Day 27: Purnululu, the southern bit.

A walk among the beehives...

Another day where the long walks were being studiously ignored in favour of an easy day with an

early return to camp and cold beer. One difference for today was the resolve to make an early start.

Which, for once, we did.

After a minor detour to the helicopter office to check tomorrow’s flight, it was a short drive to

Piccaninny from where all the walks to todays attractions start.

The awe starts from the drive in. You start to see the domes and it gets better and better as you get closer. 

The start of that layered sandstone and unique weathering...

First sight of the beehives

Then you get to the carpark and realise that all the promo shots are just of a very small corner of this area, which in itself is a very small corner of the National Park. So, after a brief pause to pick up your jaw, you start on the first walk which is part of The Domes Loop. Wow. No conglomerate today, just banded sandstones, but just as sensational. 

Starting the Domes loop

From here the walk carries on into Cathedral Gorge where the beehives are temporarily replaced by high gorge walls before suddenly opening into the "Cathedral" at the end.

You can imagine this place being popular with Aboriginals for the helter it would provide, but the

pool was one you wouldn’t want to bathe in, let alone drink

The entrance to Cathedral Gorge

Taking in the scene

Cathedral Gorge is quite a large place...

Then the path followed the creek bed towards what for us would be the furthest point, The Window. You can follow it for another nearly 20km up intp Piccaninny creek. I had cold beer calling. The Window itself is not overly impressive, but the walk there is picturesque as it’s a continuation of the beehive and gorge formations. The on our way back we took a detour into Piccaninny creek lookout. This detour is worth the effort as we got a slightly elevated viewpoint towards the gorges.

Walking up Piccaninny Creek

The patterns caused in the riverbed by boulders in the turbulent flow are nearly as cool as the Beehives themselves

The view from Piccaninny lookout

With beehive overload, it was time to head back to the car. It’s about now we realised that our slow saunter had kept us wandering around the area for nearly 6 hours. Maybe I’d better thave a couple of beers. Rehydration purposes, of course…