North Coast of Queensland
The northern Queensland coast sits at the junction of the tropical far north, the rugged frontier of the outback, and the civilized cities of the southern coastline. Waving fields and smoking mills represent the region's greatest industry, sugar cane. Towns-ville, Queensland's second largest city, is the economic and residential center of the area. Off its shores, Magnetic Island offers solitude and koalas in the wild. Between here and Mission Beach, white beaches glow next to crystalline water, across which the Great Barrier Reef beckons. The miles inland hide swaths of rainforest populated by birds, bugs, and bouncing 'roos, and between it all, the civilization that clings to the coast wrests its existence from the unrelenting wild.