Christmas Island is a unique Australian territory located in the Indian Ocean. It's not part of Western Australia as we thought (although WA laws apply and that state provides health and education), but an overseas territory. We discovered that truth when we found out that our flight from Perth was to leave from the International Terminal. Luckily check-in accepted our Driver Licenses! The island was named on guess what day in 1643 by Captain William Mynors of the East India Company on a regular spice trade journey from the East Indies, now Indonesia. He never landed but noted how inhospitable it looked. Though mapped, CI remained largely unexplored for centuries due to its unwelcoming limestone cliffs and dense rainforest. It was eventually annexed by the British in 1888 after the discovery of rich phosphate deposits, by HMS Egeria which finally found a safe enough anchorage. The Egeria's boat was called Flying Fish. To extract the guano-based phosphate, the British imported labor from Singapore, Malaya, and China, creating a multicultural society that persists today. Of the current 1,600 residents, a significant portion is of Chinese and Malay descent, alongside an Australian "expat" community. A Malay Kampong near Flying Fish Cove forms the heart of the island's current Muslim community.
CI gained international prominence in the early 2000s due to the North West Point Immigration Detention Centre. Built to process asylum seekers and keep them off the mainland, the facility has been a focal point of Australia’s border politics. It has cycled through periods of being active, dormant, and repurposed for quarantine, and it remains a significant but controversial part of the island's modern infrastructure. At the time of our visit, we believe the centre is empty of "customers" but costing a fortune to maintain.
Despite the industrial and political footprints, 63% of CI is National Park. Extensive efforts are underway to protect its 250 endemic species from threats like Yellow Crazy Ants and feral cats. Today, the island stands as a fascinating intersection of industrial history, cultural diversity, and world-class conservation. It enjoys and protects incredible endemic wildlife.
Christmas Island is 1600km from the nearest part of the Australian mainland, but only 355km from the nearest part of Indonesia and 495km from its capital, Jakarta. Given that Indonesia is a country of 17,000 islands, adding another one might have been both trivial and logical, but the greedy British got there first when in 1888 it was "annexed" by the Crown, and were not giving it away! Japanese forces occupied the island during World War 2, after which the British put Singapore in charge. Singapore's independence in 1959 made that untenable, and by some arrangement Australia bought the island for £2.8 million, paid as compensation to Singapore for the loss of future phosphate royalties.
The Island's Claim to Fame...
Life on Christmas Island is dictated by a unique biological clock linked to the tropical seasons and the lunar cycle. The most spectacular manifestation of this is the annual Red Crab spawning which has made the island famous. Due to bad timing, we were on CI about 3 weeks before spawning began. After an arduous march from the forest to the coast, female Red Crabs wait for a very specific window to release their eggs. It's always during the last quarter of the moon on a receding high tide just before dawn. The salt water causes the eggs to hatch instantly upon contact, creating a literal "black cloud" of larvae in the shallows. A month later, when conditions are right, millions of tiny megalops (baby crabs) emerge from the sea to begin their own long march back into the jungle. During these migrations, island roads are closed, and specialized "crab bridges" and underpasses are utilized to ensure the millions of travelers can reach their detsination safely. Inconveniencing humans to protect these natural rhythms must be quite rare in our world!
Mining, the good, the bad and the ugly...
Phosphate mining has been the "lifeblood" of Christmas Island's economy and community for over 120 years, shaping both its cultural identity and, unfortunately, the physical landscape. The island's deposits were originally discovered as guano that had accumulated over thousands of years. Today, the rock phosphate is processed for high-grade fertilizers and specialized chemical compounds. Commercial mining began in 1899 after the British annexed the island for its mineral wealth. Since 1990, the mine has been operated local commercial enterprises. Mining is expected to wind down by 2030 as economically viable reserves are depleted. Phosphate is mined on the southern plateau and historically transported by conveyors to the port at Flying Fish Cove. A railway was closed in 1987. After dring and crushing, most of the High Grade Rock Phosphate (rich in calcium) is shipped to Indonesia and Malaysia, some to New Zealand and the mainland, the current volumes being up to 600kt/a. Despite efforts to diversify, the island remains heavily dependent on this single industry, being about 40% of the island's economy and directly and indirectly employing 45% of the island's total workforce. Historical mining stripped away rainforest to reveal jagged limestone pinnacles, leaving the land largely unusable for traditional agriculture, but a dedicated Mine-site to Forest Rehabilitation (CIMFR) program uses royalties from the mining company to replant these "scars" and restore them to native rainforest.
