Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
8
Information
Visitor Centre
( 08-9189 8121; Banyjima Dr; 9am-4pm Apr-Oct, from 10am Nov-Mar)
Indigenous
managed with excellent interpretive displays highlighting Banyjima culture and park
wildlife, good maps and walks information, a public phone and great air-con.
8
Getting There & Away
There's no public transport. The closest airports are at the mining towns of Paraburdoo
(101km southwest) and Newman (201km southeast). Integrity coaches stop at Munjina
(Auski) Roadhouse on Thursday (northbound) and Friday (southbound). Munjina is the
best place to wait for a lift.
JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH
The instructor sits down in the Water Slide, pushes off, then disappears. I hear a splash echo from below. He's
done this a thousand times. I haven't done it once, and I'm next.
We're in the depths of Karijini's Knox Gorge. It's 35˚C 'upstairs', but the water in the gorge is freezing, and
while we're all in summer wetsuits, everybody's shivering. The day started early when our guides, Dan and Pete,
kitted us out with wetsuits, gorge slippers, harnesses, helmets and inner tubes. A short, sunny stroll down from
Knox Lookout brought our small group to a pool ringed by native figs, where we practised paddling. A quick
'jump test' off a 2m rock to check we won't 'choke' at the first obstacle (the one I'm staring at), and we were off
into the restricted zone, with the gorge shrinking rapidly to a single body width.
I sit down, give the thumbs up, and push off and over a 4m drop into an enclosed plunge pool. An involuntary
scream and I'm underwater. It's scary and exhilarating; I'd love to do it again, but once over the edge, there's no
way back. Soon we're all down, and floating in the Styx-like water, and Dan sets up the 8m abseil into the next
pool. Light falls in narrow shafts as sheer walls tower overhead.
Eventually we escape shady Knox into the sun at the bottom of Red Gorge and warm our bodies on a nearby
'beach'. Soon we're back on our inner tubes, this time for a sunny, relaxed paddle across long, tranquil pools. We
pass the entrance to Weano Gorge, a 40m-high waterfall, on the way to our lunch spot at Junction Pool, 130m be-
low Oxers Lookout. As we munch sandwiches, we watch a rock wallaby bounding around halfway up the vertical
face, seemingly oblivious to the sheer drop only centimetres away.
Joffre Gorge leads off darkly to the south, but we head into Hancock Gorge, and a tight, steep, slippery climb
beside a cascade leading through The Centre of the Earth to Garden Pool. Sublime and sobering, Regans Pool
(named after a local SES volunteer who died during a rescue) is next and as Pete lays in the rope for the climb
above the pool, the rest of us float silently, lost in our thoughts.
The climb is the last hurdle as we ascend steeply, doubly clipped into the anchor rope. A short traverse and
we're out of the restricted area into Kermits Pool, and our final swim. The Spider Walk holds no challenge and
soon we're through the sunny Amphitheatre and up the exit ladders to the car park. We've been out all day, and
it's been one action-packed, adrenalin-charged adventure.
Steve Waters
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