Cairns?

The flight to Cairns was uneventful. A LOT of Asian people on the plane - it became apparent during boarding that they have no concept of personal space whatsoever! Amazing how quickly one can feel claustrophobic when everyone is right on top of you.
Cairns itself is really low-key. The whole Cairns region is about 150 000 people, so Cairns itself is not that big. The main industry is tourism, and this is their slow season (the hostel said they were at maybe 30% of capacity). I'm disappointed to say that beach bunnies are definitely not in season. However, I'm primarily here to chill and learn to dive. Probably be another week at least before I go diving. There is a big cyclone in the offing, expected to make landfall tomorrow night. More on that later, when there is more.
I'm currently in Port Douglas, mostly because there is a beach and they provide a shuttle transfer from Cairns to Port Douglas. The water is bathtub warm, almost too warm for serious swimming but great. The beach seems to go on forever but you can only go swimming at one spot, within the jellyfish nets. Apparently the box jellyfish migrate here this time of year and are very unpleasant to the touch... Today the beach is already closed due to the impending cyclone.
Probably no exciting adventures until another week or more, have to do some work and figure the diving thing out.