One of the features of Port Douglas is the many restaurants in Macrossan Street and in Wharf Street. These vary from places where you can purchase take-away food to eat elsewhere or restaurants where you can sit down to a quality meal.
Rattle n Hum is busy bar and grill with a pizzeria situated om Macrossan Street. We have purchased pizza from there to eat back at the rooms but also had baramundi burgers there one night while on another occasion enjoyed crumbed chicken schnitzel and chicken parmigiana.
Watergate is a good restaurant to go to for a relaxing meal off the main street. We have passed the entrance to the restaurant on a number of previous visits to Port Douglas but this was the first time we had dined there. For entree we shared duck pancakes plus prawn and pork dumplings with strips of salmon - both delicious. Robin then had prawn and crab ravioli while I had the wild mushroom risotto with vegetables. The area where we sat was in a semi-enclosed area but there are also tables in the garden. The area provides a feeling of dining in the tropics.
Dave's Takeaway, as the name suggests, has a wide range of take-away food. We ordered the grilled barramundi with chips and salad. Unfortunately the fish had been wrapped in foil to keep it war but the fish kept cooking in the foil and was dry after walking the short distance to our accommodation. It may have been better to have asked for fried fish. Still, we noted tat the number of photos of Dave's who have visited the shop now pass 2,000 (last November).
The Iron Bar is another place where we like to have a casual meal. We shared a selection of prawns and scallops. I then had lamb shank while Robin had coconut coated barramundi.
The
Iron Bar is also well known for nightly cane toad races.
The Jade Inn is a licensed Chinese restaurant that we have visited on a number of occasions in the past. This time we shared seafood Holkien noodles and crumbed chicken pieces.
Whenever we needed an ice cream at Port Douglas we wandered down to the
Shakes Gelati Bar, a short distance from the apartment.
If you want a coffee there are many places providing coffee and / or snacks. One of these is Cafe Ecco.
Coffee can be purchased at some unlikely sources such as at this clothing shop,
Moonshine, which has a small garden out the back where coffee is served.
Whileaway Bookshop and Cafe was the cafe we usually went to for coffee and hot chocolate. I rather enjoyed sitting inside drinking reasonable hot chocolate surrounded by books. On our last visit to Port Douglas we discovered a cafe,
Taste on Macrossan, that sold good hot chocolate but the establishment had closed.
One afternoon, Pat and Ian Crothers, called in to see us so we spent an hour or so at
Whileaway having drinks and a chat. Pat and I share a pair of convict ancestors - George Guest and Mary Bateman - so it was good to be able to have a leisurely family history chat while the men talked about family history and sport. (As can be seen from the photo it had been a windy day).
When we first arrived at Port Douglas we wandered around the main streets checking on changes, particularly to the restaurants. Some of the restaurants no longer open included
Port Izakaya Japanese Restaurant and Sushi Bar,
Taste on Macrossan, Lanternfish and
Mango Jam are no more.
Harrison's has moved to the Sheraton Grand Mirage Resort.
On the Inlet is no longer on a wharf over the water but is across the road in Wharf Street. We did make a booking for dinner one evening but as I was unwell for the second week we had to cancel. Normally we would also have a meal at the Italian restaurant,
Bel Cibo.
