Australia 2014: Karijini National Park

Day 18 – August 6, 2014 – Karijini National Park - distance travelled: 122 kms - 23^oC high; 8^oC low. Today was hiking day; not necessarily looked forward to by all kids. As normally happens, once we got going it was fine. We drove 40 kms or so to our first destination, Knox Gorge. The trail into it turned out to be a class 5 trail according to the Australian trail classification: “difficult, high level of fitness required, trail markings minimal, steep sections common, expect to encounter natural hazards including large boulders, pools of water” etc. Mt. Augustus was a class 4 trail which was moderately difficult. Anyway, what it meant is that the 2 km trail – which called for a 3 hour return trip – was marked by blue dots on the rocks at regular intervals and went steeply down into the gorge where it ran along the now almost dry stream to a point past which you are not allowed to go. The trail used the natural rocks and involved some scrambling here and there but nothing too serious. Pretty walk, with the sun shining down to the bottom in places and lighting up the red layered walls of the gorge. The trail took us 1.5 hours return; the times indicated are rather liberal. The next trail – class 4 and 5 - took us down to the bottom of another gorge from where we could see Joffre Falls coming down; with only Don, Jordan and I opting to go all the way down. Although there was not a lot of water flowing down, the falls were very pretty as was the scenery in the gorge. After that we drove to Weano Gorge, hiked the kilometre down to the bottom with the goal to walk down to handrail pool. As it turned out we would then have to wade through water to get to the next section and although we saw hikers wading, when Don waded the water came up to the bottom of his shorts which was a bit deep for at least some of the kids so we turned around. Don would have like to show the rest of this trail to the kids, as it was part of what was known 22 years ago as the “Miracle Mile”, where you walked through handrail pool, then did some serious scrambling down big boulders from Weano Gorge into the next gorge – Hancock, waded through water and then scrambled back up and out of Hancock Gorge. The Miracle Mile was described in the Lonely Planet guide at the time and Don and I did it. As there had been too many accidents, you are no longer allowed past handrail pool (unless authorized) and similarly when you go down into Hancock Gorge you also come to a restricted area at one point. Anyway, another short hike took us to Circular Pool and Oxer lookouts, where five gorges come together. Impressive, and very hard to capture. Our last hike was down into Hancock Gorge, another class 5 hike and another one which required wading not far into the gorge. This time the water reached to just above Don’s knees, and other than Shannon everybody took of their shoes and gave it a shot. Cold water, and you couldn’t rush walking through it as we were walking on sometimes fairly sharp rocks. The water was followed by some scrambling on rocks and ledges, after which the gorge first opened up into a large natural amphitheater and then narrowed right down to a width you could straddle with both legs, with water running through the bottom. This narrow area is known as the Spider Walk, and you could either walk down it while holding on to the ledges in the walls, or you could walk on ledges in the walls while also pushing off with your hands. One more scrambly bit over ledges and then we were at Kermits Pool and as far as we could go. The view looking further into the gorge as it continued was beautiful, and the hike to it actually quite fun (although Claire would disagree). Going back seemed a lot easier and faster and before we knew it we were back where we had left Shannon. Ian and Jordan had no problems with any of the scrambling, and especially Ian takes the trails like a mountain goat. We certainly were not the ones taking off our shoes and wading through the water; we probably met about another 12 – 15 people coming and going. Our neighbour at the campground talked to Shannon while he was waiting for his wife to come back. As the kids were all hiked out for the day, we drove back to the campground and called it a day.