Jenn P.
Yelp
As the current Duchess of this hotel and as a guest who had a largely positive experience here, I feel compelled to write a review!
The Pullman Reef (right across the way from the other Pullman hotel) is located right at the end of the Esplanade on the water. The water-facing rooms have a pretty view of the inlet. We were on the 6th floor and we had a cute little porch area with a small table and two chairs.
The hotel itself has plenty to do inside of it - there's a wildlife dome (which we did not have time to visit), several restaurants, a bar, and a casino. The hotel has complimentary coffee in the morning and has a HUGE / very nice pool area on the fourth floor.
The staff is extremely friendly. Myles did the check ins - he is a newer staff member and he was friendly and welcoming. There is an older gentleman at the concierge table who we spoke with almost exclusively and he knows pretty much everything about Cairns. He recommended restaurants to us and knew a lot about the tours (timing, what you can/should bring, etc).
The bathrooms in the rooms were spacious and the rooms themselves were a nice size.
My only complaints about the hotel are rather small. The first night, it was noisy outside of our room on the street, which isn't the hotel's fault but our area only had 7 floors so I'm sure it was a little noisy for everyone (that being said, it was only like that on Friday evening). Secondly, we had a weird experience in the lobby where the water tasted funny (concierge fixed this ASAP). Lastly, when they made up our room, they kind of just chucked everything I had on my bed back onto it (fine, ok, I shouldn't have left clothes and stuff on the bed, but it also didn't need to be put back on in a heap either).
For those who are booking multiple rooms - you can try to get rooms that are next to each other that share a common entryway (I.e there are two doors to get in - one that covers both rooms and then a second one that divides the rooms). This is what we did and it was helpful.
We went on a tour of the jungle and we took a shuttle bus back - our hotel was the last stop so we saw a bunch of the other hotels on the way, and we think we made the right choice.
Summary: Nice hotel, recommend it, book it.