How many Perth families can afford $1500 a night to stay at Rotto’s newest lodging?

My late mother was besotted with Rottnest. In the ’80s, we’d bundle over there when finances would allow and stay in one of the basic self-contained beachfront cabins. Even then, an annual holiday to the idyllic island was a bit more than our household budget could stomach.

Mum’s affection for Rottnest continued into her 60s. She snorkelled on the island with her best friends every year and stayed at the Karma Rottnest Lodge. And she’d wrangle the five grandchildren to stay for a night or two each summer.

The grandkids playing at the old Karma Rottnest Lodge.Credit: Sarah Brookes

The Lodge was affordable for two adults and a mob of kids. They’d food camel at the buffet breakfast before a busy day of riding to the bays and beaches and bakery.

Before she passed away in 2022 from cancer, mum asked me to keep the grandkids together and to continue the week-long January sojourn to Moore River and Rotto. They’d always been close thanks to her knack for roping the family in on her adventures.

So with stage one of the $25 million refurbished Lodge Wadjemup done and dusted, bookings opened over the weekend ahead of its opening in March.

I jumped online. Just shy of $1500 a night for the family room. Nearly $6000 for four nights. The room allows up to six guests, but that comes with a $100-a-night charge for a roll-away bed for the fifth and sixth guest. The dead of winter is more affordable, at $848 a night.

The cheapest option for a family of four during the first week of the April school holidays was a room – sans air-conditioning – with two bunk beds at $483 a night. A poolside suite for four is $790 a night, or $3160 for four nights.

Lodge Wadjemup general manager Jeremy Nordkamp said room rates were calculated using a dynamic pricing model based on the time of year and market demand.

“Factors such as major events being hosted on the island, on-site weddings or conferences, long weekends or the school holiday period and the season contribute to the average nightly room rate,” she said.

Nordkamp said rates started at $320 per night for a four-person room with two bunk beds. During off-peak times, that would drop to $250 a night.

The new lodge will feature two swimming pools.

But the affordable options are drying up on WA’s premier island getaway.

Back in 2022, the cost for a family to stay in one of Rottnest Island’s glamping tents near Pinky Bay skyrocketed as operator Discovery Parks looked to recoup more than $1 million in losses sustained during the pandemic.

When bookings opened, the Rottnest Island Authority hoped the new accommodation would dampen criticism the island’s self-contained units were expensive and at times difficult to secure. But demand for those lofty prices has waned.

A Discovery Resorts spokesman said its expected occupancy sat around 85 per cent through the December and January holiday period, similar to the previous year.

Boats mooring at Rottnest on a busy summer day.

“The resumption of international and cost pressures impacting households has slightly impacted demand over the past two years, a trend which emerged last summer, and we expect to continue this year,” he said.

“While average daily rate has remained relatively stable over the past two years, increased availability offers more opportunity for customers to find a great deal over the peak summer period owing to our demand-based pricing model.”

When WAtoday crunched the numbers last year on the cost of a tent for a family of four to stay four nights across all price points, the cheapest option was a superior tent for four nights priced at $4165.

A week-long stay in a deluxe family tent would set you back $17,290. The cheapest option was a standard tent that only sleeps two for $3765.

The prices for a stay during the working week on Rottnest during the first week of the April school holidays has almost halved to $2665.

This summer, Rottnest Island is gearing up for its busiest season on record with new businesses offering guided cycling tours, handcrafted ice-cream, sailing adventures on a pearl lugger, beachside wellness programs, late night ferry services and major infrastructure projects completed.

The state government had set a visitation target of 800,000 for Rottnest by 2034. It’s already hit that target, with 823,000 visitors to the island last financial year, partly thanks to Tourism Minister Rita Saffiotti unashamedly promoting Rottnest to the rest of the world and making sure visitors went home with a quokka selfie.

Once upon a time, Rottnest was my family’s peaceful getaway. But it’s now too expensive for many and over-commercialised as a tsunami of tourists swamps the no longer car-free island.

What attracted me to Rottnest in the 80s, and what I wanted my children to experience, is rapidly being lost as more resort-style options spring up to cater for ever-increasing crowds.

It’s become harder to escape those crowds, with packed ferries and private boat flotillas filling the bays on warm days. It’s even hard to find a place to plonk down at the pub.

And as for the 10,000 quokkas that call the island home? It’s become harder to live the quiet life when you’re flanked by an army of amateur snappers waiting for their turn for a coveted Insta-worthy selfie.

In this cost-of-living crisis it might be time to say bon voyage to that annual summer trip with the grandkids, or pray to the weather gods and head to Rotto in the depths of winter.

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