Crystalbrook Riley: The Rooftop Bar You Can Walk Into

Most people file Crystalbrook Riley under “hotel we are not staying at” and walk straight past it. That is a mistake. The building on the Esplanade with the blue-lit tower has a rooftop bar twelve floors up, an Asian restaurant that does breakfast through to dinner, a poolside seafood and Champagne club and a day spa, and you do not need a room key to use any of it. Treat it as a venue rather than accommodation and it becomes one of the better nights out in Cairns.

Rocco, the rooftop

Level 12 of the tower, Middle Eastern share plates, herb-infused cocktails and a serious Champagne list. This is the reason to come and the view does most of the heavy lifting.

The details that will save your evening: Rocco opens Tuesday to Thursday 4:00pm to 10:30pm and Friday and Saturday 4:00pm to 11:30pm, which means it is closed Sunday and Monday. There is a smart dress code and it is enforced, so no rubber thongs and no singlets. Children are welcome until 7:00pm and not after. And it does not take cash at all, debit and credit cards only.

None of that is unreasonable for a rooftop bar, but all of it is the sort of thing people find out at the lift.

Paper Crane, the all-day one

Ground floor, beside the lagoon pool, Southeast Asian sharing plates from breakfast through to dinner. Breakfast runs 6:30am to 10:30am and dinner 5:00pm to 10:00pm daily, and it is cashless like the rest of the building.

We have written it up in full, the menu and prices, the set menus and the weekly deals, in our guide to Paper Crane.

Calypso Club and the lagoon

The pool is the other thing people do not realise is there: a proper lagoon pool with a sand edge, sitting behind the Esplanade rather than on it. Calypso Club is the poolside operation, seafood and Champagne, and it is the daytime counterpart to Rocco’s evening.

The numbers, from the hotel’s own facilities list: more than 1,000 square metres of water with a beach at one end and a lap lane at the other, cabanas around the edge and full food and drink service to your lounger. The catch is the phrase the hotel uses for it, guest exclusive use, so the lagoon is a reason to book a room rather than something you can wander into off the Esplanade. Calypso Club runs daily from 10:00am to 6:00pm.

Eléme Day Spa

The on-site day spa runs treatments for walk-in bookings as well as guests, which makes it one of the few genuinely good rainy-day options in the city that is not the aquarium. If the weather has turned, it belongs on the same list as our wet weather guide to Cairns.

Where it is

131-141 Esplanade, right on the waterfront in the city centre. That puts it a short flat walk from the Esplanade Lagoon, five minutes from Cairns Aquarium, and about the same from Rusty’s Markets if it is a market morning. The Night Markets are a few minutes the other way.

If you do stay, the upper floors on the water side look straight over the Esplanade, Trinity Inlet and the ranges behind it. The building opened in 2018 and was the first of the three Crystalbrook hotels in the city.

If you are pulling a day together around it, the Cairns city guide has the rest.

The verdict

Go for Rocco at sunset on a Friday, check the dress code before you leave, and take a card because they will not take your cash. It is the closest thing Cairns has to a proper rooftop scene and the fact that half the city still thinks of it as somebody else’s hotel lobby is the only reason you can usually get a table. It is also night one of the three we recommend in our Cairns for couples guide.

FAQs

Can you go to Rocco without staying at the hotel?
Yes. Rocco and Paper Crane both operate as public venues and welcome walk-ins alongside hotel guests.

What are Rocco’s opening hours?
Tuesday to Thursday 4:00pm to 10:30pm, Friday and Saturday 4:00pm to 11:30pm. It is closed Sunday and Monday.

Is there a dress code at Rocco?
Yes, smart dress. No rubber thongs and no singlets. Children are welcome until 7:00pm.

Does Crystalbrook Riley take cash?
No. Rocco is cash-free and Paper Crane is too, with a 1 per cent credit card surcharge and 15 per cent on public holidays.

Where is Crystalbrook Riley?
131-141 Esplanade, Cairns City, on the waterfront. Rocco is on level 12 of the tower.

Find it

Header photo: ours, Rocco, Crystalbrook Riley, 2020.

The photographs here are from our own shoot. Nobody paid us to write this and we were not paid to shoot it. The venue offered us food on the day and we did not eat it.