Our Northern Explorer Cruise, Australia 2025 PART 2

03 Jun Our Northern Explorer Cruise, Australia 2025 PART 2

Day 6 April 21st – Cairns QLD

After visiting Willis Island on the afternoon of 20th April, we sailed approximately 450 kms through that afternoon and night to Cairns, in North Queensland, Australia.

Arrival time in Cairns was around 7am on a very wet easter Monday. To dock the ship, the captain had to enter Chinaman Creek (a very wide body of water to be called a creek), pass the Cairns Cruise Liner terminal, do a 180 degree turn and be pushed and pulled into place at the wharf by a couple of tug boats. Of course the captain would have had a pilot onboard to assist with this manoeuvre. When in place the ship’s bow was facing the Cairns Marina near the mouth of Chinaman Creek and beyond that, the Coral Sea, from whence we came.

It is worth noting the external wall art along Lake Street; “Malabar Grouper With Juvenile Golden Trevally’ by Amok Island, Cairns, Australia – May 2018, and

“If We Lose Our Reef, We Lose Ourselves” by Claire Foxton. Both artworks can be found online for a closer look.

The Barrier Reef Hotel, originally established 1898 as the Empire Hotel, is a heritage listed property, being the oldest waterfront hotel in Cairns.

Our ‘off ship excursion’ was a late morning guided tour of the Cairns Museum, plus a walking tour of the Cairns CBD. Our guide took us up Lake Street with the first stop at the Museum (corner of Lake and Shields Streets). Although I was snapping shots of any interesting buildings along the way.

The Museum is worth visiting for the very succinct stories told of the beginnings and development of Cairns.

The discovery of gold in the Palmer River (1873) and later the Hodgkinson River, some 80 kilometres west of the coast, created initial interest in the area and led to the establishment of Cairns as a port in 1896. But, not everyone could become rich finding gold, so the Chinese immigrants in particular turned to feeding the gold minors, by growing crops, sugarcane becoming the most successful long term.

In the 1890s a new industry developed, logging the Atherton Tablelands (southwest of Cairns). This was driven by the demand for timber in the mines, plus the need to build infrastructure, and housing in the area. Initially logs were transported to Cairns by bullock trains and eventually by rail.

Cairns proximity to the Great Barrier Reef, interest in the nearby Daintree Rainforest and sports such as fishing have made it a popular tourist destination Post World War II.

An American captain named George Bransford had been stationed in Cairns during World War II and spent his recreational time talking to the local fishermen, who told him there was an abundance of black marlin in these waters. In the early 1960’s Bransford’s left his home in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to settle with his family in Cairns, where he purchased a suitable boat and started fishing for black marlin.

On September 26, 1966, Bransford and his deckhand Richard Obach hooked a large marlin that Bransford thought was smaller than a beast they had struggled with and lost the year before. After a two-hour fight, this marlin was finally secured alongside the boat. However when they tried to get it into the boat, they couldn’t lift its head out of the water, so they towed the marlin back to Cairns. Caught on 80-pound tackle, it was later weighed at 1,064 pounds, a new IGFA world record.

After showing us through the museum our tour guide showed us many of the historic buildings within the CBD.

The Bolands Centre is a large reinforced concrete structure, which was formerly a prestige department store. It was designed and built in 1912–1913 for Michael Boland, an Irish immigrant who came to Australia in 1881 and became a leading merchant in Cairns. The building was for many years the tallest structure in the city. and is the last surviving example of a large, early 20th century department store in Cairns. (Wikipedia)

Edward Albert Koch (1843 – 28 June 1901) was a German-born medical practitioner in Cairns. He is best known for his treatment of malaria and his early recognition of the role mosquitoes played in transmitting the disease. Koch’s fever remedy and preventative measures played a significant role in controlling endemic malaria in far North Queensland in the late 19th century and first half of the 20th century. (Wikipedia)

At this point in our tour we were given free time to explore. It was a warm day and we’d been on our feet for a couple of hours, By a vote of two to Zero, Maggie and I opted to find a nice place to have a beer and something to eat, on the board walk adjacent to the marina. The ship was about 200 meters from that cafe.

