First impressions count, and never more so than in the business of luxury retreats. Wow me. Woo me. Make me go “Ooh”.

So, after arriving at a small gravel car park close to South Mandu beach, I waited patiently for Amy - a tanned eco-sprite dressed in khaki - to unload my luggage from the minibus and somehow deliver me into the Sal Salis resort.

I stood in the glassy West Australian sunshine, surrounded by white dunes dotted with low, olive-coloured shrubs. Amy indicated a small path leading off into the sands. “You might see some wallabies,” she said, brightly.

I pointed at the little gravel track.

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“I have to . . ?”

“Yes,” she said. “You mean . . ?” “Yes.” “Walk?” “Yes, walk.” I strolled into the dunes. And, sure enough, there were wallabies - just yards away, watching me with their soft, long-lashed eyes. Hotfooted lizards scribbled sentences in the sand. A kestrel hovered. And I became aware of the deep, low rumble of waves crashing on a reef wall.

After 50yd, I entered a camp of six large tents and a lodge made of wood and canvas that was faintly reminiscent of shelters fashioned from a shipwreck. In fact, I felt like I’d washed up into a reality-television show - I was the new contestant, whose clean city clothes marked him out from the loosely dressed incumbents, lazing in front of their tents and summoning small vestiges of energy to raise a hand to say hello.

I had entered a strange paradox in the world of luxury retreats. SAL SALIS is the only semi-permanent tourist concession along the 170-mile shoreline of the fabulous Ningaloo Marine Park, and people pay a lot of money - £576 per couple per night, for a minimum of two nights - to be hosted in this canvas commune of up to 20 guests.

Australians are a practical lot, not given to calling a spade an implement for sedimentary excavation, and whichever way you look at it, well-heeled visitors from Sydney and Melbourne are sleeping in tents on a public beach.

Meanwhile, people are doing exactly the same in any of 10 Ningaloo Marine Park camp sites for 20 bucks.

So, why are we here? Naturally enough, for Ningaloo reef. We’re camped beside Australia’s “other reef”, increasingly celebrated for its fabulous variety of sea life, including the whale sharks that visit from April to June. And, unlike its Great Barrier counterpart, you don’t need expensive motorised craft to get to it. The coral at Sal Salis is quite literally off the beach.

It’s weird being able to hop into the world of Jacques Cousteau whenever you like, but that’s what I did. And every time, the species queued up to swim past my nose in waters that were calm, clear and warm.

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