Day 63 June 1, 2025 - Travel to Lizard Island
Today we flew first to Cairns (pronounced Cans) and then to Lizard Island. The flight to Cairns was a bit late, and we were a bit concerned about making the connection. However the airline taking us to Lizard Island was one of those small plane operators, so they were very flexible. Our two o’clock flight actually took off around 2:30. There were 10 of us on the small Cessna plane and the flight was generally smooth, though there was a lot of cloud cover so little to see.
Lizard Island is an island on the Great Barrier Reef. Archaeological excavations and studies have shown that human occupation of the island dates to about 8,000 years ago, which shows that it was the earliest offshore island occupied on the northern part of the Great Barrier Reef.
The name Lizard Island was given to it by Captain Cook when he passed it in 1770. He commented, “The only land animals we saw here were lizards, and these seemed to be pretty plenty which occasioned my naming the Island Lizard Island.”
There are many hiking trails and beautiful beaches, some only accessible by boat. The only accommodation on the Island is the Lizard Island Resort, set within the National Park and surrounded by 24 white sand beaches.
We landed at a small landing strip and were met by the resort team. We were taken to the lodge for some snacks, and of course champaign. Our suite is a small Bongalo with its own plunge pool overlooking sunset beach. Unfortunately, tonight there was not much sunset due to the heavy cloud cover.
June 2, 2025 - Lizard Island
This morning, after breakfast we went down to the beach club for a snorkeling adventure. We were fitted with fins, masks and a wet suit as the water was only about 77 degrees. I also figured the wet suit would help with buoyancy.
We boarded the Nemo for the trip over to Mermaid beach, one of those you can only reach by boat. We moored off the shore and after a brief introduction to the swim by Thomas, we were in the water for a great view of the coral, fish and other marine life. We swam for about an hour before getting back on the boat and heading back to the shore.
June 3, 2025 - Lizard Island
After breakfast we took a walk along the beach by the lodge. Then went in search of “Sunset Beach”. We found that and ran into the Island’s namesake.
It was a leisurely morning and then lunch before heading out for another snorkeling adventure. This was to the “Clam Garden” and it certainly lived up to its name. At first, I thought seeing some of the smaller clams was something, and we did run into a turtle swimming about, but then we got to the real reason it is called the “Clam Garden”! These things were huge. The pictures do not do justice because there is no contrast to judge the size but some were more than 3 feet across! Open, they exhibited the most beautiful hues of blue and teal, spotted with white dots, it looked like a universe in microcosm.
After an hour in the water we headed back to the shore for more relaxing. Then to the bar for before dinner cocktail, dinner and getting ready to leave tomorrow.
