Put this one on the Bucket List. After many landings at Whitsunday Airport, Shute Harbour, staying at Airlie Beach over the years, we finally made room on a safari for a few days at the much celebrated holiday destination of Hamilton Island.
Before flying in, I figured this one could well be a potentially busy airport, frequented by all sorts of tourism air traffic, so I did lots of homework, called the tower and spoke to ATC and learned it was just a normal Class D airport surrounded by water! It’s got a dedicated VTC so there are no mysteries, and ATC could not have been more helpful. On our last trip, we landed on a day with fairly low cloud, and right from our initial contact on the instrument approach, the guy in Hammo Tower greeted us like a favourite bartender.
What a treat to land on a tropical island! Securing your landing and multi-night parking permission on Hamilton takes a bit of paperwork, so get onto that before you leave home. Once that’s out of the way, there are no surprises.
The amount of air traffic you’re likely to encounter on your visit could range from dead quiet to festively busy, as the tower deals with RPT jets, scenic heli and fixed wing flights and itinerant pilots touring the Whitsunday Islands. Call ahead and ask when it’s likely to be quiet.
It is staggeringly beautiful flying around Hamilton, Hayman, South Molle, Daydream Islands, and of course the iconic Whitehaven Beach which looks like a postcard from the air. On our departure, we did a clockwise route around all these, before hitting the coastline again and heading back inland to the outback to continue our winter safari.
