Lady Elliot Island — Local services in Coral Sea

Had a great stay.

The island is accessed by Cessner propellor plane from various small airports on the mainland. Scenic flight is great fun, with exciting landing on 650m long grass runway.

The resort itself is situated on one side of the island. Island is small and only takes about 15mins to walk from one side to the other.

Included activities here are various guided walks, talks & documentary screenings. Room rate also includes free use of rock shoes/crocs, mask, snorkel and fins and an outing in the glass bottom boat with snorkelling for about an hour. We visited in October and found in the shallows the water is as warm as a bath,  but out deep its cold. You can rent long or short wetsuits for 16-25Aus$ a day.

Additional cost activities are open water scuba diving, a trial scuba in the resort pool and other boat excursions. Note that if you have not dived for a long time,  you will need to pay for a refresher in the resort pool. Scuba equipment rental is extra.

You can scuba or snorkel on two sides of the island in marked "safe" areas by the lighthouse or in the Lagoon. The Lagoon area is only open when the tide is up. There is a slight current, but its not very strong. On the lighthouse side you need to walk out through the shallows in designated area , place your rock shoes in a secure basket on a pole and get your fins on.

For anyone who is not a swimmer you can take a walk around the island or its shoreline; take part in some activities; see the multitude of birds living on the island; sunbathe on the provided loungers/chairs on the shoreline or pool. Note you will need rock shoes as the beach is stone/washed up coral.

The resort has a cafeteria where the included buffet breakfast & buffet dinner meals are served.  During our stay they were not properly re-stocking in the second half of service, so we missed out on a few things because all the school trips had descended on it like locusts before we got there.  Lunch is NOT included and must be paid for separately. The cafeteria also has a bar to buy wine/ spirits/soft drinks and snacks like crisps. Outside of meal times you can help yourself to free fresh fruit, tea/coffee/water.

In the evenings staff take a cart to the beach with soft/alcoholic drinks and snacks to buy and you can watch the sun set.

There is no phone signal except patchy service by the lighthouse. WiFi can be purchased @ 20Aus$ for 1Gb);

Reception area has a small gift shop  and there is other merchandise in the scuba office.

Other facilities are shaded swimming pool with loungers; free laundry room (detergent to buy in reception) + drying machine; volleyball net; kids climbing frame & games room.

We stayed in a beachfront villa which had x2 bedrooms (1 double, 1 twin); reversible A/C; shower room with really good quality shampoo/conditioner; kettle/tea/coffee; fridge; raised terrace; washing line with clothes pegs. They also provide earplugs as the nesting birds are very noisy at night.  NB. the rooms are all open with no keys and there is no safe, but you can get a locker @ no charge @ reception.

Things I would recommend the resort changing are as follows:-

Become full board and include lunch in the room rate, rather than charge for it. Guests have no other dining options, so not including it seems a bit tight.

Include free use of wetsuits.

Employ someone full time to clean up the bird poo and the few dead birds around the resort. Obviously it's a bit of a loosing battle with x10 times more birds to humans on the island, but their excrement is all over the communal areas, sun loungers,  room terraces etc so you have to always wear shoes or put a towel down.

Notwithstanding the above, we very much enjoyed our stay and would definitely be back. We saw bucket loads of turtles; sharks; loads of...

Some of the best diving and snorkelling on the entire great barrier reef. The island has it’s own shallow lagoon which is snorkellable around high tide. It is a nursery for lots of tropical fish so generally see smaller fish however this also attracts the occasional friendly neighbourhood black tipper reef shark or two. Dozens of turtles in the lagoon and if you are lucky you might even see an octopus or epaulette shark. Go on the guided reef walk and you will learn about good spots to snorkel and also learn about the marine life which will make snorkelling more enjoyable. The conditions in the lagoon are generally calm, with excellent visibility and ability to get up close to sea life due to it’s shallowness of max 1 metre at high tide. The west side of the island is more reef but deeper water however here is where you will see manta rays and larger turtles. if conditions are calm, visibility is easily 30 metres. Currents can be moderate to strong so check at the dive shop and start your snorkel going with the current. If you snorkel along the “2nd” reef, in between three pyramids and the lighthouse dive site, you are vey likely to see manta rays, eagle rays, and dolphins if your lucky. Winter months are best for mantas!

The only thing I would say that could be improved is that they should provide full length 5mm wetsuits in the winter months for snorkelling however they only provide 5mm shorties and if you’re paying that much to get to this island then that should be included. The staff were very good at catering for vegans, but I think this could be increased especially as it’s an “eco resort” and eating meat is a major contributer to the climate crisis, animal habitat destruction and extinction and seems very strange to eat meat in a place that promotes not harming or even touching marine life.

Also, I would recommend staying in either reef or garden units as opposed to the glamping tents. Even with a light breeze, it was impossible to sleep well with flapping tent walls. I wouldn’t bother paying extra for reef units as the garden units are just as near the lagoon except not right on the beachside. I believe the ecolodges are not...

Wonderful experience at the base of the Great Barrier Reef. The flight over was awesome with great views as we landed on the island. Staff were amazing, big shout out to Pieter and Nav(hope I got that right!) They really looked after us and clearly cared about our experience. Pieter went above and beyond, giving us extra personal time on the reef walk and showing how much he loves and cares for this ecosystem. The accommodations are not ritzy but they're really clean and tastefully decorated, we had the reef view cabins with private bathroom - having a nice cold beer on the balcony was a treat at Sunset. The food was unexpectedly good, nice variety of dishes every day and Breakfast and Dinner were included. Lunch is available at extra cost. Staff here too were super nice and accommodating, though it would be nice to have more vegan protein options, perhaps a bean dish in the cold bar. Snorkeling the island was amazing, the reef, though exhibiting a little of the stress all coral reefs are experiencing was teeming with life, you may see Manta Rays if you're an early riser, Whales depending on the season, Reef Sharks, Colorful Eels, Turtles, Squid, Octopus and various species of fish, mollusks and other life in the ocean. Gear was good in the most part (Shout out again to Nav for hooking me up with nicer flippers) but I would recommend bringing your own snorkel if you can as the ones supplied have no valve and when the seas are choppy, water can get in. This is an eco resort with a big commitment to preserving the ecosystem and lowering their carbon footprint, wastewater is treated and reused, power comes from solar and the restoration of the island is ongoing. Highly recommend a visit if you can, its not cheap but its a once in a lifetime experience, flying out on our last day close to sunset we were already wondering when we...