About Heron Island

Great Barrier Reef Hotel

If starting your day with a sunrise and finishing it off with a spectacular sunset is your thing, Heron Island is your island. This is an exclusive island for guests only (no day-trippers here) and, with television-free rooms and no mobile phone reception, it's ideally positioned to take you “back to nature”, as it is a natural coral cay. The nature itself is absolutely spectacular. The island is situated on the Great Barrier Reef, which means you can snorkel right off the island. Scuba divers come back again and again to fully discover the 20 dive sites that are just minutes off the island. The resort caters to both couples and families and has approximately 100 comfortable rooms, all with ceiling fans and either balconies or terraces.

Heron Island is small enough to walk around in 20 minutes, yet it has everything you could wish for: a restaurant (Shearwater Restaurant) to satisfy healthy appetites, a deep resort swimming pool backing onto a bar (Baillie's Bar) and an abundance of wildlife that will truly amaze. Turtles return year after year to lay their eggs and guests can gather just outside their rooms (particularly the Beachside Suites) to watch the hatchlings make their way to the water.

Come June you may see whales passing by on their annual pilgrimage. Nesting season sees the island's resident human population well outnumbered by birds. The island's “twitchers list” (available from the information centre) lists no fewer than 19 birds; two of which (the Black Noddy and the Wedge-tailed Shearwater) visit annually from October to March to breed.