InterContinental Hayman Island Resort

In 1950 the transport entrepreneur Reginald Ansett opened the Royal Hayman Hotel on a steep, wooded island at the northern edge of the Whitsundays, and the first guests came by flying boat. Seven decades and several rebuilds later, InterContinental Hayman Island Resort occupies the same sheltered shore of Hayman Island, off the Queensland coast, with the outer Great Barrier Reef beyond.

History

The Whitsunday Islands are the sea country of the Ngaro people, who lived on and travelled between them for thousands of years. James Cook sailed through the passage between the islands and the mainland in June 1770 and named it for Whit Sunday. Hayman Island itself takes its name from Thomas Hayman, a Royal Navy navigating officer who charted these waters in the nineteenth century.

Ansett, whose airline grew into one of Australia's two national carriers, took up Hayman in the late 1940s and built a resort that became part of Australian holiday life for a generation. In the 1980s his company rebuilt it on a far grander scale, and the new Hayman, opened in 1985, set the standard for the island resort in Australia, with marble, a collection of art and antiques and a large saltwater pool.

The island later passed to Mulpha, the investment group that owns it still. After a long refurbishment it reopened in 2014 as One&Only Hayman Island. Cyclone Debbie crossed the Whitsundays in March 2017 and damaged the island badly, and the resort closed for a rebuild. It reopened in July 2019 under the InterContinental name, managed by IHG.

Rooms and suites

The resort is laid out around its pools and lawns facing the beach, with wings and pavilions stepping back towards the hill. Accommodation runs through rooms and suites with views of the pools, the beach or the water, rooms with direct access to the pools, and beachfront villas with their own pools, set apart from the main wings. The largest residences have several bedrooms for families and groups.

Dining

The resort has several restaurants and bars, which cover an all-day dining room facing the pool and the sea, an Asian restaurant and a beach venue for long lunches. Seafood from Queensland waters runs through the menus, and private dining can be set up on the beach.

Wellness

The spa occupies its own building, with treatment rooms and a fitness centre, and the resort offers tennis and non-motorised water sports.

Weddings and events

Hayman hosts weddings on the beach and lawns and has meeting and function rooms for conferences and incentive groups, which the island's isolation suits well. Groups can take over areas of the resort for private events.

Location

Hayman is the northernmost of the resort islands in the Whitsunday group and lies closer than most to the outer reef. Blue Pearl Bay, on its western side, is among the best snorkelling spots in the Whitsundays, with corals and reef fish in shallow water. At low tide the sandbar at Langford Island rises from the sea a short boat ride away. Whitehaven Beach, with its fine white silica sand on Whitsunday Island, and Heart Reef, a heart-shaped coral formation best seen from the air, are reached by boat, seaplane or helicopter.

Guests fly to Hamilton Island Airport and transfer on the resort's own boats, a crossing of about an hour, or by seaplane or helicopter. Whitsunday Coast Airport at Proserpine is the mainland alternative. As a luxury resort in the Whitsundays, Hayman has had a longer run than almost any other, and its story follows the rise of the Australian island holiday from flying boats to private villas.