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Published: March 11th 2023
80 kms off the Queensland coast accessed by 12 seater plane from Bundaberg or Hervey Bay is a tiny coral cay that is 100 percent Eco and 100 percent satisfaction.
The southern most island of the Great Barrier Reef and a haven for corals, seabirds, colourful fish, manta rays, turtles & humans...limited to 330 guests who snorkel, scuba dive, bask or otherwise simply enjoy the teeming wildlife.
Where else can you find a piece of paradise where there is Nil to complain about?
As Jack Johnson sings
"In times like these...what will be will be...and so it goes." A last minute plan to spend time with my sister for Christmas in Queensland leads to a few days on a previously booked out tropical island.
Who'd have thought?
How often do last minute plans lead to serendipity in over drive?
When Denise & I
'wing it' in travel...it happens quite often we find!
******
My sister lives within a stones throw of Woodgate Beach near Bundaberg, Queensland...invitations to visit were tempting but during Covid, Aussie state borders were closed.
Denise & I are travellers
who need to fly. So in mid December I rang my sister and asked if we could stay with her for a few weeks for Christmas 2022...she delighted to oblige...suggesting we must include time on Lady Elliot Island, the Manta Ray capital.
Onto the internet...of course it was booked out for months.
Then a small opening for an Eco cabin for 3 nights from Boxing Day (26 December 2022) so I rang the Resort and they were even more surprised than me that a vacancy had suddenly opened.
Booked it...gotta pack...get to the airport...the Dancing Ones are coming.
What to bring Purchased a GoPro Black 11 and got hints from our son in Canada who is the GoPro & Drone King. Now I have waterproof camera gear in addition to my usual.
Reef Shoes obligatory for a tiny coral cay surrounded by coral reefs...boardies...sunburn cream...shorts...shirts...undies...toothbrush & toiletries...medications...that's about all. The island supplies linen, towels & snorkeling gear.
Luggage as little as possible as max 15kg per person for the small plane to the island. Lucky that doesn't include my carry-on camera gear!
How to get there 40
minute flight in a 12 seater plane 83 kms from Bundaberg to Lady Elliot...others can fly 120kms from Hervey Bay...the island like a tiny beating heart in the endless Pacific sea...bouncing on landing as the tarmac is dirt and grass... pilot so skilful to him like sipping a cup of tea.
What to find The adverts on the internet are punchy & brief:
"Over 1,200 species of marine life - manta rays, turtles, and unspoilt coral reef. Natural Beauty. Eco Friendly. Picture Your Toes In The Sand! Best Snorkeling In Aust. Guided Diving Tours. Crystal Clear Water. Home Of The Manta Ray. Low-Key Eco Resort." If that's the Welcome Mat...being there reveals much, much more
History Said to never have been part of the Australian mainland it is believed it first was above sea level as a coral shingle spit about 3,500 years ago. Thereafter storms deposited coral shingle providing nesting areas for seabirds whose dropping led to its surface being raised and vegetated.
It is thus a coral shingle cay rather than a sand coral cay.
Walking along the shorelines that surround the island is an adventure
navigating the crunch and slip and slide of massive deposits of coral shingle with rocks of fossilised corals thereon.
The remainder of the island is raised and land and sand/soil-formed without the crunch.
The island was discovered in 1803 which resulted in a brief period in 1805 of sea cumber farming for the Asian delicacy market, abandoned when depleted.
In 1816 it was rediscovered by Captain Thomas Stuart in the ship
'Lady Elliot' and the island was thus named.
Between 1863 to 1873 it was mined for guano (bird poo) for fertiliser and gunpowder removing layers of deposits (about 1 metre of topsoil and 20,000 tonnes of guano).
This removed all vegetation except 8 Pisonia trees that were retained as shade from the tropical sun and rain for the Chinese & Malay workers.
