Woody Island is located 15 kilometres (9 mi) from the town of Esperance

Esperance, Western Australia

Esperance is a large town in the Goldfields-Esperance region of Western Australia, located on the Southern Ocean coastline approximately east-southeast of the state capital, Perth. The shire of Esperance is home to 9,536 people as of the 2006 census, its major industries are tourism, agriculture,...

. The island is part of the Archipelago of the Recherche and is listed as a nature reserve

Nature reserve

A nature reserve is a protected area of importance for wildlife, flora, fauna or features of geological or other special interest, which is reserved and managed for conservation and to provide special opportunities for study or research...

. Woody Island is the only island of the archipelago that is open to visitors, it is accessible by daily island cruises and has accommodation available. The island itself is reasonably small in size, about 1.5 kilometre (0.93205910497471 mi) in length with a total area of 240 hectares (593 acre). Facilities on the island include an interpretive centre, a cafe, a swimming platform with a slide and a snorkelling trail. Woody Island received over 16,000 visitors in 2003/2004.

Further reading

• Goodsell, J., A. Tingay and S.R. Tingay.(1976) A resource survey of Woody Island, Archipelago of the Recherche Perth. Dept. of Fisheries and Wildlife. Report (Western Australia. Dept. of Fisheries and Wildlife) ; no. 21.