Coral Sea

10 records, all Australian, all on or beside the Great Barrier Reef. The reef governs everything here, including what may be built: national park boundaries, marine park zoning and permit regimes decide where a resort can put a jetty, and several islands in this register are national park with a lease on one bay.

That produces an unusual arrangement — islands shared with science rather than with settlements. Lizard has an Australian Museum research station, Orpheus a James Cook University one, Heron a research station older than the resort. The register records these as shared islands, and the sharing improves the place rather than diminishing it: the briefings are better because someone is measuring.

Cyclones are the region's clock. Hayman has been rebuilt twice, Bedarra more than once, and the current buildings are engineered to a standard the originals were not. The season that matters is the one to avoid.