Wildlife Habitat, Port Douglas
The shuttle bus is available for short trips within Port Douglas. Wildlife habitat is a short shuttle bus trip from Shantara and cost us 5$ each way. We waited about 2 minutes at the bus stop up the road and a short time later arrived at Wildlife Habitat.
We had heard great reviews about Wildlife habitat with all the beautiful birds flying around while you have a buffet breakfast. If we were to go again we wouldn’t bother about the breakfast. While the staff were pleasant the food fresh it was hard to access and for me not in a logical set up to easily get at the food. The large breakfast area was under a large canvas tent top and with the sun shining through you could see the shadows of birds walking in flying over top. there were birds everywhere either on trees or flying between trees. There was a bit of a buildup of bird poo on the top of the canvas rooftop and overall the place didn’t look like it had changed much since the time it was built.
We had our breakfast and the went on a tour of the wetland area. The tour guide Renee was excellent. She had a trolley full of different food for each of the bird varieties and as we walked along the boardwalk she introduced us to each of the birds sometimes by name and encouraged the kids on the tour to hand feed the birds food from the trolley. The food on the trolley looked good enough for humans on a healthy diet – there were almonds, fruit salad, small fish and grains.
The great thing about going on a tour when it’s feeding time you actually get to see the birds and at the same time learn about them. we saw all sorts of birds including a male and female cassowary. Cassowaries are magnificent prehistoric colourful emu sized birds ( we have heard them described else ware as “emus in drag”. we spent a couple of hours following the tour then had a look at the wallabies and kangaroos.
We caught the shuttle bus back to Shantara and had a bit of a rest and a swim in the pool.
Four Mile Beach and a chocolate milkshake
Four mile beach is a short walk from Shantara and we went for a walk to check it out. Their were plenty of people swimming mbetween the flags and having fun in the water.
We stopped at a cafe nearby and had a chocolate milkshake each. I don’t have milkshakes very often but love it when I do.
The Boathouse Restaurant and Wine Bar for some Haha
A magnificent view from the Wine bar!
We did not have plans for dinner and took a punt at finding somewhere by walking along the main strip. We looked at going to Barbados for a drink but being a Saturday night were overflowing. We decided to go to the The Boathouse Restaurant and Wine bar above Barbados and have a bottle of the Ha ha wine we had shared the night before. As the sun was setting we sat at the bar overlooking the marina and enjoyed the spectacular views and the wine.
You must book a table if you want to eat in popular restaurants in Port Douglas
Once the sun had set and the wine was gone we meandered up towards the main strip. There are plenty of places to eat in Port Douglas however the majority do this weird thing of taking bookings for tables and leave them vacant until the booking turns up – which may be 8. You walk past half empty restaurants at 6 pm knowing that they are “fully booked”. We like to eat early, on average take an hour and are on our way.
Yummy food at Sushi Port Douglas
We walked past a Japanese restaurant called “Sushi Port Douglas” and got one of the last tables. We ordered a sharing platter with miso soup.
It was fantastic and had delicious tempura and sushi delights. With a Japanese beer excellent food and excellent service it turned out to be a much better choice than 2 fish ( which were “fully booked” at 6 pm even though we could see about 10 empty tables for 2!). And when we walked back to the resort we chatted to some people about the table booking system in Port Douglas and our 2 fish experience and they said they had eaten there a couple of nights ago and the food was average.