Advice on moving to Cairns?

Question

I was just wondering if anyone has any advice on anything to do with Cairns. I'm more looking for small random things that I may not have thought about yet about living in the tropics. Apart from the weather (which I think is a positive), what are some other advantages and disadvantages of living in Cairns? Any advice at all would be appreciated.

Answer 1

My wife and I moved from Brisbane to Cairns 18 months ago; Kuranda really, which is about an average of 4 - 6 degrees cooler than central Cairns. Overall we're happy with the move, but I'll try to give you a couple of possible disadvantages, as you've asked.

I guess one disadvantage is the lack of reasonably priced places to eat out. In Brisbane (West End, Fortitude Valley etc) we were spoilt by lots of these, but in Cairns they all seem to be biased towards 'tourist prices', probably similar to the Gold Coast in that respect. Although if you search you can find gems (look up the Lillypad, eg).

If you are a beach person (which we're not, so it doesn't bother us) you will be disappointed that various marine stingers result in beaches being closed for a lot of the year.

One can also become a bit annoyed at times by the lack of 'big city' service, especially by tradepeople, and the "We'll have to get that up from Brisbane, Sydney etc".

The type of development going on up here can also be a source of annoyance to some. Besser block boxes on flat land (ex cane fields) festooned with airconditioners seems to defy logical tropical architecture, although with our recent change of council that might change.

The laid-back attitude of many people up here can surprisingly be a bit annoying at times. For example, the state government spends most of its money in the south east corner of the state, whilst the highway between Townsville & Cairns is frequently cut off during the wet season. The locals just throw up their hands "Ah well, that's the tropics!" whereas if they had a more whining attitude things might actually get fixed by the govt, who seem to have the view that "The northerners are a tough lot, they'll manage OK!"

I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel with whinges now, so that's about it.

There are however, plenty of advantages - the rainforest, the reef, pretty well everything one needs/wants is available.