickets:

We caught our flight from Brisbane. If you follow Jetstar or Virgin Airlines you will be able to find a good deal. We used our points from Virgin Airlines and paid $175 (AUD) for both of us (return). We heard people getting $50 tickets from Jetstar or $300 from Virgin Airlines. So it is little bit of luck and timing.

Car Hire:

We searched fair bit for a car hire companies and East Coast was the winner! It is not the cheapest but we paid $425 (AUD) for 4 days inc all the insurances you can imagine lol! We were lucky and got the brand new car. Only part we were not super happy about it was their rental office is outside of the airport. They pick you up from airport (free) and take you to their office which is 15 min away from the airport. Other than that everything was good.

Itinerary:

There are so many things to do in North Queensland! We listed a few below mainly the ones we have done! Of course itinerary changes depends on your budget.

• Cairns Skyrail:

  It is a great experience especially if you have kids! We don’t have kids but still loved it.

  There are 3 options in their website to choose from. We used the cable cars to go up to the rainforest and caught Kuranda Scenic Railway (old train) come back to Cairns. Our trip started and finished at the Smithfield Terminal. The view is absolutely gorgeous and considering the World’s oldest rainforest is here it was definitely an amazing experience! It also gives you an opportunity to see the little town Kuranda! Tickets are $119 (AUD) per person. It is not cheap but something nice to do!

• Scuba Diving in Great Barrier Reef:

  It is something we wanted to do for a very long time! I (Sezgi) have never dived before and Chris had tried couple of times. We couldn’t think of diving somewhere better! You can do it in Cairns (they take you to the diving spots with boats from Cairns which takes little longer) or Port Douglas. We chose Port Douglas and were so happy about it! It was an all day tour, lunch, 2 diving (different spots) and snorkelling included. We paid $400 per person. It is really expensive but we are so happy we did it!

• Daintree Rainforest, Seeing Waterfalls and Mossman Gorge:

  There are many ways to see Daintree Rainforest. You can drive, get a tour with guide, get river tours to see crocodiles or stayed somewhere close and experience the rainforest. We drove since we hired a car. Last time we went to a river tour to see crocodiles so this time we drove and went to the Cape Tribulation. We were the only people in the entire area and took so many pictures. They do not recommend you to swim there as we have salt water crocodiles around the area.

  On the way back we went to the Mossman Gorge and had to jump in to the water. You go to the information centre by car and they take you to the gorge by bus. It costs $12 pp return and something you should definitely do!

  There are so many waterfalls in the area. Milla Milla is the most famous one and if you are planning we recommend you to go really early otherwise you will end up swimming with bus full of tourists!

• Visiting Palm Cove

  Hmmm, it is overrated? Yes! Is Port Douglas much better than Palm Cove? 100% Yes! It is a cute little town with bars and restaurants but unfortunately much more expensive than Port Douglas! Still worth to visit the Palm Tree Farms to take some photos and drone shots.