Land of Endemics...
Our decision to visit Christmas Island was opportunistic - we were in Western Australia, so why not? Everyone knows of the detention centre and the annual crab march, but being here, we discovered that it is a true ornithological wonder, often referred to as the Galapagos of the Indian Ocean, due to its extraordinary density of unique avian life. The island's extreme isolation has allowed evolution to run its own course, resulting in a remarkable number of endemic species and subspecies that are found nowhere else on Earth. Of the approximately 80 species of birds recorded here, several are the island's exclusive residents, including several endangered varieties, none of whom we saw. Perhaps most famous is the Abbott’s Booby, a prehistoric-looking seabird that nests only in the tall emergent trees of the island's plateau rainforest, and the telegenic Golden Bosunbird (a unique color morph of White-tailed Tropicbird) that has become the unofficial symbol of the island. We managed to capture (photographically) both of these.
The island serves as a vital sanctuary for massive breeding colonies of seabirds that rely on the towering limestone cliffs and dense forest canopies for protection. Many species exhibit a striking lack of fear toward humans, allowing for close-up portraits that would be difficult elsewhere. The birdlife here represents a raw and unfiltered window into an ecosystem that remains one of the most significant tropical seabird rookeries in the world.
Preserving the Australian Galapagos
Christmas Island rivals the Galapagos for its diversity of endemic species, those seen nowhere else in the world. But it has also fallen prey to invasive creatures which threaten the endemics' very existence. Accordingly, the island has become a massive open-air laboratory for invasive pest management. The invaders include feral cats, with a program due for (successful?) completion in 2026. Trapping methodologies include so called gantry traps (elevated beyond the reach of Robber Crabs who would otherwise take the bait) and grooming traps which use AI to identify passing cats, then spray them with something nasty which the cats lick off. The program is currently in the "mopping up" phase, using specialized methods to catch the final remaining ferals.
We saw none of this but there is also a joint program between the Shire and National Park to manage black rats, which are a huge threat to ground-nesting birds. They use specialized bait stations, also designed to be crab-proof. And there is a Yellow Crazy Ant Suppression Program uses a biological control (a micro-wasp?) to reduce the population of certain insects, which in turn starves the crazy ants of the "honeydew" they need to form "supercolonies" that kill the island's precious Red Crabs.
We had the opportunity to visit the premises of two conservation programs. Christmas Island was once home to six native reptile species, but five of them have been all but lost to cats and snakes. A Reptile Captive Breeding Program started in 2009 with 43 Lister's geckos and 66 blue-tailed skinks and the hope is to return an expanded population to the wild. Similarly with the Christmas Island Bird Rescue facility which is a hospital for injured or abandoned birds with the objective of "release". CI is a high-altitude plateau with sheer cliffs, young seabirds are vulnerable during their first attempts at flight. If a fledgling "crash-lands" in the jungle or on a road, it often cannot get enough lift to take off again from the ground. Without the Rescue Program, these birds would succumb to exhaustion, dehydration, or the island's predatory Yellow Crazy Ants. The general protocol here is rehydrate, feed, excercise and release. Because the birds cannot take off from flat ground, once they are healthy, the rangers or volunteers drive them to cliff edges where they are held up into the wind until they instinctively take flight and rejoin the wild population.