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Day 7, 8 & 9 April 22–24 – At Sea

It seemed to take forever to reach Darwin (three days, but it is a long distance). And in that time I thought we’d be close enough to the QLD coast most of the way to see it, however this was not the case, during the day time at least. Here are some photos of when we could see land.

It may be obvious, but large ships of all types sail through these waters within the normal shipping channels to avoid the various coral reefs and to ensure they have sufficient depth for the ship’s draft during tidal variations. For this reason there was a region specialist pilot on board from Cairns to Darwin. On Day 9, April 24th at sea this pilot gave us a presentation in the Princess Theatre, in which he recounted stories of piloting ships through the various northern Australian waters. This included an experience of managing a large bulk carrier with only a 1 meter clearance between the hull and the sea floor. That was obviously a rare instance, but according to the pilot’s information some northern waters of the Coral Sea, along with areas of the Torres Strait, the Arafura Sea and the Timor Sea are relatively shallow.

This seems like a perfect place to provide some fascinating facts about the ship, Crown Princess.

Guest Capacity: 3,090

Crew: 1,200

Tonnage:  113,561

Length:  952 feet (290.17 meters)

Height: 195 feet (59.44 meters)

Beam: 159 feet (including bridge wing) 118 feet (excluding bridge wing) (48.42 meters & 36 meters)

Draft: 27 feet (8.23 meters)

Number of Decks: 19 (Decks 5 – 18 available to guests)

We were fortunate to have wifi for 90% of this cruise as, despite all the activities one can be a part of on the ship, there were times we just wanted to know where we were.

At 6.22pm on 24 April I know where we were; in the Princess Theatre taking our seats for a performance by Prinnie Stevens. The performance didn’t start until 7.30pm, but we found by experience that unless you were there by 6.30 pm you were unlikely to get a seat.

Prinnie was backed by a 7 piece band. The show was very professional and enjoyable and certainly worth the early arrival. We also saw Prinnie with the same band in the theatre on 22 April “Celebrating Tina Turner”.

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Day 10 April 25th – ANZAC Day in Darwin NT

The Ship docked at Fort Hill Wharf Darwin around 7am. We had booked an afternoon tour, which left us time in the morning to attend the Darwin ANZAC Day March. It started around 9.30am from the corner of The Esplanade and Knuckey Street.

The march was led by this ‘riderless horse’, followed by non service people driving WWII jeeps and trucks.

(If some of my captions related to the march need to be altered, please let me know.)

Maggie and I both became quite emotional during the march, I think it was partly because so many of the service people marching (men and women) were young, plus the knowledge of the damage done to Darwin during the WWII bombings.

Before the march I had a chat with few of the blokes from the brass band. Firstly we just wanted to know which direction the march took and then got onto talking about playing brass instruments, which I did in my younger days. They immediately offered me a position in the band (jokingly of course).

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We returned to the ship for lunch and a rests, as cafes were either full of people from the march or closed for Anzac Day.

Our afternoon bus tour left Fort Hill Wharf around 1.30 pm. with the first stop at the Museum and Art Gallery of Northern Territory. Maggie and I visited the Museum in September 2023, so I went looking for new exhibits. The 2024 Northern Territory Year 12 students artworks were on display and there were some I really liked.

Next we were taken to the serene George Brown Darwin Botanic Gardens.

The last stop of the day was at Dudley Point lookout.

After a big day in Darwin, we left there around 6pm to be treated to the following special, post-sundown scene at around 7pm.

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Thanks for viewing the photos and reading the story behind them, in part 2 of Our Northern Explorer Cruise. I hope you found some enjoyment in this.

Please “keep an eye out” for Part 3 of our journey, which should be available in a couple of weeks.

Take care and feel free to leave a comment below.