For our stay in the rainforest, I had taken a good look on the internet and come to the conclusion that the Cape Tribulation Resort and Spa at Coconut Beach (which I'm going to refer to as Coconut Beach from this point on so as not to wear my fingers out) would fit the bill nicely. It seemed to be a perfect romantic retreat with just enough of a back-to-nature feel without requiring us to lose some of the home comforts we were used to. Besides which, there's som...

By the time we came to the end of our stay in the rainforest at Cape Tribulation, Eloise and I had exhausted most of the plans we'd had for Australia. Back when we were sitting at a table in a dirty corner of a local pub in north London and planning this trip, my suggestion that we should spend at least a month in Australia had initially been greeted by Eloise with extreme doubt. Having never been to the continent before and not really knowing how much of eve...

Strange as it may seem, we hadn't seen any aborigines on our trip so far, and as it was Eloise's first visit to Australia, she had been asking me where they were all hiding. In reality, most of the true aboriginal settlements are either scattered across the middle of the country, in northern Queensland or the Northern Territories - so many visitors who arrive in Australia intending to spend weeks sunning themselves on the gold coast never get to experience any of...

Learning from our previous misadventures trying to find somewhere to stay in Surfers Paradise, Eloise and I had phoned ahead and booked a motel room for our short stopover in Cairns. I had already booked what I hoped would be a romantic retreat in the rainforest at Cape Tribulation for the next few days, but we were a day early arriving in northern Queensland and the courtesy bus from the rainforest resort wouldn't be arriving to collect us until the next day - s...

As you can imagine, there are a number of competing companies eager to take you out to the Barrier Reef, and the choice you make is ultimately based on how much you wish to pay and whether you are expecting to relax or have a deep sea adventure. I had been eager for some time to go SCUBA diving on the Great Barrier Reef - one of those things people are keen to tell you to do before you die - so I chose a company called Great Adventures which had come highly recom...