Aquarium will be great asset

IT HAS felt like a long-time coming with its share of funding problems, technical issues and delays, but finally the Cairns Aquarium is open for business.

The aquarium promises to be the biggest thing to happen to Cairns tourism in years.

It will also be the ultimate way for visitors unable or unwilling to make a boat trip out to the Great Barrier Reef to get a glimpse of the region’s incredible underwater habitat.

With the opening week coinciding with school holidays there is expected to be a steady stream of both tourists and locals heading down to the Florence St site.

Organisers have predicted 2000 people to come through the doors each day this week and they will get the chance to experience some Australian firsts, including the largest freshwater tank in the country, 15,000 specimens and a huge 10m sea tank. It is the first aquarium built in Australia in almost two decades.

The attraction seems like the perfect fit for the city and makes the Reef even more accessible for international and domestic visitors.

Coming into the wet season, where marine stingers can make the water less inviting or poor weather forces Reef trips to be cancelled, it is expected to be an even more popular activity. The Cairns economy is based on tourism and shoulder or low seasons are times when the industry does it a lot tougher. But an all-year, all-weather attraction is something that doesn’t come along too often.

Co-founders Andrew Preston and Daniel Leipnik have spent six years bringing the aquarium together.

They say, along with tourism, it has other major research and conservation applications which will further prove its worth to the city and the Far North. Grace Mason grace.mason@news.com.au