Rodney Campbell's Blog

It was Karijini Travelling time… We’d spend two night staying at Dales Campground at the eastern end of Karijini National Park and today we’d be shifting to the Karijini Eco Retreat which is close to the major gorges towards the middle of the park.

Before we left the area there was just enough time to do a quick redo of the panorama I took at Three Ways Lookout above Dales Gorge. As with yesterday this is a stitched panorama of a number of horizontal frames. Today I took eight (8) frames at 66mm at around 10 minutes past 8 in the morning. By this time the sun had risen high enough to light the gorge walls deep enough so that I could avoid deep shadows on the far walls.

Gorgeous Dales

NIKON D750 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 66 mm, 1/80 sec at f/11, ISO 100 x 8 Frames

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger – so click any of the images below to see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer.

The early morning light just punches and accentuates the richness of the epic red cliffs and hills with their cover of green spinnifex and trees against a backdrop of clear blue skies. A magic time to be out. Then it was onwards on our Karijini Travels.

Thankfully I’d booked ahead at the ECO Retreat (when we were still in mobile range near Port Hedland a few days back). We’d be staying here for three days (which wouldn’t be anywhere near enough :)).

The ECO Retreat is possibly the most expensive unpowered campground we’d been to by far (it was actually more expensive per night than most of the caravan parks with power and water)). The reason I decided to stay here was totally for convenience and time saving.

Karijini National Park

Karijini National Park

There are three main areas (for photography and just sightseeing in general) in Karijini National Park.

– there’s the eastern end with Dales Gorge/Fortescue Falls/Circular Pool
– there’s the main middle part with Weano/Hancock/Joffre/Knox Gorges
– and the western part with Hamersley Gorge

NIKON D750 + 28.0-300.0 mm f/3.5-5.6 @ 180 mm, 1/400 sec at f/5.6, ISO 100

The camp fee’s at Dales Campground are very reasonable and the facilities are very good (no showers or power but they do have good toilets). It’s also extremely close to Dales Gorge (you can walk there easily from the campground). However it’s about a 50km+ drive mostly on really terrible dirt roads to get to the gorges in the middle of the park. Or you can take the longer 90km+ route which is almost entirely sealed and is a much better route.

The ECO Retreat however is only about 10km to even the furthest gorges in this area. When you are getting up every day before sunrise that extra hour of Karijini travelling each way was soo worth it to me. Plus even though they don’t have a water supply (for the caravans) they do have good facilities with solar powered showers – yes!.

Outback Colours

NIKON D750 + 28.0-300.0 mm f/3.5-5.6 @ 170 mm, 1/200 sec at f/11, ISO 500

Once we had checked in and setup our camp area, my daughter and I went for a bit of a walk around the retreat area to take a look. It’s very hot and dry out here (it’s the wet season after all). However even with the sun beating down almost mercilessly and the land seemingly dry and arid, still the amazing colours of this outback shine through. Even though it was pretty obvious a bushfire had swept through some time back and burnt everything, new life was springing up everywhere.

Karijini Travels

NIKON D750 + 28.0-300.0 mm f/3.5-5.6 @ 72 mm, 1/80 sec at f/11, ISO 160

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