Dunk Island Resort is back on the market with owner Adam Bond to sell the resort on Dunk Island located off Mission Beach on the Great Barrier Reef,
With recent island sales and upgrades on the Great Barrier Reef the sale of Dunk Island Resort could get strong interest.
Adam’s father, Peter Bond had taken over the island after Cyclone Yasi, that was one of the biggest cyclones on record, had ripped the resort apart back in 2011 and paid a reported AUD $7.5 million for the island freehold at the time. In early 2016 ownership was taken over by Peter Bond’s son Adam.
The Bond family had one of the biggest tasks to undertake in the history of Dunk Island Resort to clean up the resort after Cyclone Yasi badly damaged the island and that was never going to be easy. There still remains much more work to do before the resort will be open for business.
In 2014 the leased spit area was reopened to the public and there were plans to build “shipwrecks” that had included an area for concerts to bring in well known bands and artist from around the globe.
Back in 2018 the Dunk Island Spit Tender was awarded to Experience Co, who own local skydiving and rafting companies, when the Cassowary Coast Regional Council considered tender submissions for the Dunk Island Spit camping and recreation area at a special meeting in March 2018.
According to owner Adam Bond in 2017 the rebuilding of the resort should have been competed early 2018 and the resort would be reopened to the public. These plans never happened and the resort to this date has never reopened.
Adam Bond said at the time “We are currently finalising the building contracts. This has taken a little longer than we would have liked however, we are working hard to have resort fully operational by The first quarter of 2018. This includes 86 rooms, The golf course, 4 bars and eateries and some new facilities”
In September 2017 marked the return of the Dunk Island Billfish Classic after years of the event not being held on the Cassowary Coast. It was great to have the return of this event, bringing people back to Mission Beach and Dunk island and the region as a whole. Events such as this play an important role in tourism for the local area. Some area’s of the resort were reopened to the public for that weekend of the Dunk Island Billfish Classic.
Someone with deep pockets who buys Dunk Island Resort will be able to have the jewel of the Great Barrier Reef. The small near by community of Mission Beach needs Dunk Island Resort reopened as soon as possible to increase local tourism numbers and help bring in more money to the small businesses.
After the resort closed in 2011, the Mission Beach area has been on a slow down hill path with many businesses closing or changing hands
Recently a new small marina was approved in Mission Beach and currently being built at Clump Point. Also, Castaways Resort & Spa last year were given approval for a $70 million staged redevelopment of their beach front resort.
There are things happening in the local area, to have Dunk Island Resort reopened to the public would be like a heart transplant for tourism in Mission Beach. Many in the community believes that without Dunk Island Resort the area can not get back to the good days of the 1990’s when the area was booming.
A reported sale to a cryptocurrency consortium Property Bay last year did not proceed. Their plan was to develop a AUD $500 million mega resort on the island, that was funded by Bitcoins, with the first stage to raise $100 million to begin their project. A project of it’s proposed size raised to many questions in the local community as it was not a good fit to the World Heritage listed area.
It seems that the Property Bay website can not be reached and the website for their Dunk Island project is now showing paid ads to other websites not related to Property Bay, their Facebook page Dunk Island Project is still currently live promoting their project. Requests for a statement go unanswered by Co Founder Tim Sommers.
