Months earlier, Steven and I booked an overnight trip that began with a flight from Broome in far northwest Western Australia to the Bungle Bungles, an unforgettable mountain range in Purnululu National Park in Western Australia's remote Kimberley region. Unfortunately, because we were too close to the region's notoriously inaccessible wet season, which made much of the park impossible to navigate, the plans changed to allow only the flight and a hike to part of the park, instead of the overnight stay and additional exploration the following day. We were initially disappointed, but it worked out perfectly in the end, allowing us to explore more of Broome on our 'free day.'
After a 5am pickup, we arrived at Broome Aviation, where Aaron, the pilot, pointed out where Broome was, with the large number of pins on the left, and the stops we'd be making about 850km east of Broome, in the national park.
Gwen and Mike, a couple from Mesa, Arizona, were our companions for the day as we boarded the Cessna 210 five-passenger plane. Steven and I got the rear seats, as we were seated according to our weights to balance the plane. There could be no fudging on weights that day!
Through headsets, Aaron announced we were flying over the Broome Jetty ...
... and then over the Broome Bird Observatory. We'd see both those sights by land in the next couple of days.
Below us, we were looking at tidal water as the wet season neared its end.
I imagine you've heard of stations in Australia - they're very large rural properties used to raise livestock and are often thousands of square kilometers wide, sometimes larger than entire small countries! The owners are called pastoralists or graziers, similar to ranchers in the US and Canada. This was the Roebuck Plains Cattle Station, where 20 to 30 mostly Aboriginal people look after 750,000 hectares of land, according to Aaron. Larger cattle stations have up to 70,000 head of cattle.
In a month, this whole area will turn from green to brown because of the dry season.
Here was just a tiny stretch of the Great Northern Highway, Australia's longest highway and the primary inland route connecting Perth with Western Australia's north. Stretching approximately 3,200 kilometers, the highway is among the world's most isolated sealed roads, with massive distances between roadhouses and fuel stops. Much of the highway is impassable for two weeks during the wet season because of flooding from the creek beside it.
Aaron said that cattle, kangaroos, and other wildlife come to use the shaded drinking spots like the one in the middle left.
Suddenly, visibility became significantly reduced because of haze from backburning or small fires intentionally set by Aboriginal people and conservation groups to prevent much larger forest fires that can sometimes last from May to September.
Aaron joked that when he flies locals and Aboriginal people this high, they normally take out blankets, as it's too cold at 7,500 feet. Note the use of feet here versus kms earlier. I'll explain later.
Blue Sky Mining Company, with just 20 to 50 employees, owned this area. It was considered a small firm, since larger companies with hundreds of employees were located farther south. Ninety percent of the iron ore is shipped to China. Liquefied natural gas, or LNG, is also moved offshore. Rare earth minerals, with support from American companies, are mined around the Kimberley if they get approval from local people or governments; I'm not sure which.
Aaron added that US companies are also trying to set up fracking by the Fitzroy River, our first stop. However, local opposition will challenge it in court. He added that generally companies can't proceed with mining or fracking, because Aboriginal people often state that it's on sacred ground.
All the creeks lead to the Fitzroy River, which collects 75% of Western Australia's rainfall during the wet season.
These looked like waves to me initially, but Aaron said they were ribbons of clouds from nighttime fires. Once we got a clearer view, the clouds were pretty spooky!
Aaron had given each of us a map so we could follow his flight path as we headed east from Broome.
As we flew over Mt. Anderson, Aaron commented that Aboriginal people often "make arrangements with mining companies to take a percentage of the profits." That's why there are "so many Aboriginal people in Broome with large, flashy cars."
We were over the Aboriginal community of Looma, where the people have been given subsidized housing. Most people there don't work, but if they do, they provide support for the stations, Aaron said. Because the people in Looma were big fans of the Australian Football League, they built a football field in the community. This area of WA is cut off during the months-long wet season, except by plane!
This was an irrigation system for one cattle station, so the cattle could be fattened up before being sent to the slaughterhouse. Instead of being rounded up by ranch hands on horseback, helicopters are used! Each larger station would have five to ten planes.
