A short break on Lady Elliot Island with our grandchildren, Aylee and Nate. Yesterday we drove from home to Maryborough and then on to the airport at Harvey Bay this morning.
Access to the island is by a light aircraft from Harvey Bay and takes about an hour flying out past Fraser Island to our south (quite spectacular) and landing on a small grass strip on the island. As Lady Elliot Island is the most remote Great Barrier Reef island regularly accessed, boat access is impractical.
Lady Elliot Island
Lady Elliot Island is a coral cay located at the southern tip of the World Heritage Listed Great Barrier Reef.
Situated within a highly protected ‘Green Zone’ the coral cay is a sanctuary for over 1,200 species of marine life and is known for its abundance of manta rays, turtles, amazing array of spectacular marine life and unspoilt coral reef.
Lady Elliot Island is one of 16 coral cays in the Capricornia section of the southern Great Barrier Reef. The Island’s history includes being mined for guano and hosting a herd of goats that were kept on the Island to ensure food for shipwrecked sailors. The Island has recovered wonderfully over the past 50 years, due to the conservation and revegetation efforts introduced by Don Adams and continued by the passionate team at Lady Elliot Island Eco Resort, and today is home to a fascinating mix of vegetation, birds and other wildlife.
The vegetation is a mix of iconic coral cay species, such as octopus bushes, casuarinas and pisonia; and various herb, shrub, and ornamental species that in part owe their presence on the Island to the generations of lighthouse keepers. A pisonia forest in the south-west part of the Island is associated with a large noddy bird rookery, and the Island boasts a pair of sea eagles that also frequent this part of the Island. Elsewhere, the herb lands and shrublands are home to numerous birds, such as buff banded rails, ruddy turnstones, and silvereyes. Frigate birds soar overhead, boobies are common, mutton birds descend on the Island at night, and the Island is even home to several breeding pairs of red-tailed tropicbirds. Lady Elliot Island is now one of the most important seabird nesting sites in the entire Great Barrier Reef and is a magnet for bird watchers. In addition to birds, the Island also has a healthy green frog population and several species butterflies, but fortunately few flies and mosquitoes.
Lady Elliot Island is one of 16 coral cays in the Capricornia section of the southern Great Barrier Reef. The Island’s history includes being mined for guano and hosting a herd of goats that were kept on the Island to ensure food for shipwrecked sailors. The Island has recovered wonderfully over the past 50 years, due to the conservation and revegetation efforts introduced by Don Adams and continued by the passionate team at Lady Elliot Island Eco Resort, and today is home to a fascinating mix of vegetation, birds and other wildlife.
The vegetation is a mix of iconic coral cay species, such as octopus bushes, casuarinas and pisonia; and various herb, shrub, and ornamental species that in part owe their presence on the Island to the generations of lighthouse keepers. A pisonia forest in the south-west part of the Island is associated with a large noddy bird rookery, and the Island boasts a pair of sea eagles that also frequent this part of the Island. Elsewhere, the herb lands and shrublands are home to numerous birds, such as buff banded rails, ruddy turnstones, and silvereyes. Frigate birds soar overhead, boobies are common, mutton birds descend on the Island at night, and the Island is even home to several breeding pairs of red-tailed tropicbirds. Lady Elliot Island is now one of the most important seabird nesting sites in the entire Great Barrier Reef and is a magnet for bird watchers. In addition to birds, the Island also has a healthy green frog population and several species butterflies, but fortunately few flies and mosquitoes.
The Lady Elliot Island Eco Resort is a family run and operated eco-tourism business. Peter Gash, family and several partners have held the lease from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority to operate the resort since 2005. Since this time, enormous strides have been made to introduce sustainable initiatives to convert the resort to renewable energy with the goal to be 100% renewable by 2020.
