The Best Job in the World

Yesterday¹ was Australia Day, when each January 26th, Australians crack open some beers and toss another shrimp on the barbie to celebrate their arrival on the world’s smallest continent all the way back in 1788.

Australia has many wonderful things to celebrate, not least in being the location for the claimed best job in the world, which is a post that requires the successful applicant to take up residence on the tropical Hamilton Island, off the Queensland coast.

The job was offered a couple of weeks ago and the story quickly spread round the entire web², as it promises the winning applicant the role of “caretaker” – which basically amounts to a bit of blogging, feeding some fish, and collecting the island’s mail. No formal qualifications are required, but candidates must be willing to swim, snorkel, dive and sail.

For completing these duties, (which amount to 12 hours a month of actual “work”), the successful applicant will receive a salary of A$150,000 ($103,000, £70,000) for six months, and get to live rent-free in a three-bedroom villa, complete with pool.

It turns out that Hamilton Island is a lot more densely populated³ than the promotional materials would have you believe – meaning that we weren’t able to determine which is the actual villa where the successful applicant will reside – but there’s loads of nice ones to choose from. Infinity pool anyone?

Hamilton Island is the second largest inhabited island of the Whitsunday Islands, and is in fact dedicated almost exclusively to tourism. Anybody fancy some go-karting?

There’s lots of other islands to explore here, including Dent Island where they’re building a golf course, or Whitsunday Island, where on Whitehaven beach we find a couple of seaplanes, a beach party and… is that a helicopter?

Also worth mentioning is Hayman Island, which is home to a resort built by Reg Ansett, which features its own harbor and several helipads. Of course, there are at least 3 swimming pools and even a recursive pool-in-a-pool (on an island).

If you’re thinking that the Whitsunday Islands might be a good place to spend a few months, then you’ve got until the 22nd of February to apply.

Thanks to our Austrian (no, I’ve not misspelled that) correspondent, Al Cohole.