Darwin to Cairns Australia
Monday, November 19, 2018
Departed Darwin at 8:30 AM local.
Flying about 1 hr… clear sky, ground speed of 135 kts or 155 MPH due to a 15 kt headwind. Flight should take about 6 hrs 40 min.
We are meeting my Aussi friends Norty and Meg Gill.
Norty is a retired airline pilot and his wife was deputy mayor of Cairns. I met him in 1986, and stayed at his hotel, The Flying Horseshoe. On my last trip with Dick Sollner, we stayed at his 4 bedroom condo facing the Coral Sea for 5 nights. We were again invited but I decided to stay at the Pacific Hotel, a 5 min. walk to their home.
Tuesday, November 20, 2018
Cairns Australia:
Norty picked me up about 10:30 this morning. We stopped at the airport and paid an invoice for my oil change from yesterday. A US dollar is worth $1.34 Aus.
We then headed north to Port Douglas, about an hour drive, which is the gateway to the great barrier reef. Most of the day I re-explored the town that I visited 13 yrs. ago. Beautiful WX today. We then continued north to several small villages.
I was dropped off at our hotel after a 5 hr. trip. I was able to hit a food market to replenish our food supply for the plane… pretzels , peanuts and M&Ms.
We are invited to Norty and Meg’s home for dinner tonight.
We had a great night with our Aussi friends at our hotel for dinner last night. My friend Norty and his wife Meg met us at our hotel this morning.
We had a 10 min. walk to a very nice small Aussie coffee shop on the water. I had crushed avocado on toast which was terrific. Norty took us to the airport around 10:00 AM where we had an oil change and refueled for a Wednesday departure to Nadi in the Fiji Islands. We got back to our hotel about 2 PM which was enough time to make a hotel reservation for Fiji. The WX has been great here.Tonight Norty and Meg are taking us out for dinner with their family at Barnacle Bill's to celebrate our flight.Very close to our hotel.
Tomorrow is a totally free day to soak up Cairns .
From the Gill's balcony
Cairns
kill
Port Douglas
Port Douglas