The 8 Pisonia trees remain to this day but the coral cay was so bare that seabirds abandoned it for nesting and only a lighthouse with its lonelier lighthouse keeper's families was its sole reason for habitation. The graveyard of misery, a daughter died of pneumonia in 1896 and suicides of a lighthouse keeper's wife in 1907 are sobering indeed.
In 1969, a keen aviator Don Adams built an airstrip and commenced conservation, revegetation and tourism on Lady Elliot with the assistance of Commonwealth Government grants, receiving a conservation award in 1994 for his revegetation achievements. By the late 1980s trees obstructed the effectiveness of the lighthouse requiring in 1994 a 43 metre fully automated light tower with 6 revolving light beams visible for 40 kms from the island.
The current operators took over the lease in 2005 from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and have worked tirelessly to create one of the highest ecologically friendly tourism locales, not only in the Great Barrier Reef but in Australia.
The solar power station, desalinated water, reduction in diesel use and carbon carbon emissions by over 70 percent...awards for Advanced Eco Certification...truly inspiring.
With revegetation the seabirds returned...once a barren wasteland now an island with the second highest diversity on the Great Barrier Reef with about 100 species of land sea migratory birds...and NO predators.
The air filled with birds...the sea filled with coral reefs and sea life aplenty...the island a pleasure to wander and enjoy.
Island Life The joy of travel
is often highlighted by the people we meet.
Our first greeting was Sandy in the Dive Shop who claimed to be
"The Good Looking One"...but with its band of super capable and friendly diving guides, marine and bird experts, chefs and hospitality staff, he had plenty of competition!
Fitted us out with flippers & snorkel gear and booked us in for our introductory snorkel lesson.
As we headed to our Eco Cabin I got waylaid.
LEI Birds by their thousands White-capped or Brown Noddys in every branch of every tree...nests of twigs and leaves...one on the nest...its partner for life beside or fetching more nesting materials...white bird droppings like cake icing flowing from each...incessant squawks...Bridled and Crested Terns also filling the shoreline trees...a strutting Eastern Reef Egret...Buff-Banded Rails, Pacific Golden Plovers and Capricorn Silvereyes searching for insects...watching and ducking as I walk while Noddys and Terns swoop head high!
Armadas of Frigate Birds patrolling the skies with pairs of smaller birds in synch sweeping, darting or swooping...the occasional Sea Eagle avoided by others.
I got up up one morning at 4:30am to catch the 5 a.m. sunrise...thousands and thousands of birds
suddenly emerging together from the trees...crossing the reef in saturated battalions greeting the first glimpse of the sun...then swooping back to enjoy their day.
The Eco cabin suited us fine...we each had a lower bunkbed with all our gear loaded on top. Full glass frontages with heavy curtains & sliding doors, louvered windows to catch the breeze...pairs of terns holidaying, caring for chicks or fighting on the steps & below every window...perfect to sit on the deck and watch the bird carnival in the sky.
But late at night was another World. Cosy in our cabin awoken by screams from the wooded area behind our cabin.
"Someone is being murdered"
Crying of babies...lamenting moans...more screams...
"Where are my Musician's earplugs when I need them?" Wedge-tailed Shearwaters AKA Muttonbirds having arrived from Siberia are nesting.
The brochure says,
"They have an interesting 'love song' that you may hear at night sounds like a baby crying or ghostly wail." Talk about understatement...at least we are not sleeping on the ground or in tents into which they collide with exhaustion after their long migrations.
Walks, Educational Tours & Eating & Drinking First foray for
Denise and I was a walk along the coral shingle beach. Fascinating. Fossilized coral on rocks...flat corals in the shimmering shallows...coral hunks & shards piled feet deep against the grassy treed banks of the island...birds in and out...above and around...the sun beating down as ever-present reminder we are in the tropics....on dusk returning to roost in their thousands.
Could not help feeling if t'was not for the sun and the strong sea breezes forcing me to hold my hat on my head...I could be out here forever!
There is always something for everyone on Lady Elliot Island.
