Reef View Hotel

Rooms and decor

Rooms come in three styles. Coral Sea View is the popular one — on floor 6 and up you look out over Whitsunday Passage to the Whitsunday island opposite. Garden View faces the quieter tropical gardens of Palm Valley, and Marina Side looks the other way. Every room has its own balcony with big glass doors. Open them in the morning and you see Catseye Beach curving in a C, with the tour catamarans heading out of the Marina around 8 am — the Whitsundays postcard you have seen before, in person.

Food and amenities

There are three pools — a large Lagoon Pool in the middle of the hotel, a Kids Pool, and a Spa Pool jacuzzi, plus a sun deck by the beach. Food spreads across four restaurants: Pool Terrace for daytime, Sails for steak and seafood in the evening, Mariners Seafood for fine dining over the Marina, and Coca Chu for Asian fusion. We'd take dinner at Mariners, watch the sun drop over the Marina, then walk back to the room through the gardens.

Location and getting there

Reef View sits on Resort Drive right by Catseye Beach. We flew straight from Sydney into Hamilton Island Airport (HTI) in 2 hours 30 minutes, then walked out and caught the free Resort Shuttle — 10 minutes to the door. The airport is on the island itself, so no ferry. The other route is a flight to Whitsunday Coast Airport (PPP) and the ferry from Airlie Beach. The other thing that makes Reef View the best value here is the Hamilton Island Resort Network: free golf buggies and shuttles, partial access to the spa and the small Wild Life park, and a Tour Desk that books the Whitehaven Beach trips and the Heart Reef scenic flight.

Things to know before booking

It is not cheap — rooms start around $247 a night, and you reach the island by flying into HTI or taking the ferry from Airlie Beach. It is also a large 386-room hotel, so it feels busier than the adults-only Beach Club next door, which has just 57 rooms. And there is no kitchen in the room, so you eat at the resort restaurants the whole trip and the food bills mount up.

Our take

Reef View suits families and couples who want the full Hamilton Island Resort experience in one place — a Coral Sea-view room, Catseye Beach, several pools, and Resort Network access across the island. If this trip is mainly about Hamilton Island — diving Heart Reef, getting out to Whitehaven Beach, a round at the Dent Island golf course — Reef View is the main pick, and the best value for the money at roughly $247 to $430 a night.