Though the Fitzroy River is the lifeblood for the stations, people have to be careful swimming in it because of crocodiles! The river regularly floods its banks and the bridges along the highway.
Only a dirt road leads to the Aboriginal community. If I put a positive spin on it, Aaron sounded pretty jaded when he added that the road is mostly used by police officers, because "Australia is heavy into the police force, and there's not much (for the police) to do, except get the outlaws or the Aboriginals when doing stupid stuff."
There are small schools in the community for young kids; they are then moved to schools in Perth or Darwin in the Northern Territory for long periods. The kids go back and forth via planes!
A water bore, the lifeblood for animals:
Aaron commented that the areas that had been intentionally burned were totally random.
I can't imagine the absolute desolation of living anywhere here or in the agricultural research station belonging to one of the universities in WA.
Aaron used this rock as a good reference point for proximity to Fitzroy Crossing, where he was going to refuel.
The mighty Fitzroy River slows to just a trickle during the dry season.
The community of 1600 people is a central hub for Aboriginal people and the stations to do all their shopping.
Of course, I made a quick dash for the ladies' room while Aaron filled up!
No wonder our tour cost an arm and a leg, as it cost $700 to fill both tanks! He said the rule was never to trust the fuel gauges, and that he needed to calculate the fuel and figure out where he was heading next.
Before taking off again, he had to do a visual check to see if any farmers were flying onto the runway, because they don't use the radio, and there was no such thing as air traffic control in these deserted areas. Even though it's all "wild man land in the Kimberley," he always checks in on his radio to announce his arrival and departure by asking," Is anyone out there listening?" Almost always, there's nothing but you and the air!
More views of the Fitzroy:
A little further east was Fossil Downs Cattle Station, which had its own runway for its twenty staffers who came from all over the country to work there.
The further east we flew into the Kimberley, the more mountainous the terrain was. He believed that 80 to 90 percent of the people in the Kimberley are Aboriginal, but still accounted for only 1 to 20% of the country's population of 25 million people.
The Leopold River comes off the mountain ranges and feeds into the Fitzroy River.
Next, he showed us a remnant of the Little Gold River, which attracted 30,000 people during the 1885 Gold Rush. The idea was not to tell people, but the word quickly got out! As with most gold rushes in Australia, it lasted just six months. The people who grew rich off the gold set up lucrative cattle stations.
The Corolla plateau valley:
As I mentioned in a previous post, camels hang around airstrips in Australia, so Aaron has to be careful when landing the plane. Since people were brought from the Middle East to tend to camels during the dry season, this area is often referred to as Morocco West!
Aaron calculated that the road train, or super-long truck, on the Great Northern Highway was 56m long!
This was our first view of the 360-million-year-old Bungle Bungles that sit in Purnululu National Park! Aaron ascribed the oddly named mountain range to the 100-year-old Bungle Bungle Station, which was itself named for a type of grass. Bundle bundle grass, common in the east Kimberley, was named because of its tendency to grow in a clump, or bundle.
How bundle bundle became Bungle Bungle is open to speculation, but it is suspected that local Aboriginal people borrowed the European Australian name for the grass and changed it to bungle bungle. “There’s many place names that are English versions of Aboriginal names, but this is one of those rare ones that is actually the opposite.”
As the range's northern section is considered sacred to the local Aboriginal people, no outsiders can land or travel there. As a result, Aaron had to circle around to land on the airstrip.
I found it remarkable that, because the Bungle Bungles were so remote, they became known to the broader Australian community and the rest of the world only after being featured in a documentary made in the early 1980s. However, the Bungle Bungles hold great significance to the Traditional Custodians of Purnululu National Park, the Karjaganujaru peoples, who have lived in this region for over 20,000 years, and they call it Purnululu.
The striking, but unimaginatively named, Deep Gorge and its adjacent sandstone creek:
The curious dome-shaped rock formations, or karst, carved by wind and rain, were striped with different sandstone layers, from glowing orange to dark gray or black bands, although the colors were a little wishy-washy from the plane. They were formed about 20 million years ago from sediments deposited in the region more than 350 million years ago!
