Best time to visit the Whitsundays for a boat tour, month by month

If you can pick a month for a Whitsundays boat tour, pick one of these four. The south-east trade wind blows most afternoons at fifteen to twenty knots, which is exactly what a sailing yacht wants, and the air is dry, so the water over the fringing reef at Hook Island is at its clearest. Days sit in the mid-twenties, evenings on deck ask for a jumper, and the sea stays at twenty-three or twenty-four degrees, warm enough for an hour in the water.

From July to September humpback whales pass through the islands on their way north and back, and the overnight yachts see them from the deck in the channels. It is the one season when the sail between anchorages is as good as the anchorages.

It is also the busiest season, and the Australian winter school holidays fall in July. Our top pick at $372 carries small groups and fills weeks ahead; book it as soon as your dates are fixed.

The wind eases through spring and the water warms past twenty-six degrees by November. The days get longer, the whales are gone by the end of September, and the water keeps most of winter’s clarity until the first summer showers. Stinger suits go on from October on every boat, which most people find they want anyway for the sun.

Outside the September school holidays it is a quiet month at the beach, and the day cruises from $170 have the lookout to themselves more often. A good season for people who want the sailing without the winter crowds, and for the scenic flights, which have calmer air as the wind drops.

Summer in the Whitsundays is thirty degrees, humid, and the warmest sea of the year at twenty-eight or twenty-nine. Showers come in the afternoon, usually short and heavy, and clear to blue sky within the hour. The islands turn a deep green, the waterfalls on the mainland run, and outside the Christmas weeks the beach is quieter than at any other time.

Every boat supplies a stinger suit, and the crew asks you to wear it in the water; it is thin, it keeps the sun off, and after the first swim nobody notices it. The day cruises with shade and a buffet, like the eco-cruise at $178, are the comfortable summer answer; the overnight yachts run all summer and the warm nights are the ones people sleep on deck.

The reef is warmest and the fish are most active. If the postcard version of the Whitsundays is the white sand and the turquoise water, summer delivers it with the fewest other boats in the frame.

The showers thin out through March, and by the middle of April the humidity has dropped, the trade winds are back and the water over the reef is clearing. May is the quiet start of the dry season, before the winter school holidays, and one of the best-value months on the water: winter conditions, spring crowds.

Stinger suits are still supplied until the end of May, and the sea is still warm at twenty-five or twenty-six degrees. It is the month the operators themselves take their holidays before the season, which tells you something about how good it is.

Go between June and September for the Whitsundays at their best on the water: trade winds, clear reef, whales, and cool evenings on deck. Go in April, May, October or November for most of that with fewer people. Go in summer for the warmest sea and the emptiest beach and wear the stinger suit. In every month, book our top pick at $372 a few weeks ahead, because the boats are small and the beach is the same in all of them.