Lizard Island is an island on the

Great Barrier Reef The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over over an area of approximately . The reef is located in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland, ...

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

(Australia), northwest of

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

and part of the Lizard Island Group that also includes Palfrey Island. It is part of the Lizard Island National Park. Lizard Island is within the

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

Lizard Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 7,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic since it excludes the snakes and Amphisbaenia alt ...

in the

Cook Shire The Shire of Cook (The Shire) is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia. The Shire covers most of the eastern and central parts of Cape York Peninsula, the most northerly section of the Australian mainland. It covers an area ...

Geology

Lizard Island is a

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

island about 10 square kilometres in size, with three smaller islands nearby (Palfrey, South and Bird). Together these islands form the Lizard Island Group and their well-developed

fringing reef A fringing reef is one of the three main types of coral reef. It is distinguished from the other main types, barrier reefs and atolls, in that it has either an entirely shallow backreef zone (lagoon) or none at all. If a fringing reef grows direc ...

encircles the deep Blue Lagoon.

History

Aboriginal

Lizard Island was known as Dyiigurra to the Dingaal

Aboriginal Aborigine, aborigine or aboriginal may refer to: *Aborigines (mythology), in Roman mythology * Indigenous peoples, general term for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area *One of several groups of indigenous peoples, see ...

people and was regarded as a sacred place. It was used by the people for the initiation of young males and for the harvesting of shellfish, turtles, dugongs and fish. The Dingaal believed that the Lizard group of islands had been created in the

Dreamtime The Dreaming, also referred to as Dreamtime, is a term devised by early anthropologists to refer to a religio-cultural worldview attributed to Australian Aboriginal mythology, Australian Aboriginal beliefs. It was originally used by Francis Ja ...

. They saw it as a stingray with Lizard Island being the body and the other islands in the group forming the tail. The local Dingiil Aboriginal people call the island Jiigurru.

European

The name Lizard Island was given to it by

Captain Cook James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean an ...

when he passed it on 12 August 1770. He commented, "The only land Animals we saw here were Lizards, and these seem'd to be pretty Plenty, which occasioned my naming the Island Lizard Island." Cook climbed the peak on Lizard Island to chart a course out to sea through the maze of reefs which confronted him and the island's summit has since been called 'Cook's Look'. By the 1860s the island was being used by

sea cucumber Sea cucumbers are echinoderms from the class Holothuroidea (). They are marine animals with a leathery skin and an elongated body containing a single, branched gonad. Sea cucumbers are found on the sea floor worldwide. The number of holothuria ...

fishermen who found that the waters contained substantial quantities of the creature which was a popular delicacy in Asia. In 1879, Captain Robert Watson with his wife Mary Watson, two servants and baby son, modified an abandoned cottage left on the island by the crew of the ''Julia Percy''. The ruins are still visible. Captain Watson was a sea cucumber fisherman and during one of his absences, Aboriginal people from the mainland killed one of the servants. Mrs. Watson was only 21 when she arrived at Lizard Island and is famed for her courage and endurance. After the attack, accompanied by her child and the other Chinese servant, she attempted to flee to the mainland in an iron boiling tank (it can be seen in the

Queensland Museum The Queensland Museum is the state museum of Queensland, dedicated to natural history, cultural heritage, science and human achievement. The museum currently operates from its headquarters and general museum in South Brisbane with specialist mu ...

– it is a large rectangular tub) used for boiling sea cucumber. The vessel floated away from the coast and all three died of thirst nine days later on the waterless No 5

Howick Island The Howick Island is the southernmost and a now uninhabited island in the Howick group that is part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in Far North Queensland, Australia. It fell within the territory of the Ithu people in pre-colonial tim ...

. Their bodies were found three months later along with Mrs Watson's diary. The

State Library of Queensland The State Library of Queensland is the main reference and research library provided to the people of the State of Queensland, Australia, by the state government. Its legislative basis is provided by the Queensland Libraries Act 1988. It contai ...

holds two diaries by Mrs Watson. One is about her last 9 months on Lizard Island and the other is notes documenting her last days. In retaliation to the attack, a

punitive expedition A punitive expedition is a military journey undertaken to punish a political entity or any group of people outside the borders of the punishing state or union. It is usually undertaken in response to perceived disobedient or morally wrong behavio ...

was mounted against Aboriginal peoples. In 1939, all of the islands in the group were declared a national park, which is now administered by the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service. The island is also part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, administered jointly by the

Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park protects a large part of Australia's Great Barrier Reef from damaging activities. It is a vast multiple-use Marine Park which supports a wide range of uses, including commercial marine tourism, fishing, ports an ...

and the Queensland Environmental Protection Agency. Permits are required for all manipulative research in the Lizard Island Group and the waters surrounding it.

Heritage listings

Lizard Island has a number of

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and man-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In many ...

sites, including: * Lizard Island:

Mrs Watson's Cottage Mrs Watson's Cottage is a heritage-listed house ruin at Lizard Island National Park, Shire of Cook, Queensland, Australia. It is also known as Stone ruin at Lizard Island. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992. H ...

Lizards

The most commonly found lizard on Lizard Island is the yellow-spotted monitor (''

Varanus panoptes The yellow-spotted monitor (''Varanus panoptes''), also known as the Argus monitor, is a monitor lizard found in northern and western regions of Australia and southern New Guinea. Taxonomy The first description of the species was provided in ...

).''

Current settlement and use

Aside from the national park, Lizard Island also contains a number of other facilities:

Lizard Island Research Station

Situated on Lizard Island's most westerly point, the research station is operated by the

Australian Museum The Australian Museum is a heritage-listed museum at 1 William Street, Sydney central business district, New South Wales, Australia. It is the oldest museum in Australia,Design 5, 2016, p.1 and the fifth oldest natural history museum in the ...

, providing research and education facilities for those interested in studying coral reefs. As a result of research conducted at the station, about 1,000 scientific publications have been produced by Australian and international researchers since the station was set up in 1973.

Lizard Island Resort

On the island's north western side is an ultra

luxury resort Luxury may refer to: *Luxury goods, an economic good or service for which demand increases more than proportionally as income rises *Luxury tax, tax on products not considered essential, such as expensive cars **Luxury tax (sports), surcharge put ...

owned by Hong Kong listed property company Sea Holdings and operated by

Voyages Hotels & Resorts Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia Pty Limited, commonly called Voyages, is a subsidiary business of the Indigenous Land Corporation. Voyages manages tourism and resort facilities in the Northern Territory, in Western Australia and in Queensla ...

until November 2009, the resort is now operated by

Delaware North Delaware North is a global food service and hospitality company headquartered in Buffalo, New York. The company also operates in the lodging, sporting, airport, gambling, and entertainment industries. The company employs over 55,000 people worl ...

. The 40 villa resort focuses on providing seclusion and watersport activities that take advantage of the island's location on the Great Barrier Reef, including diving trips to the nearby Cod Hole.