Port Douglas, Radisson Treetops

My husband and I booked our honeymoon in June for Sept/Oct travel. We booked three locations and three different hotels all around the same budget (AUD$200-$300 per night). Sea Temple in Palm Cove (highly recommended) and Coconut Beach Lodge in Cape Trib (also recommend). Our only mistake was Treetops Radisson in Port Douglas. The Treetops needs to be totally renovated and brought into the 21st Century to match the room rates. We were appalled with the service and the surroundings, and likened it to a rooming house suitable for back packers, and probably worth about $100.00 AUD per night. We got stung at $280.00, and checked out within an hour of checking in!!! The staff were unsympathetic, and I would NOT recommend staying there.

The party for our trip to Port Douglas-Radisson Treetops consisted of myself(38), my boyfriend(43) and my son(8).

We travelled to Singapore with British Airways and from there to Cairns with Australian Airlines. The flights could not have been better and the staff were excellent. Changi Airport is the cleanest, most well equipped airport in the world!!!

We were picked up at the airport by a bus from Sunpalm that I had ordered via internet in UK. Port Douglas is about 1 hour north of Cairns and is set in lush rainforest and gorgeous empty beaches. The hotel is 5 mins walk from 4 mile beach - a long white stretch of luscious clean sand. The hotel itself was lovely, with no external walls so the rainforest is literally coming in towards the hallways. Lovely big baths and powerful showers!! Stafff couldn't be more helpful and the pool was saltwater with a pretty waterfall. The food there was good but pricey.

The Main St (Macrossan) is lined by small boutiques and restarant with a supermarket and post-office. The locals are just so friendly towards tourists especially on Sundays when there is a market in Aztec Park. The food varies from Mexican to Thai and we did not suffer one bad meal during our 9 day stay and was very reasonably priced. I thoroughly recommend the Java Cafe for their superb breakfasts, smoothies and lovely coffee. We also took a couple of tours. The first was with Quicksilver, an immense Catamaran that took us out to a huge floating raft set by the Agincourt Reef wher we could scuba, take a trip in a semi-submersible or just sunbathe on the deck. They served free coffees and a amazing inclusive buffet lunch of salads, meat and fresh fruit. The second tour we took was on the Kuranda Railway that took us high into the mountains and up to the village of Kurand where there is a daily market with all sorts of locally produced goods - think Kangaroo paw backscatchers and opals. Also there were some visitor centres such as the Koala experience where you can cuddle a Koala and hand-feed wallabies and Roos. We then descended the mountains in the Skyrail - the worlds longest Gondola ride, to visit Tjapukai - an aboriginal experience, with dance, boomerang and spear throwing and and an art gallery. Lunch was also included ther and was totally delish - vegetable curry, steamed veg, curried reef fish, cous-cous, lentil daal etc. etc.

This was possibly the best holiday I have ever experienced and thoroughly recommend it to anyone, but if your children are under 7, they may find the flights overly long.