Aaron said there were palm trees at the bottom of Picanninny Gorge, but I didn't see any from our bird in the sky.
Aaron gave us a bird's-eye view of the inaccessible sacred area and explained that there are lots of waterfalls here in the wet season.
I was surprised when Aaron said, in response to my question, that he hadn't seen much effect from climate change in the Kimberley, except for more forest fires.
Aaron then flew over the beehive section, where the colors were even more pronounced as they moved down the layers of rock.
The mysterious conical structures, each reaching up to 250 meters, flanked narrow gorges and slot canyons with dramatic cliffs and towering sides.
The limestone creeks all looked like roads snaking through the gorge, as we flew over the Picaninny Gorge again!
Aaron announced we'd be hiking to the Birthing Pool here shortly!
"Our" dirt, but long, runway in the Bungle Bungles could land planes that were up to 15-seaters! Arron prefers to land here in the wet season because there's less wind.
We arrived in the clearing around 10:30 and met Bec, the guide with the all-women-owned Kingfisher Tours. She explained that the massive national park had two lodges, campgrounds, and private camps. It was 52 km from the highway and accessible only by 4x4. She introduced us to damper, an easy-to-make snack popular with Aboriginal people.
She said it was customary among her people not to introduce yourself by name, but by saying, "Who's your mum?" As an Aboriginal person, she can go anywhere in the East Kimberley and will fit in with other Aboriginal families. Before becoming a tour guide seven years ago, she drove a truck for a diamond site until it was decommissioned.
Close to the rest spot was a termite mound.
Heading into the bush, there was a surprising amount of traffic, as the road had only recently opened at the end of the wet season. You can't get into the park off the Great Northern Highway during the wet season.
Bec mentioned that the vegetation is kept low, so they do a controlled burn at the beginning of the wet season to prevent a large-scale fire.
The first point of interest was Elephant Rock, but we just caught this glimpse as we whizzed by.
Silver-leaf eucalyptus trees lined the road.
Here on terra firma, we had a much better appreciation for the magnificent colored striations in the rocks.
Bec performed a Welcome to the Ground You're Walking On Ceremony with wattle grass on each of us.
Gwen and Mike from our plane:
Bec said that these rocks were food storage cupboards because it was customary to leave cooked food wrapped in tree bark for hungry people passing by. The food had to be placed in crevices high enough up so dingoes couldn't reach it, and with a rock on top, so birds couldn't get it either. The food just needed to be heated in water to be eaten.
After a pregnant Aboriginal woman experiences contractions, she drinks eucalyptus sap to numb the pain and gives birth in a small pool of water. They wrap the afterbirth in grass, then plant a boab tree.
Older Aboriginal people from previous generations had no knowledge or sense of time, according to Bec. They didn't know when they were born. The only idea of how many people lived anywhere was by counting the number of boab trees. That was how they took a census!
After losing an Elder, the grieving process lasts from six to nine months. Women shave their own hair to make a hair belt, which they place on a bed of leaves from a bloodwood tree for 4.5 months before bringing it to a termite mound for the same amount of time.
The remains are then brought down, painted with red ochre, and placed on a table where the family mourns for a week, sitting in a circle. The family decides the location of the final resting place, but people are normally buried where their ancestors came from. A woman is sometimes buried with her husband, but not necessarily. People are often cremated now, with the ashes wrapped in paper, because of park ranger rules.
A native hibiscus:
Though we'd already heard about the origins of the Bungle Bungle formation from Aaron, Bec mentioned that the 360-million-year-old rocks had been sitting in the Ord Basin. Over millions of years, sediments settled in the basin, forming layer after layer.
The distinct dark bands consisted of thin layers of cyanobacteria that hold moisture and grow on sandstone layers, contrasting with the bright orange iron oxide bands, which don't collect water.
Bec explained that when "water remnants" come out during the dry season, birds come out at dawn and dusk. The key to knowing where water is is to follow birds.
