More......

 Someone asked me how we spend our time when we are in Port Douglas.  It is really a break from the mundane when we are here.  I don't cook many meals and if I do I make it as simple as possible.  I'm really crushing on the Marions Kitchen Range.  These were on special at Coles last week for $6 and they are good value.  All you have to add is your protein.

Our mornings in Port this time around have been pretty full on with renovations to the apartment, new roller door for the storage shed and extras fitted to the caravan.  We have also had to deliver our slide-on to Cairns from where it will be freighted to Melbourne.  The new owners will love it as much as we did.  It was kinda sad to say goodbye as we have had some amazing trips with our little "Tardis".

But, getting back to our day, each morning if we don't have anything on the agenda we  start with some form of exercise.  We both like to rise early and lately that has been around 5.30am.  We have coffee in bed and then Philip goes for a cycle with his buddies and I usually do a 5km walk.  We then have breakfast either in the apartment or at one of the local restaurants.  We had a very good breakfast at Monkey Joes this week and an awful one at Ziva.  The one at Monkey Joes was love on a plate whereas the Ziva breakfast was literally thrown onto the plate with no love at all.  

It is such a shame that some Chef's don't take pride in their presentation.  I follow Spencer Patrick on Instagram.  He is the owner and hatted Chef of Harrisons Restaurant.  He wrote that before every service he is nervous because without nerves comes arrogance and with arrogance comes mistakes.  This is very true of some chefs but you can not say that about C'est Bon Restaurant in Cairns where we again dined this week.  Their food presentation is the best I've seen.  I had Potato, Leek and Pear soup followed by Chicken Cordon Bleu. They say you eat with your eyes so check these dishes out and tell me your mouth is not salivating.....

On Saturday we drove again to Cape Tribulation for lunch with our friends who are were staying at the Cape Tribulation Camping Ground.  Gosh it is a lovely spot and one I'm certain we will return to.  When we arrived at the camp there was a note on the door that said "At the Beach". We thought that they must have gone for a walk so we settled back with a beer and waited for them to return.  We finished the beer and were about to open another when Philip decided he had better go for a bit of a walk down to the beach to see if he could spot them. He was back within five minutes with a command to follow him back down to the beach.  What a lovely surprise to find that our friends had set up a table complete with linen tablecloth, in the shade of some beautiful trees right on the beach.  The women enjoyed a glass of bubbles and the boys settled back with chilled beers while we sat back to shoot the breeze.  We feasted on home made pappardelle with a fabulous bolognese style sauce followed by Lemon Curd Cronuts.  Yum, Yum. After lunch was cleared away our friends taught us how to play a card game called Frustration.......well named!!  Around 4pm we said our goodbyes and made the return trip back to Port.  It really was one of the nicest days.

On Sunday we had a long awaited lunch date with my hairdresser (Jodie) and her partner.  Jode has been my hairdresser for 14 years!  We have such a great rapport and I love my hair appointments.  We have only caught up socially a handful of times over the past few years but each time it ends up with us all drinking rum and cokes at one of the local venues!  We started our lunch date at Seabean Restaurant where they serve delicious Tapas and Paella.  Gosh we made pigs of ourselves. Jode and I washed down our food with the Cocktail of the Day while the men stayed on beer until we moved to a different venue.  It was a long lunch date that went well into the evening with many laughs.

Most afternoons, when the heat has left the sun, Philip and I walk down to the beach for a leisurely swim in the stinger net enclosure.  We rock around in the waves for ages and we absolutely love it.  We ask ourselves every time "Why haven't we been doing this at Palm Cove?".  We put it down to just being too busy but our new year resolution will be to make time for a swim each afternoon.  It can't be that hard.....