Rottnest Island Information

Rottnest is an ideal spot to get away from it all and have a holiday away from the everyday and experience a simpler kind of living, even if just for a while.

There is plenty to do on Rottnest, with both natural and heritage attractions in plentiful supply.

The hotel known as the Quokka Arms was built in the mid 1800's and is still going strong. The cemetery and it's associated heritage walk are also worth a visit, telling tales of some of the early european visitors to the island including a monument in honour of Willem de Vlamingh, a dutch seaman who visited Rottnest in 1696. The view from the top of the trail is spectacular. There are also walking tours around some of the best examples of colonial architecture on Rottnest, it takes in some of the fascinating history of the islands pioneers and history as a prison. Take a walk around the heritage trail at Oliver's Hill where WWII concrete gun emplacements, war rooms and underground tunnels still survive.

Rottnest has had it's fair share of shipwrecks over the years and these have become an attraction in their own right. The Rottnest Wrecks Heritage Trail is a walk that marks the locations of the local wrecks.

Another of the unusual natural attractions are a group of lakes in the north-east of the island. Known as the "Salt Lakes" many are actually fresh water and attract heaps of wildlife to the area. On the western side is Cape Vlamingh a fantastic vantage point to gaze across the Indian Ocean as it crashes across the reef. Looking west there is uninterupted ocean all the way to Madagascar almost 6500 kilometres away.

Explore the Oliver's Hill Heritage Trail. The concrete gun emplacements, underground tunnels, magazines, engine rooms and plotting rooms are some of the best examples of a World War II defence system.