Karijini National Park

[iandsmith]

This is an email I sent back after one day in Karijini.
A DAY OF HARD KNOX
The day started well. We were first (just) down the Knox Gorge ahead of a busload of backpackers only we turned right and they went left on the main trail.
We worked our way towards the upper end of the gorge. The track is classed 5 just like the one we had done the day before and, at times, it was very tricky getting past obstacles and avoiding the very cold water. More than once we helped each other climbing the shale cliffs to find a route onwards.
The rewards however were views of yet another of Karijini’s masterpieces. We later overheard a local ranger say that some rate Knox as the prettiest of the lot.
Nothing quite prepares you for the stunning reds as the sun sheds light on this 2 billion year old landscape, pushed up from the ancient ocean floor by forces beyond your imagination.
As we clamber our way along the edges the cameras click endlessly and there are moments when we find it hard to continue, such is the magnificence of the spectacle.
Karijini continually exceeds its promise, and there’s so much to see. We forced our way around a bend, scrambling over the layered rock to be confronted by paradise for photography.
Dramatic red cliffs studded here and there with precariously clinging vegetation all set beneath untainted blue skies and coursed by a crystal clear bubbling stream. Fodder for the soul indeed.
What could have been a 90 minutes walk had taken us well over three hours and we adventurously decided to climb a virgin scree slope to get us to the top of the gorge and avoid all the obstacles going back.
Here there were no trails but it all went well except for the lawn of the apocolypse (spinifex) that attacked us all the way up and, in just over half an hour, we were back at the motorhome.