Great Barrier Reef island visited by Captain Cook set to fetch $20m

It was visited by Captain Cook on May 30, 1770, when he disembarked HMS Endeavour and set foot on the island while on a journey up the Queensland coast, following his historic landing at Botany Bay a month earlier.

Looking for fresh water, he climbed a hill on the eastern tip of the island, where he concluded that iron ore in the hill (which he later named Pier Hill) caused the needle of his compass to deviate sharply from true north.

“The loose stones that lay upon the Ground had no effect upon the needle; I therefore concluded that it must be owing to the Iron Ore upon the Hill, visible signs of which appeared not only here, but in several other places,” he wrote.

Quail Island has operated as a farming property since the 1940s, when it was acquired by Charlie and Vena Vaughan, part of a prominent family based at Stanage at the time.

In the 1960s it was operated as a cattle station by a partnership that included Sydney lawyer Bill McNally. In 1997, Mr McNally bought back the property at auction from receivers (after the partnership was dissolved) for $475,000.

In 2020, Mr McNally sold Quail Island for $2 million to Anthony Macallister, Crystin Cann and their family, who used it to farm goats.

Selling agent Virgil Kenny from Elders told The Australian Financial Review the island had been independently valued at $24 million, but that the vendors were not seeking that much.

“We expect it to sell in the $18 million to $20 million range,” Mr Kenny said.

While Quail Island has operated as a farm, Mr Kenny said it would also appeal to lifestyle buyers given its natural attributes.

A short boat ride from Stanage across Thirsty Sound, Quail Island includes a one-kilometre airstrip. It is subdivided into nine main paddocks and has cattle and goat yards.

Accommodation comprises a four-bedroom main homestead with views over the Pacific Ocean, a four-bedroom manager’s residence and a three-bedroom workers’ cottage. Power comes from a solar array.

Cattle station on the market

In the Northern Territory, Filipino businessman Romeo Roxas has put the last of his big cattle stations on the market after listing 559,000-hectare Murray Downs, north of Alice Springs, for about $40 million.

Mr Roxas, now 85, made his big move into Australia’s cattle industry almost a decade ago when paid more than $20 million for Murray Downs and 265,000-hectare Epenarra Station.

In 2015, as he was sealing these acquisitions, Mr Roxas told The Australian Financial Review he viewed Northern Australia “like America 200 years ago”.

“Australia has not really paid too much attention to it, but the north has vast resources and potential which is untapped.”

His investments in the two cattle stations came at a time when offshore capital was pouring into the sector, including from the likes of China’s Shanghai CRED Real Estate, which bought the Kidman portfolio with mining magnate Gina Rinehart in 2016.

Despite seeing untapped potential in Northern Australia, Mr Roxas sold Epenarra Station to bull breeders David and Suzanne Bassingthwaighte in 2019 for more than $14 million.

While Mr Roxas still has smaller farming investments in NSW, selling agent David Russell from Nutrien Harcourts Cobar said Murray Downs was the last remaining cattle station in his Australian portfolio.

Located in the Lower Barkly Downs region, about 400 kilometres from Alice Springs, Murray Downs is being offered on a walk-in walk-out basis that includes 10,000 head of Santa Gertrudis breeding cattle, a Cessna 172 airplane and road train.

Infrastructure works undertaken by Mr Roxas’ Australian Green Properties during its period of ownership include the construction of 70 kilometres of a new laneway system and 310 kilometres of new barbwire fencing.