Cairns

My Four corners and the (redgreen) centre route takes me in a big M across Australia, hop-scotching in and out of the tropics: Perth is at 32° S, Darwin at 12° S, Alice Springs at 23° 42' S, Cairns at 17° S, and Melbourne at 37° S. I  had to consult the interweb to check whether Alice is in the tropics. The Tropic of Capricorn is at 23° 26' 16" S, so all of my journey in the Red Centre was outside the tropics. However, in the process of checking, I discovered the curious fact that the Tropic of Capricorn is not always in the same place, and is currently drifting north at the rate of 0.47" a year. A quick check with the calculator shows that, if this rate has remained constant, Alice Springs would have been in the tropics in the year 3 B.C. I wonder if anyone noticed.

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The Great Dividing Range running up the eastern side of Australia is - at 3500 kilometers - the fourth longest mountain range in the world. In the south the coastal plain is relatively wide, but in the north there is only a narrow coastal strip. Cairns is squeezed in between the ocean and the mountains, whose eastern slope and crest harbour World Heritage rainforests. Behind the crest is a fertile plateau, the Atherton Tableland, with the country becoming drier as you travel further inland.

An Esplanade runs along the ocean front. On the land side, there are the usual range of seafront businesses: cafes, restaurants, and abundant tourist agents. On the ocean side, there is a mud flat - complete with the occasional mangrove sapling (I discovered that the council has a contract for someone to 'weed' the mudflat and stop it turning into a mangrove forest).

The Espanade is therefore the perfect place for a spot of bird-watching, including the odd pelican or four ...

... and groups of waders on their way south for the winter - or summer as it is in Australia.

Between the seafront and the row of businesses, there is a narrow park, with various activity areas for children and adults. The council seems keen on encouraging physical exercise, and there are posters up for various fitness programs. This one could do with a comma or hyphen to clarify whether the prospect is pleasing or alarming:

Although a flourishing modern city, Cairns is not that large, with a population a little over 120,000, so there is space in the city for wildlife, including a small colony of fruitbats ...

... and masked lapwings enjoying the grassy verges and roundabouts.

The city also retains some rather characterful older buildings: