Tangalooma: Snorkeling the Shipwrecks and More

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Overview

Tangalooma Wrecks Photo - Moreton Island, Australia

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When you talk about snorkeling to anyone in South East Queensland, invariably they will respond with "have you been to the Tangalooma shipwrecks?" These wrecks, just off the coast of the second largest sand island in the world, Moreton Island, provide wonderful snorkeling and diving and are incredibly unique; while they aren’t quite as awe-inspiring as the Great Barrier Reef to the north, I don’t know of any other place where so many wrecks are so accessible.You can see the shipwrecks when you dock in the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort, but the rusty hulls sticking out of the water are still about a kilometer’s walk up the beach. If you think it seems odd that so many wrecks would sink in ...Read More

When you talk about snorkeling to anyone in South East Queensland, invariably they will respond with "have you been to the Tangalooma shipwrecks?" These wrecks, just off the coast of the second largest sand island in the world, Moreton Island, provide wonderful snorkeling and diving and are incredibly unique; while they aren’t quite as awe-inspiring as the Great Barrier Reef to the north, I don’t know of any other place where so many wrecks are so accessible.

You can see the shipwrecks when you dock in the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort, but the rusty hulls sticking out of the water are still about a kilometer’s walk up the beach. If you think it seems odd that so many wrecks would sink in the exact same place, especially when Moreton is entirely made of sand—hence, no hidden rocks to strike a vessel down—you are right. The twelve wrecks were actually intentionally sunk, starting in 1963 with the Maryborough, to create an artificial harbour for other, more sea-worthy boats.

Even with these wonderful shipwrecks, Moreton Island is often overlooked in favor of its neighbor to the north, Fraser Island. Fraser is touted as the largest sand island in the world and offers a huge array of tours lasting anywhere from 1 day to a week, along with plenty of options for renting 4-wheel-drives and doing the island your own way. Its shadow engulfs Moreton, which is actually much more accessible to those in Brisbane and has just as much island wilderness. The main differences are World Heritage listing (which Fraser has, but Moreton does not), wildlife (Moreton is not home to a large number of dingoes, like Fraser, or kangaroos and wallabies, like North Stradbroke to the south).

After having enjoyed Fraser so much, I would have loved to explore the Pacific Coast, inner pristine lakes, or the one rocky headland (Cape Moreton), but money was a big issue. Prices for tours were about the same as on Fraser, and after going to Cairns and finding other innovative ways to spend my money, I just couldn’t cut it. Instead, James and I decided to take a day trip to the island via the Tangalooma Flyer ferry, described in the "transportation" section. This ferry was inexpensive, at per person round trip, and there is plenty to do, even with 1km of the Tangalooma Resort.

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A holiday on Moreton Island, which is actually a misspelling of Captain Cook’s name "Cape Morton", can cost anywhere from to several thousand dollars. In this way, it is really a destination for all. However, if you want to keep your trip cheap, it is highly advisable to take your own food. We, being the chirpy morning people we are, forgot to even bring water, much less lunch. When we ate breakfast at the Coffee Shop, we were surprised at how cheaply priced the food was; however, this was the last nice surprise of the day in relation to food prices. The Beach Café (which I have reviewed along with the Coffee Shop in another entry)’s prices were insane and at the combination souvenir shop/convenience store for the resort guests, prices were even worse. It cost upwards of for a bottle of Pringles and for a normally .25 box of Tim Tams. Needless to say, our pockets were a little lighter by the end of the day.

You should book your ticket before arriving. Information is here.

There are no problems with bringing your own snorkel gear if you own it; you don’t have to be on a guided tour to go out on the wrecks, as James and I demonstrated. However, don’t go out and buy new snorkel gear for the sole reason of going to Tangalooma if you don’t plan on snorkeling anywhere else soon. The resort offers an amazing plethora of rentals (detailed in another entry), which include both snorkel and wetsuit hire. Even though we already had snorkels and fins, I did take note of the fact that hire was quite cheap— for more than a couple hours and less than half of that otherwise. This is much better than the minimum you can buy snorkeling sets for in a sports store like Amart!

Since we went during the winter and the water wasn’t quite the temperature it was when we snorkeled in Cairns, a wetsuit was essential. Plus, the wetsuit keeps you buoyant and makes the snorkeling much less work—that is, unless you want to dive down and look at things up close! I rented a wetsuit for for the day, and I am glad it was full body, so I didn’t have to experience the chill I felt in my ears in the rest of my body!

Best Way To Get Around:

As I’ve stated above, we took the Tangalooma Flyer to Moreton Island. This is actually a fleet of three strange looking catamarans—the Tangalooma Jet, Flyer, and Express. All three operate from a terminal in Pinkenba, which is on the east Brisbane River next to the Gateway Bridge, and is a 75-minute boat ride from Tangalooma (although we made it in 60). We drove and parked in their locked car park, which cost . They also offer a coach transfer, which takes you to/from Roma St Station for each way. Of the four different launch times (8am, 10am, 1pm, and 5pm), the coach only connects with the second, and of the four different return times from Tangalooma (9am, 2pm, 4pm, and 7pm), the coach only connects with the third.

The boats are officially owned by the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort and are there for the "guests" of the resort. Don’t let this scare you away—they offer 5 different packages for people not staying at the resort as well. The simple day trip, which only includes the ferry rides (leaving at either 8 or 10am), costs . You can add on wild dolphin feeding or whale watching for an extra price.

Even when you are on one of these trips, you are still considered a resort guest. This gets you access to all of the resort’s perks, like 4wd adventure trips, parasailing, quad biking, and much more. You can also lounge on their stretch of beach, grab a bite in their various eateries, swim in their pool, or take advantage of their many rentals.

The only downside to going on the Tangalooma Flyer as opposed to the Moreton Venture (or miCat) is the walk to the shipwrecks. It’s not a long walk along the sandy stretch of beach, and I enjoyed looking at the wonderful scenery around me the entire way. However, if you just want to see the wrecks, the Moreton Venture car ferry takes you straight there. The cost is for a slightly longer ride, since it is a much larger boat. It operates out of Wynnum Central, which can be accessed via a 40 minute ride on the Cleveland (purple) train line followed by a short bus ride to Kingsford Smith Drive. Read Less

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Beach Cafe and Coffee Shop

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Restaurant | "The Beach Cafe & The Coffee Shop"

Regal Pelican Photo - Beach Cafe and Coffee Shop, Moreton Island, Australia

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When we arrived in Tangalooma around 9 o’clock, James was starving and I could feel the growling beginning to grow louder in my stomach. In the short time we had before our ATV tour, we stopped at the Coffee Shop, which seemed to be the only place open. I wasn’t sure what to get until James pointed out their toasted sandwiches, with ham, cheese, & tomato only costing $6—not much of a markup, considering all the food had to be shipped from the mainland. The sandwiches were surprisingly good, although I suppose it’s pretty difficult to mess up a sandwich.There were a couple nice-looking restaurants in the Tangalooma resort, one of which had a buffet with decent choices for $19.50. Unfortunatel...Read More

When we arrived in Tangalooma around 9 o’clock, James was starving and I could feel the growling beginning to grow louder in my stomach. In the short time we had before our ATV tour, we stopped at the Coffee Shop, which seemed to be the only place open. I wasn’t sure what to get until James pointed out their toasted sandwiches, with ham, cheese, & tomato only costing $6—not much of a markup, considering all the food had to be shipped from the mainland. The sandwiches were surprisingly good, although I suppose it’s pretty difficult to mess up a sandwich.

There were a couple nice-looking restaurants in the Tangalooma resort, one of which had a buffet with decent choices for $19.50. Unfortunately, all of these places had closed by the time we arrived back from the wrecks at around 2.30 (they opened for lunch from 12-2 then closed until dinner). We had decided it was sandwiches again for lunch until I spotted the Beach Café on the way back from going to return my wetsuit. This café had a much larger menu, and by this point, after snorkeling for an hour and a half, I was absolutely starving.

Unfortunately, when James and I walked over, we realized that more options came at a very high price. It seemed nothing on the menu was under $9—even the bread came in at $9.50. But, as happens with captive markets, we had to pay it, or we had to wait another 2 ½ hours until we were back on the mainland, and that wasn’t going to happen. After much deliberating, James picked the salt-n-pepper calamari, I got the beer-battered barramundi, and we split a garlic bread. It cost me $3 for a coke with that!

We soon found out that the higher prices didn’t bring higher quality along with them. James wasn’t a fan of the calamari at all, and my fish was obviously very overcooked, so I’m sure people on the mainland could have heard me crunching. The garlic bread, which came in the form of a pizza, was so good that we left all bar 3 slices there. All in all, I would say it was a rather unsuccessful meal, although we did at least get some form of sustenance.

I don’t blame Tangalooma for inflating their prices to compensate for transport costs, but I was hoping that in such a high-quality resort, the food would be the same way. Not only that, but the lady at the counter was unfriendly and made faces at me whenever someone in the kitchen yelled to her for help. So, if you haven’t brought food along to Tangalooma, I highly recommend eating the sandwiches at the Coffee Shop instead—they are better value for your wallet and your tastebuds! Read Less

Member Rating 3 out of 5 on August 31, 2006

Beach Cafe and Coffee Shop
Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort
Brisbane, Australia
+61 7 3410 6000

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ATV Quad Bike Tour

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Attraction

Tangalooma from an ATV Photo - ATV Quad Bike Tour, Moreton Island, Australia

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On the ferry to Tangalooma, we saw a video that was chock full of activities that we could do at the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort. I was interested in parasailing, since I really wanted to try it out in Cairns but missed out, but part of the intrigue there was the spectacular views of both the mountains and the reef. Plus, when we saw quad bikes spraying sand in the dunes, James’ eyes lit up. I knew this was much more up his alley, so when we walked up to the Tours desk in the Resort, next to the Beach Café and Coffee Shop, I booked two of us for the earliest tour possible.The beginning of our tour consisted of our group (James, me, a parent with 3 children and a parent with 1 child) being...Read More

On the ferry to Tangalooma, we saw a video that was chock full of activities that we could do at the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort. I was interested in parasailing, since I really wanted to try it out in Cairns but missed out, but part of the intrigue there was the spectacular views of both the mountains and the reef. Plus, when we saw quad bikes spraying sand in the dunes, James’ eyes lit up. I knew this was much more up his alley, so when we walked up to the Tours desk in the Resort, next to the Beach Café and Coffee Shop, I booked two of us for the earliest tour possible.

The beginning of our tour consisted of our group (James, me, a parent with 3 children and a parent with 1 child) being shown the basic controls on an ATV and being given graphic descriptions of what happens when people do something wrong and say, break their ankle. James and I were worried that we wouldn’t be able to ride because we were wearing flip-flops, but this worry was quickly solved with 2 pairs of goofy looking shoes courtesy of Tangalooma. We were then given beautiful hair nets and pointed to our assigned quad.

At the beginning of the tour, James and I were both very worried about the quality. Since there were four children on child-size bikes, the tour wasn’t exactly moving at record pace…in fact, some of the starfish on the shore looked to be moving faster than us. Fortunately, after a slow, slow climb up the driveway behind the resort, we were waved into a different line with another guide and away we went.

We were led through the backside of the resort and then on to the sand dunes. Here, we essentially did donuts and kicked up a lot of sand for thirty minutes, all the while with a spectacular view of Moreton Bay and the Shipwrecks. The lady leading the pack, after the instructor, was a bit slow, but it didn’t matter because we could stop and wait until she cautiously followed the instructor before trying our best to charge up the various banks and spray as much sand around as possible. There was a photographer on hand to take pictures of us trying this; unfortunately, the shots cost $15 back in the Resort’s photo shop. Apparently, I wasn’t so good at kicking up sand, but James had a fair bit flying at the camera when he went past.

After we’d had our fun there, we went back onto the road and onto another sand dune for some more fun. After doing a couple laps on the pre-carved course, we got to carefully head down a huge drop and back to the Tangalooma beach. While not the most exhilarating tour, it was a great intro to quad bikes and even James, who had ridden before, enjoyed our hour in the dunes. Read Less

Member Rating 5 out of 5 on August 31, 2006

ATV Quad Bike Tour
Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort
Brisbane, Australia

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Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site

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Attraction | "Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks"

The Explorer Photo - Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site, Moreton Island, Australia

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The twelve old government ships which now form a harbour at Tangalooma present an interesting sight. I had only ever seen one shipwreck (at least that looked like a shipwreck) before—the Maheno, on 75 Mile Beach on Fraser Island—and it wasn’t nearly as interesting as the rusty shapes I saw as we inched closer to Moreton on the Tangalooma Express. As these brown shapes took a more definite form and became bows and bulkheads, I got even more excited, especially since I knew that what the ships held under the surface was just as striking as the ship graveyard above.Once we reached the little peninsula on the beach just across from the first wrecks, we found a suitable place off of the beach (sinc...Read More

The twelve old government ships which now form a harbour at Tangalooma present an interesting sight. I had only ever seen one shipwreck (at least that looked like a shipwreck) before—the Maheno, on 75 Mile Beach on Fraser Island—and it wasn’t nearly as interesting as the rusty shapes I saw as we inched closer to Moreton on the Tangalooma Express. As these brown shapes took a more definite form and became bows and bulkheads, I got even more excited, especially since I knew that what the ships held under the surface was just as striking as the ship graveyard above.

Once we reached the little peninsula on the beach just across from the first wrecks, we found a suitable place off of the beach (since it’s also used as a 4wd road) for our stuff. Luckily, at the Tangalooma Resort, they provide $4 purse-sized lockers for the entire day, so we didn’t have to worry about any of our valuables disappearing whilst we were on the wrecks. While we were getting ready, the boatload of people on the Tangalooma tour, who had left when we left the Resort, loaded back up onto the boat and left. This meant that a) I was very happy we went on our own, because we had as much time as we wanted to explore, and b) there was much less traffic around the wrecks to bump into.

Once we managed to get into our wetsuits and snorkel gear, it was time to jump in. Doing this elicited screams from both of us; the water was freezing! Fortunately, I had a full-body wetsuit and James doesn’t get nearly as cold as I do so we got used to it fairly quickly, although my ears had a slightly numb feeling for a while!

The most difficult part of snorkeling the wrecks is getting there from the shore. This is where the people coming in on boats had a huge advantage, because they could just hop out next to their wreck of choice. We, on the other hand, had to swim across a fairly short distance of water that seemed a lot longer because we were fighting the current the entire way. This was mainly because we wanted to start at the southernmost wreck and work north—the direction of the current. The swim also didn’t provide much to look at—just the sandy bottom sometimes and dark water enveloping you at others.

Our legs were a little tired when we finally made it to the first wreck, but it was well worth the swim. All of a sudden, rather than enveloping me, the water cleared and I could see the oyster-covered hull of a ship directly in front of me. When I say cleared, I don’t mean completely—the visibility was nothing like it was at the reef, but I couldn’t expect that.

This entry is continued in Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks, pt. 2. Read Less

Member Rating 5 out of 5 on August 31, 2006

Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site
Landward Side
Moreton Island, Australia

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Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site

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Attraction | "Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks, pt. 2"

James on the Wrecks Photo - Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site, Moreton Island, Australia

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This entry is a continuation of Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks.I suppose the visibility was about 5m or so, but it changed depending on the current and how much was rushing past you. James said the visibility was worse than the last time he had been, but it was still good enough to see the wrecks and their hidden treasures—you just had to get a bit closer.We quickly realized that grabbing onto the wrecks for support against the current was a little more difficult than it looked. It wasn’t quite low tide, but it certainly wasn’t high tide, so there was a fair amount of hull that is sometimes submersed sticking out above the water. This meant that a fair amount of oysters were visi...Read More

This entry is a continuation of Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks.

