Northwest Day Six, Seven and Eight: Karijini National Park

Karijini is just north and east of Coral Bay into the Pilbara outback. The hilly landscape with brigt red dirt has been carved into deep, rock gorges that create gorgeous natural pools. As soon as we set up camp on Day Six, we climbed down to Fortescue Falls. It was so great to relax and cool off swimming after such a hot day in the bus. We spent so much time lounging in the waterfall.

On Day Seven, we went on two separate hikes. In the morning, we went to Kermit's pool, where you come down into this beautiful circular clear pool with steep cliffs on all sides. It was so great to float on my back and look up to see the cliffs leading up to the blue sky. I lingered behind to be the last to climb out, just so I could look back on its vastness. Even though it's great fun to be with such a big group, sometimes I wish I could experience the beautiful silence and awe that comes from being in such an amazing piece of God's creation all alone. In the afternoon, we went through the Spider Walk: a skinny little channel where we're clinging onto the sides of the rock! It opened up into Hancock Gorge pools with a really tranquil waterfall. Then we climbed/swam down further to a smaller rock we could jump off into a pool that overlooked a steep, treacherous gorge. It was so cool!

On the morning of Day Eight we packed up camp and then went beyond Fortescue Falls through lush forest area along the river to Fern Pool. The pool is a sacred Aboriginal area because they say under the waterfall is a resting place for the creator snake. The snake slithered from the Pilbara to the coast when the earth was soft and that is how the hills, or Hamersley Range, were created. The pool was beautiful and it was really cool to sit on the ledge behind the waterfall.

On the way hiking, our guide showed us some old Aboriginal art etchings. We also went to the visitors center and it was really fascinating to see how the Aboriginal people from the area are involved in the running of the park. This fits in incredibly well with everything I am learning in all three of my classes. The Aboriginal people have a vast system of knowledge centered around the notion of Country, which is the land and all of their connections to it. Although they have struggled throughout Australia's settler history to have rights to Country, they have been given ways to be involved in the management of the land in National Parks. It was also interesting to be able to apply some of the concepts from my Nature-Based Tourism class to most of the places we visited on this trip!