Calls for Coast to host whale festival
STATE Tourism Minister Kate Jones has backed calls from leading whale-watching operators and researchers for a new festival celebrating the annual humpback migration on the Gold Coast.
Griffith University whale researcher and co-founder of volunteer group Humpbacks and Highrises Dr Jan-Olaf Meynecke said the city should be celebrated as the “number one spot” to view the massive mammals in Australia.
It comes as an estimated 32,000 whales will travel past the Glitter Strip this year, with the whale population continuing to grow after almost being hunted to extinction last century.
Dr Meynecke said the introduction of a two-day or week-long festival promoting the creatures and designated observation platforms along the coast would be a tourism drawcard like similar events in Byron Bay and Hervey Bay.
Dr Meynecke said a festival could be held during the peak whale watching period in August – when whales are travelling both north and south past the Coast – and would benefit fledging whale watching operators because larger companies often book out during those weeks.
“The Gold Coast is the number one spot for whale watching in the country,” Dr Meynecke said.
“We have 80,000 to 100,000 people coming to whale watch per season.
“Stopping the hunting of whales and protecting them is a success story we need to tell.”
Sea World Whale Watch general manager David Robertson said a festival would be a boon to the city and there was merit in installing lookouts instructing visitors and tourists how to spot whales.
He said the Gold Coast is an ideal spot because the vast majority of the whales were “funnelled” towards the city as they travelled around Cape Bryon and Point Danger, with many swimming within 2km of the coastline.
“I fully support it, even viewing platforms along the coast,” Mr Robertson said.
“It’s phenomenal how so many whales travel past the city, when they turn the corner at Byron Bay and around Point Danger they’re all funnelled right past the Coast.”
But he said the industry needed to be united to support the festival.
“We need to be co-operative, which is what they have done in Hervey Bay,” Mr Robertson said.
Spirit of Gold Coast spokes-
“It’s phenomenal how so many whales travel past the city.”
woman Angela Del Bianco welcomed the opportunity to celebrate the whales.
Minister Jones said she supported the calls for an annual festival.
“The latest industry research tells us today’s tourists are looking for unique experiences. They want to experience something they can’t get anywhere else,” Ms Jones said. “That’s why it makes sense for the tourism industry to get behind an annual festival to celebrate the whale watching season on the Gold Coast.”
A Destination Gold Coast spokesman said the organisation was interested in exploring the idea of a festival – as long as it was bigger and better than any other festival in Australia.
“The more people who know how accessible whale watching is on the Gold Coast, the better,” the spokesman said. “There are other whale festivals in Australia though – at Eden, Phillip Island, Sydney and Hervey Bay, to name a few – so what we do on the Gold Coast would have to be bigger and better. But it is an idea worth exploring.
“Perhaps there is a way to also advantage of our ocean-facing high-rises as perfect whale-spotting platforms during the migration season.”
HERVEY Bay tourism operators have profited for decades off the story that humpback whales make the long journey from the Antarctic to breed in their waters.
The story is true to the extent that numbers of whales do calve and hang around – but generally not within ready view of Hervey Bay’s beachside suburbs. If you want to see whales there, you board a whale-watching tour and travel a long way across the bay to the calm waters near Fraser Island.
But whales breed and frolic in other waters too, especially the Gold Coast and all the way up the coastline to the northern Great Barrier Reef. Humpbacks like to spread the love.
Hervey Bay has its Ocean Festival next month, which in effect is a whale festival.
Gold Coast whale-watching businesses are popular with tourists for an up-close experience, and as reported today they also assist researchers in monitoring the health and movement of whales and in assessing growing population numbers.
Griffith University expert Dr Jan-Olaf Meynecke co-ordinates much of that, and was instrumental in setting up Humpbacks and High-rises, a citizens’ network that keeps an eye out for humpbacks migrating past and in many instances, calving and using our waters for rest and recreation.
Dr Meynecke can see enormous potential in the Gold Coast celebrating the magnificent mammals with its own whale festival. His suggestion to the Bulletin has been quickly embraced, grabbing the imagination of Tourism Minister Kate Jones and Gold Coast Tourism, and we’re sure the entire Gold Coast. It is a great idea for a city constantly seeking new ways to celebrate its assets and good fortune and, as Dr Meynecke says, it can be broadened to host scientific gatherings too.
An estimated 32,000 whales will pass through our waters this season. Many swim close inshore and are clearly visible from our beaches, headlands and high-rise apartments. A dedicated lookout would be a wonderful tourism asset, particularly if it included educational information and highpowered telescopes.
There are risks. The whale that trapped itself in a shark net off Burleigh yesterday was cause for concern, but our city and the State Government must protect surfers and swimmers. A fatal shark attack on our beaches would destroy decades of hard work and the safety record built since the nets were first installed in the 1960s.