I suppose the visibility was about 5m or so, but it changed depending on the current and how much was rushing past you. James said the visibility was worse than the last time he had been, but it was still good enough to see the wrecks and their hidden treasures—you just had to get a bit closer.

We quickly realized that grabbing onto the wrecks for support against the current was a little more difficult than it looked. It wasn’t quite low tide, but it certainly wasn’t high tide, so there was a fair amount of hull that is sometimes submersed sticking out above the water. This meant that a fair amount of oysters were visible and there to grab, before you thought about what you were actually grabbing. I ended up with some pretty sore fingers after a couple of these incidents. We had to be careful when swimming or standing as well—even though we had flippers on, we both managed to get gashes on our feet from the sharp shells. This made me slightly paranoid about trailing blood and attracting sharks!

The wrecks were amazing. It was great to sit in the shadow of a giant rusted hull and peek in the portholes to see what its innards held. There was coral growing in many places on the ships, below the oyster shell line. Millions of tiny neon fish played in between the rigid, tiny tendrils of yellow coral. Even though my snorkel was taking in a bit of water, it didn’t stop me from keeping my head down and admiring the underwater wonders. I tried diving down to get a closer look a few times, but the current and wetsuit proved too much for my skill and I ended up having to fight the current back to my original location.

Aside from the tiny fish living around the coral, there were huge amounts of larger fish just hanging out around the wrecks. Many of these seemed to not take notice of us until we were within centimeters of them. There were definitely some that caught the eye immediately with their brilliant primary-colored stripes.

There is a big sign on the wrecks stating that it is dangerous to climb on them and doing so could result in serious injury. However, it was OK to balance yourself on one of the old decks to take a breather and just look around. Even better than this was actually going inside the wrecks—it was amazing to go through an old doorway and peek at the dark-dwelling creatures within. I got a fair way inside one cabin, but decided that since my foot was bleeding, I didn’t want to catch a shark unawares, so I backed out again.

This entry is continued in Snorkeling the Tangalooma Wrecks, pt. 3. Read Less

Member Rating 5 out of 5 on August 31, 2006

Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site
Landward Side
Moreton Island, Australia

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Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site

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Attraction | "Snorkeling the Tangalooma Shipwrecks, pt. 3"

Tangalooma Wrecks Photo - Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site, Moreton Island, Australia

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This entry is a continuation of Snorkeling the Tangalooma Wrecks, pt. 2.James took the warning on the wrecks very seriously—so much so that when I was exploring cabins, he was sitting on the roof taking a breather and enjoying the view. At one point he climbed up and old staircase to get a better look at the upper part of the ship.We worked our way to the top of the southernmost ship and then swam north along the bay side of the wrecks, since James said this was the more interesting side. We did this for about another hour, taking in all the coral and schools of fish. At one point, I found a little nook where there was neon pink coral growing—the brightest coral we’d seen all day—so I ...Read More

This entry is a continuation of Snorkeling the Tangalooma Wrecks, pt. 2.

James took the warning on the wrecks very seriously—so much so that when I was exploring cabins, he was sitting on the roof taking a breather and enjoying the view. At one point he climbed up and old staircase to get a better look at the upper part of the ship.

We worked our way to the top of the southernmost ship and then swam north along the bay side of the wrecks, since James said this was the more interesting side. We did this for about another hour, taking in all the coral and schools of fish. At one point, I found a little nook where there was neon pink coral growing—the brightest coral we’d seen all day—so I tried to balance myself and get a shot of it. I heard bubbles behind me and pulled away quickly to the vision of James trying to get my attention. Apparently I had come within centimeters of the oysters with my neck. That would have been…fun.

The empty area where the deck had been in one of the wrecks proved to be one of the most vibrant wildlife areas there. Colorful fish swam around huge walls of coral, including a bit of brain coral (which I’d never seen before). As soon as we swam out of that and towards the last wrecks, we ended up in a massive school of grey and yellow fish. Everywhere we looked, they were swarming. James even dived down and flew back up to the surface trying to scare them, and while they scattered slightly, they soon came back unfazed.

