Tour Australia

Today, Friday the 19th, we left Kununura and headed west before turning south down the Great Nothern Highway towards the Bungle Bungles. We had lunch along the way and set up camp in the free camp almost opposite the turn off for the Bungle Bungles. There were several other campers staying there but we were glad for that as we planned on leaving the caravan parked there over the following two days.

The Bungle Bungles had been closed for around a week prior to this due to an out-of-control fire and was due to open 9am the following day.

The next day we left at around 8am in hope of making it into the Bungle Bungles by 9am. The road was corrugated and windy so it took us longer than 1 hour to get there. We made it there a bit after 9 and sorted out our passes (on top of your Holiday Pass you need to obtain a day pass at no charge).

We headed to the northern end of the park, our first stop at Echidna Chasm. When we arrived there was no one there so we got ourselves organised and walked into the chasm. It was very amazing! The chasm walls are up to 200m high and the chasm is around 600m long. The shining sun makes the rock walls glow an orange-red colour which is spectacular.

We walked right to the end before coming back and meeting other people walking. We sat and stayed in the chasm for over an hour and waited for the golden 11:30am. At this time the sun passes over the chasm and the suns rays shine down through the chasm. It was quite nice!

After lots of photos we left and went up to the small lookout not far from the chasms entrance.

We returned to the Jeep and had lunch and then headed down to Mini Palm Gorge. This was another short walk which took us up a creek bed and then into the gorge. The gorge was spectacular and much different to what we’d already seen. We rested at the end and took in the view for quite some time before heading back.

We then chilled out for over an hour before heading to the sunset lookout near to the rangers station. We arrived and walked up to the top with around 40 minutes until sunset. We relaxed with some food and drink. Sunset was very nice and we headed out of the national park and back to the caravan in the dark.

The next day we headed back into the Bungle Bungles but this time headed south. We arrived at the trail head at around 8:30am and began our walk for the day. We walked to the Picaninny Creek Lookout first. The Bungle Bungles were amazing and we gazed at the towering beehive like rocks as we walked.

 

Our next stop wasn’t too far and is not far from the main track and is the Window. It is a hole in one of the rocks. It wasn’t quite as amazing as what we were expecting but was worth a look.

We continued along the track and made our way up to the end of Whip Snake Gorge. It was a fair walk and was mostly in the creek bed of sand or rock. The gorge was large and had a very dry plunge pool and no water flowing down the waterfall so it was a little underwhelming.

After spending some time there we made our way back to Cathedral Gorge. It is a beautiful walk up the creek and is only 500m from the main track. Cathedral Gorge is a massive natural amphitheatre with sand on the floor and a pool of water in the middle. It was absolutely amazing – we were blown away!

 

We then walked back to the Jeep via the Dome walk and had lunch. When we got back in the Jeep it wwas flashing that one of the tyres was flat. I had a look at them and they seemed ok so we made the trek out of the national park and back to the caravan where we chilled out for the afternoon.