The Whitsunday Islands

The Whitsundays are a breathtakingly beautiful part of the world, and the perfect destination for scuba diving holidays... With its satin-smooth aquamarine sea and dark green Whitsunday islands that protrude like the heads of submerged dinosaurs broken here and there by pockets of white sand.

Like other Barrier Reef islands, the Whitsundays are heavily wooded, continental islands and not 'coral sea islands' in the novelistic sense. The hoop pines are particularly beautiful and could be described as the palm trees of the Whitsundays, with their deep green colour reaching into the bright blue sky and contrasting with the turquoise water... they are a striking part of the vegetation.

The Whitsundays are in the central part of the Barrier Reef, ideally positioned for all those looking for scuba diving holidays, being about 500 kilometres (310 miles) south of Cairns and 1000 kilometres (620 miles) north of Brisbane. There are 74 islands in the group...most are uninhabited. Resorts exist on only a handful…all but five of the Whitsunday Islands are national parks.

Scuba diving
There are a number of scuba diving training organisations on the mainland offering full certificate courses of 4-5 days duration as part of a scuba diving package, including training dives at island and Great Barrier Reef scuba diving sites. There is a lot of competition for students among operators offering scuba diving lessons with some offering cheap scuba diving holidays... but don’t judge a scuba diving course on price alone... Check out several options, ask about the scuba training centres, find out what is included in the price of any cheap scuba diving holidays quoted, and ask where the training dives are conducted and on what kind of liveaboard vessel. Scuba diving instruction is also available at most of the island resorts... Holidays Allover have specialist scuba diving consultants who have been booking scuba diving holidays and scuba diving training in the Whitsundays for years…our special relationships with the operators who offer scuba diving allow us to get you the best deals and we will always offer you the scuba diving package that is right for you... just contact us.

Water temperature in the Whitsundays
Wetsuits required for comfortable scuba diving in Whitsunday waters:

Scuba diving holidays on the Great Barrier Reef
The Great Barrier Reef is renowned for the spectacular scuba diving it offers those visitors taking the regions cheap scuba diving holidays, because of the reef's unparalleled coral diversity and marine life. Some of the reefs accessible from the Whitsundays offer scuba diving on a par with the best along the length of the reef... with visibility ranging from 6 to 30 metres depending upon the winds, tides and location.

Scuba diving holidays around the islands
The fringing reefs of the Whitsundays are noted for their high diversity of corals and their teeming fish and other marine life. The water is not as clear for scuba diving as it is on the outer Great Barrier Reef itself, due to the presence of fine sediments from adjacent mainland rivers and runoff from the islands themselves. Visibility in the water ranges from 3 to 15 metres (10 – 50ft) depending upon the weather, the tides and the location, and it tends to improve as one gets further from the mainland. It is generally clearest at scuba diving sites along the northern side of Hook and Hayman Islands... There are also some definite advantages to you taking your scuba diving holiday among the islands.

• the islands are easily accessible and offer calm waters in nearly all weather conditions; most scuba diving sites have little current (except where near a headland or within a narrow passage); and

• there is prolific sea life at nearly every dive site – nudibranchs, feather stars, Christmas-tree worms, sea cucumbers, and almost every small tropical fish in the book.

Scuba diving holidays on the outer Reef
Scuba diving on the outer Great Barrier Reef is renowned for excellent visibility in the water and for large pelagic fishes and other marine life... Extended scuba diving holidays to the outer Reef (4 days and longer) are available from the Whitsundays. Among sites regularly visited by local operators offering scuba diving holidays with Bait and Fairy reefs providing the best water clarity. Surface conditions depend on wind and tide; at low tide, an individual reef can provide protection from choppy seas…Currents are a fact of life offshore, and it is often best to go scuba diving during periods of slack tide, or to dive in protected areas... and a drift dive is sometimes the answer when currents are strong.