IF Australia’s tourist authorities ever run short of enthusiasm, they should go knocking on the door of my son George. Like so many footloose British youngsters, he cleared off Down Under in his mid-twenties with a pack on his back for a time of “see-what-turns-up” travelling. After a year of banana-picking, stranger- befriending and horizon- widening on an epic 10,000- mile Outback odyssey in a dodgy £700 motor named “White Death”, he returned to England out of funds, but in love and in luck.
Soon he was back in Australia, training to become a teacher and living on the coast of north Queensland with Katy, the Australian nurse he met at the end of his travels. Now we were on our way out — me, my wife Jane and two of our daughters, Elizabeth, 19, and Mary, 15 — to meet Katy and see George after a year and a half’s separation, and to be shown a good time by the pair of them.
Magnetic Island — “Maggie Island” to George and Katy — lies in the warm blue Coral Sea half an hour’s ferry ride from the port of Townsville. If you were looking for the ideal place to reconnect with your long-unseen son, and to get acquainted with the girlfriend you knew only from photos and brief phone calls, Magnetic Island would be hard to beat.
The island is about half the size of the Isle of Wight. Half is covered in tropical rainforest, ensuring a wonderful flora and fauna. The rest is given over to tiny beach resorts, holiday activities of a laid-back sort, and swimming coves that can be reached only by tracks through the forest. Basically the whole place is beach-bum heaven.
During our three days on Maggie Island we savoured a fair few of the delights on offer. Some were adrenalin-rich: paddling sea kayaks across the mouth of Horseshoe Bay, and zooming at 40mph (65km/h) behind a speedboat while seated on a rubber ring. Others were gentler: watching koalas nibbling eucalyptus leaves, and wandering over to Radical Bay for a morning swim and stretch on sands marked only with the tiny paw-prints of wallabies.
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Best of all were the lazies — watching the sky darken over a jug of sunset-hued cocktail, breakfasting with a pair of cheeky red-and-green lorikeets on our balcony, giggling over late-night hands of cards. At such times, looking around our increasingly suntanned family circle, I could sense relaxation spreading like a tropical dawn.
It was a wrench to wave goodbye to Maggie Island. But there were other treats in store. You can’t come to Queensland and fail to see the Great Barrier Reef. If you are going to make that once-in-a-lifetime trip, you should get some insight into the corals and fish by visiting Reef HQ in Townsville.
Anyone who thinks Reef HQ is just a glorified aquarium should think again. In beautifully lit saltwater tanks and easily digestible displays, the life and natural history of the reef are held up for admiration. Here are striped fish, spotted fish, fish with trumpet mouths, fish with frills and spines; corals that pulse, corals that glow and wave more gracefully than any dancer; sharks, turtles and sawfish. We learnt how the whole wonderful structure of the reef is under threat from man’s greed and pollution, yet is capable of a sustainable salvation with a little common sense.
After Reef HQ we couldn’t wait to strap on the snorkels and taste the reef for real. But Townsville turned out to be a hard place to drag ourselves away from. There was the excellent Museum of Tropical Queensland, where I spent a whole afternoon, and a brilliant International Culture Fest in Strand Park, where we snacked ourselves silly on the delicacies of 20 nations and watched young Australian Greeks, Cubans and Indians perform their native dances.
George, who was always a keen fisherman, advised us to take the Passions of Paradise sailing boat from Cairns out for a reef trip. What we had seen and learnt about in Reef HQ came brilliantly to life a few feet below our floating, gently paddling bodies.
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A breeze got up in the afternoon, enough to let the crew set the mainsail and spinnaker. Returning from sunbathing on the foredeck, Jane and I glanced in the cabin window. The girls were sitting at a table, brown and relaxed, cuddling their brother and laughing and joking with his girlfriend as if they had known her all their lives.
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Getting there: Christopher Somerville and family travelled with Quest Travel (0871 4230111, www.questtravel.com). It has a 12-night stay with two nights’ B&B in Townsville and ten nights’ B&B on Magnetic Island, including international and domestic flights and ferry to Magnetic Island, from £1,299pp (book before January 31 for travel from April 16 to June 30).
Activities: Magnetic Island website (www.magnetic-island.com.au) is a good start. Contact Townsville and North Queensland Tourism (00 617 4726 2728, www.townsvilleonline.com.au). Passions of Paradise (4041 1600, www.passions.com.au) has a one-day sailing trip, including snorkelling equipment, from £46pp.
Further information: Queensland Tourism (www.queenslandholidays.co.uk).
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Page 2: Tips and trips for gap-year parents ()
Tips and trips for gap-year parents