 Scores of islands are scattered off Australia, between the Queensland coast and the Great Barrier Reef, but Heron Island is actually on the reef. So where a trip to the reef from some islands means a long boat ride, on Heron the coral country is right at the front door.
Heron is not a large island (you can saunter around its white-sand perimeter in a hour), but it is a protected sanctuary for both sea turtles and birds; watching turtle hatchlings make their perilous journey to the sea is a prime activity around the Christmas season.
Still, it is the diving that's the main attractio...
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 Lying just off the Queensland coast and sheltered by the Great Barrier Reef, the Whitsundays are Australia's answer to the cruising grounds of the Caribbean, and home to the island continent's largest fleet of charter yachts. The 74 islands – most of them in pristine national parks – offer a lifetime's worth of quiet anchorages and empty white-sand beaches fanned by steady breezes virtually every day of the year.
Whether you're out for a daysail, on a crewed yacht, or bareboating on your own, traveling by boat also opens the way to the great snorkeling and fishing found in ...
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 Queensland Fraser Island is a giant sand island famous for its dingos, wildlife, native birds, rainforests, creeks, lakes, fishing, and scenery.
Overview:
Fraser Island is the world's largest sand island. It is World Heritage Listed and has become an eco tourism venue now that its timber and sand mining industries have been abandoned.
Fraser Island attained its World Heritage Listing in December 1992 in recognition of the island's exceptional sand dune systems, its rainforests on sand, and its beautiful freshwater lakes. But in the twenty-first century the future of the island is in...
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