Educational tours such as bird watching, the lighthouse, eco projects, turtle egg laying, history...just look at the Daily Notice Board in the Dining area...all worth looking into.
But being terrestrial we had to recharge with the fabulous buffet meals in the Dining room with Mango Breeze Gin Cocktails...the sea breeze so strong that eating on the expansive decks was often prohibitive.
Meal times are often the best time to observe the wildlife...the human kind...body language between diners a great indicator of who may be the best company.
'Cos to us...the joy of travel is often the people
we meet.
A couple from Brisbane engaging us...pity it was their last evening as the yarns were great.
I noticed a young couple whose connection across their intimate dinner table...even the way they held their wine glasses and smiles...
"Gotta meet those two", I thought.
And we met the next day in a fortuitous way. Spent many hours and meals with Myron & Bhoomi as a result.
Meeting at the Dive Shop for our first glass bottom boat & snorkel foray...two had forgotten their reef shoes...sent back to their cabins to get them...Denise commenting to the other survivor,
"Maybe we should leave them!" The other laughing in agreement.
Myron is a medical doctor with a PhD...so I called him
"Doctor Doctor" and his girlfriend Bhoomi is a schoolteacher in a NSW country town...fabulous company where any age difference was refreshingly not a factor.
Chatting to them about dive areas when another from our snorkel approached asking if she could join us for a snorkel in the reef off the beach in the afternoon. That's how we met Lyle in full wetsuit, a retired teacher from Hervey Bay who is a regular at Lady Elliot, whose
husband Grahame we also spent time with.
I will always remember that first snorkel.
I had thought it was going to be an introductory lesson in a pool as we had not snorkeled in the Great Barrier Reef for many years...thus leaving my reef shoes (until I had to return to get them)...but more significantly not taking my GoPro as I had thought we were not going out on the reef.
For the next hour all I could think was,
"I wish I had my GoPro" as we saw Manta rays from the boat. There was no lesson but straight into it...swimming among corals with green turtles, a reef shark, nemo, myriads of rainbow, coloured and striped fish for 40 minutes...beats of my flippers and heavy breathing...
"I wish I had my GoPro" going around and around in my head.
The next morning when we went out again...this time with my GoPro...the water clearer but yet another lesson for young players.
To make it easier to use my GoPro, I opted at the last minute for a life jacket, "
I can float on the surface and film to my content", was my thought.
Yet the
buoyancy of a life jacket had its downside.
When I first looked up I found I was over 100 metres from the dive boat...the current carrying me into the Greater Pacific...yeeka...found it an ordeal to get back to the buoy lines that marked the dive areas.
Found Denise, who is a strong swimmer...schools of fish brushing our faces and bodies...
"Glad I brought my GoPro" now.
Later had a reef swim off the beach with Denise, Myron, Bhoomi & Lyle. Was like a washing machine for Bhoomi and me...the others doing better but cutting short due to strong swell. Sometimes the sea decides who is boss...not we!
Myron also has a GoPro and can dive to depths like a pearl fisher...his videos the stuff of legends.
He had one reef snorkel where he followed a green turtle that would wait for him to catch up...then shoot off at speed...wait for him to catch up...speed off...took him to the end of the island with the current...bit of an ordeal to get back to Bhoomi on the beach...videos shown to us that evening that were truly extraordinary.
Met Jhonny from Venezuela who was there for the scuba
diving...one of a number of overseas visitors who were there to do just that.
T'was sad to leave but I reckon 4 days and 3 nights is just right...goodbyes to new friends and thanks for the memories...my camera and GoPro and the incessant squawks of birds imbedded in my head.
Lady Elliot Island.
We are keen to return and will not forget.
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His Dudeness
Ralf Kreuze
Don't be sad you forgot your GoPro
Sometimes it's better without a camera. You can focus more on the critters themselves then on trying to film them or take a picture of them. Besides you have your very own GoPro with you all the time, eyes, ears and all the other senses, with an awesome processor called the brain that stores it and can replay it over and over again.