Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
early 1940s, Green Island had been declared a National Park, the visitor facilities
and camping areas at the cay had been developed and the Coral Cay Hotel had
By 1948, the tourist resort at Heron Island had also expanded and comprised
about ten cabins in addition to other facilities; an inspection of the resort during
that year by the Director of the QGTB revealed that:
The island has enjoyed a wide popularity with tourists over a period of about
fifteen years, because of its excellent geographical situation, its excellent
The growth of tourism at Heron Island was facilitated by a twice-weekly air
service from the Brisbane River to the Heron Island resort, operated by Barrier
Reef Airways using a Catalina flying-boat, which commenced in about 1947;
before that year, tourists travelled by rail from Brisbane to Gladstone before
making a six- or seven-hour crossing by boat from the mainland to the cay.
In addition to the service to Heron Island, Barrier Reef Airways also provided
weekly flights to Lindeman and Day Dream Islands, both in the Whitsunday
Group, and in the first two months of its operation, Barrier Reef Airways carried
around 1,000 passengers to the Barrier Reef (Bartlett, 1947, pp6-9).
Further expansion of tourist facilities on Great Barrier Reef islands occurred in
the 1950s. By 1950, Dunk Island had become a popular resort island, as National
Parks Ranger McKeown acknowledged:
Dunk Island is one of the major, and most popular, tourist resorts of North
Queensland, where fish and oysters are largely featured. The fact that they
can wander over a reef, and pick up a feed of oysters as they go, has a strong
One oral history informant, a charter boat operator, stated that the resort at
Dunk Island was owned by Australian Airlines. At the resorts in the island National
Parks, another oral history informant - an official of the Queensland Forestry
Department - explained, the facilities were developed and then the resorts were
excised from the National Parks; the resort owners were also issued with Special
Leases for the remaining parts of the islands in order to prevent other companies
from establishing competing resorts on the same islands. Access to the resort at
Dunk Island was facilitated by a daily ferry service; the ferry operator also offered
During the 1950s, significant developments took place at Green Island. In
1954, the Coral Gardens underwater observatory was constructed at the end of
the jetty, following a successful application by Vincent Vlasoff and Lloyd Grigg,
who were issued with Special Lease SL25283 over a popular area of the coral reef.
National Parks Ranger McKeown described the location of the observatory in
the following terms:
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