Older tourists in Cairns are almost indistinguishable from locals in Cairns — The Betoota Advocate

CLANCE OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT

While the decentralization of the big changes and tree changes is wreaking havoc on regional and coastal communities, it has never been more hostile for holidaymakers in the big cities.

As regional cities succumb to a housing crisis inherited from the capital’s pyramid scheme, the once harmless tropes of “locals only” and “blow-ins” are becoming increasingly serious.

However, there is one city that seems immune to this kind of rhetoric against outsiders, because it is impossible to tell who is just on vacation and who has lived there for fifty years.

Cairns, Far North Queensland.

A recent report from the North Queensland Secession Society found that it is almost impossible to distinguish older tourists from locals of the same age.

Once a sleepy fishing village that served as a quiet port for the Asian drug trade in the 1970s, the city emerged as an exciting metropolis in the Deep North in the late 20th century.

The Bjelke-Petersen state government from 1968-1987 saw unbridled growth and tourism in the region. This was aided by a gang of venal hotel developers and Japanese investors who broke every law possible to turn Cairns into its current self: the Irukandji Miami.

The new research shows that not only do older Cairns residents and older Cairns tourists look and dress alike, they also do the same things: play golf, eat fish and sunbathe.”

“This essentially means that the local population is permanently on holiday,” says lead researcher Professor Manning Chataway.”

“And by older locals we mean the wealthy Southerners that Skase and Alan Bond followed here in the 80s… Of course we are not talking about the local mafia or the fishermen who work off the grid”

‘We’re talking about the silver-haired leathermen you see draped in linen on the main piers. Did they get here in the 80s or did they land from Melbourne at 3pm? It’s impossible to tell. They are the same person. Some of the permanent residents even live in hotels”

The report also reveals that, apart from an occasional visit to the Mirage Golf Course in Port Douglas, neither of these two archetypes has ever seen the Far North Queensland that lies beyond the Esplanade.