Swimming back to shore was an interesting proposition, since we were both tired from our hour and a half on the wrecks. James told me the best way to swim back was just straight ahead, without worrying how far down the beach the current took me. However, I ended up facing the current many times, which I’m sure added to James’ amusement back on the beach.

Our stuff was still in the scrub where we left it, and we had a nice, lazy walk back to the resort, since we had nothing else planned. There were huge numbers of starfish all along the beach—some alive, some dead. I would have loved to keep one of the dead ones, but James pointed out that the people next to me on the plane might not appreciate the stench of rotting flesh. As we wandered back to the resort, we passed lots of happy children horsing around on the beach and paddling their kayaks in the water, and it just felt like life couldn’t get any better.

All in all, the trip left us exhausted to the point that we slept most of the ferry ride home, but it was well worth it, and I’m glad we gave ourselves enough time to explore all of the wrecks’ nooks and crannies. Read Less

Member Rating 5 out of 5 on August 31, 2006

Tangalooma Wrecks Dive Site
Landward Side
Moreton Island, Australia

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Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort

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Story/Tip

Coming in to Tangalooma Photo - Moreton Island, Australia

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The Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort is one of four settlements on national park-covered Moreton Island, and is the starting point for many visitors. I don’t know what I was expecting before the Tangalooma Express pulled up at the wharf, but I liked what I saw. The resort is expansive and stretches along a good amount of beach and back into the sand dunes, yet it isn’t disgustingly overdone. In fact, at one point when I was sitting in the Beach Café, I truly felt like I was in a small, tropical resort. I would have enjoyed staying there…had I had the $280 a night to fork over!The name of the Wild Dolphin Resort comes from the dolphins which frequent the shores in the evening. We passed by a bo...Read More

The Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort is one of four settlements on national park-covered Moreton Island, and is the starting point for many visitors. I don’t know what I was expecting before the Tangalooma Express pulled up at the wharf, but I liked what I saw. The resort is expansive and stretches along a good amount of beach and back into the sand dunes, yet it isn’t disgustingly overdone. In fact, at one point when I was sitting in the Beach Café, I truly felt like I was in a small, tropical resort. I would have enjoyed staying there…had I had the $280 a night to fork over!

The name of the Wild Dolphin Resort comes from the dolphins which frequent the shores in the evening. We passed by a board which counted more than 10 dolphins, mostly named, in attendance every night at dolphin feeding time, around 6pm. We unfortunately didn’t stay for the crowning glory of the resort because it cost another $30 just to go on the 7pm ferry rather than the 4pm, and another $20 on top of that if we actually wanted to feed the dolphins.

An interesting thing about the resort is that it is actually on the location of the only whaling station in Queensland, before whaling was outlawed in the 1960’s. This is not a fact that was trumpeted, since whaling wasn’t really approved of even then, but it is noticeable in the various mementos along the walk from the wharf to the main resort, including a very bent, used whaling harpoon.

What impressed me the most about the resort was the volume of activities it offered. When we were on the ferry coming over, we were shown a video with short clips of many of the activities/ways to lighten up your wallet, so we had a good thirty minutes to discuss and get excited about our options for the day. Obviously, we were going to spend part of the day snorkeling on our own, rather than going on the resort-sponsored $18 hour-long guided snorkel (which provides a boat ride to and from the wrecks, a wetsuit, and snorkel hire). However, for the other half-day, we could either go parasailing, ATV quad biking, 4wding on our own or with a group, whale watching, sailing, kayaking…the list goes on and on. We got quite a nice surprise when we got to the booking desk and found that all of these activities were quite cheap as well. We went on an hour-long quad bike tour for $55 each; parasailing was $60, and rental of a catamaran for an hour was either $10 or $15. All of these prices were extraordinarily low for our expectations, given the remoteness of the location.

The resort really is a great place to visit, and would be a wonderful holiday getaway. I could fill days upon days with activities, and when I wasn’t doing that, I’d be lounging on the pristine sands with a good book, reveling in how wonderful life can be.
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