The Beaches of Christmas Island
While none of them will be mistaken for the manicured sands of Bondi, the beaches of Christmas Island offer a raw, untamed charm if not great swimming opportunities. From the industrial backdrop of the Flying Fish Cove port to the dramatic, limestone-enclosed pocket of Merriel Beach, secluded enough for a skinny-dip, each beach feels like a private discovery. Greta Beach is a sad and sobering reminder of the island's position in the Indian Ocean currents — it's a magnet for ocean-borne rubbish, and both locals and visitors are encouraged (and provided bags) to assist in the cleanup. A highlight, however, is the trek to Dolly Beach, a place that feels like the edge of the world. Once you emerge from the jungle boardwalk, you aren't just met by turquoise rockpools; you are greeted by the local "welcoming committee" of Robber Crabs emerging from a rim of coconut trees. These massive, inquisitive giants are everywhere — patrolling the coconut groves and showing zero hesitation when it comes to raiding your towels or gear for snacks. It's a surreal experience to have to defend your lunch from the world's largest land-living arthropods while trying to cool off in the rockpools.
Swell Lodge
Someone we met in Tahiti recommended we stay at Swell Lodge, so we did! Swell Lodge is a striking example of remote luxury perched on dramatic sea cliffs on CI's western coast at Martin Point. It's closest neighbour is the Detention Centre! Swell holds the distinction of being the first and only eco-accommodation approved inside an Australian federally-managed national park. The lodge was a labour of love for award-winning wildlife photographer Chris Bray and his then-wife Jess, who painstakingly hand-built the luxury eco-chalets in 2017–2018, carrying materials through the jungle to minimize the environmental footprint. We didn't meet Chris - he was on safari in Africa. We were in one of only two solar-powered, glass-fronted villas and our balcony was a front-row seat to the Indian Ocean, where seabirds soared by at eye level. We stayed at Swell for a week, and the other lodge had guests for less than half that time. The solar-power had some deficiency, and our only hot water came from a small generator hidden somewhere in the bush, far enough away that we couldn't hear it, that Jazz had to turn on and off every day. Swell promised us a private, all-inclusive experience of Christmas Island, which was delivered, more or less, led by an expert guide, Jazz, with gourmet meals to be prepared by a private chef. He struggled somewhat to fulfil his duties because he suffered an injury in a football match the day we arrived. Jazz did her best, but she was no chef, and we were relieved when the real chef, whose name we have forgotten, bravely came back on deck. Despite the wheels falling off, we had a swell time at Swell and would recommend it. To our knowledge, Swell is on the market and may well be in new hands by now, so the package offered may be different.
Via Cocos Islands
The story of our stay at Christmas Island would not be complete without a mention of the saga of getting there. At the time, the only island servicing Christmas Island is Virgin, one flight in any out twice a week with a round-trip distance of 6850km, three times the distance across Australia between Sydney and Perth. This is no domestic hop! Our route went via Learmonth(an air-force base) for refuelling and Cocos & Keeling Islands. Unfortunately the latter is as far as we got! The aircraft had some technical issue, and the crew exceeded their hours. So a whole planeful had to overnight on a tiny coral atoll with no hotels and a resident population of 600, mostly Malays. While we were very critical of the lack of communication from Virgin, the local staff managed this situation with apolomb, getting mattresses to accommodate single men in the jail and on a club floor, and raiding AirBnBs for something better for families. We, being an elderly couple, were put up in a granny flat within walking distance of the airport. Virgin paid for this, we assume, or at least we were not asked for any money. Food was another matter, but Salty's Bakery at the airport must have had a big freezer and served us all three meals. They made money, of course, but deserve commendation. The next day, because of mis-information followed by no information from the airline, we could not leave the airport. To make matters worse, there is no telephone service on Cocos, and WiFi only at the airport, but it was overwhelmed. Virgin finally managed a takeoff 30 hours late. We didn't bother trying to recover the lost one night's accommodation at Christmas from Virgin. The joys of travel!
Disclaimer: I don't claim any expertise on birds, and indeed on the places that I visit. The "factual" information relayed in this and other pages are usually souced from guides (the human variety), guides (the written variety), local signage and from online sources. I find Wikipedia a great resource for historical information on places and things, and I use Merlin for bird identification which I am hopeless at. Increasingly, some artificial intelligence source, like Gemini or Copilot, is useful for all of these purposes. I sometimes use Photoshop or Lightroom to remove unwanted features like lightpoles or powerlines, and when really desperate I will use Generative AI to fix up a major problem with an image. When I do the last thing, I will usually say so in the image caption. All images are mine except for when I have to borrow someone else's in which case I will give credit.