Bec identified this as a bush-town plant, although I couldn't find it online. She said plants peak in April and May, and then wither off. We were fortunate to be there during the prime season!
Bec had a work schedule that would be the envy of many, working two months on and one month off, so she could live in the bush and maintain her roots.
Aboriginals believe in the Dreamstory, meaning the beehive's black bands come from a reptile's blood, and the orange bands come from the blood of people who have died. Because the snake is considered the keeper of the group, we must respect the snake, as he in turn looks after us. If you ever see Aboriginal rock art, the snake is always placed on top to reflect his importance.
Bec admitted how difficult it is to maintain the traditional culture in an age of phones, the "interference of white men," and the struggle to earn money.
Bec joked that this termite mound had the penthouse view!
Definitely no wishy-washy shade of orange as we proceeded further into the gorge!
There were very few other hikers as we hiked into the narrow chasm.
Think how dangerous it would be in this spot in the wet season, with water cascading down the steep walls of the cliffs!
Views of the awe-inspiring Cathedral Gorge:
Bec stated that her people always traveled at night, as it was the coolest part of the day.
The Cathedral Amphitheater sits on a major northwest joint line, formed when a waterfall undercut soft sandstone. About 100 meters downstream, the same joint caused two large sandstone blocks to slip from the cliff above.
Rainwater had cascaded down the towering cliffs into the central flat area of the incredible amphitheater, forming a small pool of water. There was no rock art in this part of the park because the water level was too high for art to have been made.
After we ate lunch and had the amphitheater to ourselves, Bec played a very emotional Welcoming Song to Cathedral Gorge, honoring the elders who had gone before. She didn't name her second song, but she remarked that it "belonged to older people." Her lovely music echoed throughout the canyon.
As we began the hike back to the plane, Bec said there were heaps of echidnas, wallabies, dingoes, kangaroos, and birds in the park. We'd have loved to spot any of the famous Australian animals, but none appeared.
We still oohed and aahed, however, at the sight of the beehive formations again! The towering domes make up about 20% of the Bungle Bungle Range, rising above the sandy plains. Unrivaled in scale, extent, grandeur, and diversity, they were one of the main reasons for Purnululu's UNESCO World Heritage listing in 2003.
Pindan wattles:
Before thanking Bec for her informative tour in the glorious Bungle Bungles, she commented that alcoholism and drugs are huge issues in the Aboriginal communities. How sad that those problems are also a major concern for Indigenous people in my native Canada and my adopted United States. She acknowledged that the federal government is doing its best at providing education for Aboriginal children. She was not, however, a fan of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, as she thought he was "all talk and no action."
All aboard for the flight back to Broome!
Before leaving the park at 2:45 for the 2.5-hour flight back, we had to wait for another plane, which had just landed.
Like the swishest of airlines, Aaron handed us frozen washcloths scented with eucalyptus oil. I could get used to this treatment!
Aaron pointed out Spring Creek below us, adding that all the creeks have two or three bridges over them because the previous bridges have washed away!
Aaron announced that he had to fly around a small storm caused by wind coming from the north. We didn't mind, as our ride was still calm.
Admittedly, I hadn't given it any thought before, but I was still surprised by the large number of rivers we saw on our flight to and from the park.
This magical view was caused by rain falling from a storm cell on the Glen Roy Cattle Station, located on a plateau! Lucky us, Aaron kept his promise and took us back a different route, so we saw more of the mesmerizing Kimberley region, which spans a staggering 423,517 square km (163,521 square miles), from 100km south of Broome to Darwin.
Even Aaron, who'd been a pilot since 1989, had never come across rain like that before! Having a storm like this so late in the west season was very rare. Normally, more storms occur in the dry season, when there are blue skies, some winds from the east, but no rain for six to seven months.
As promised: When Aaron said he was flying at an altitude of 2,839 feet, I asked him why he was now using the imperial system for the altitude. He said all (flying) units are measured in feet because Australians copy the American system for units and regulations.
While this mountain was still part of the Kimberley Mountain range, we were nearing its end.
We then flew over Mt. Broome, a two- to three-km-long, 3,068-ft-high mountain and one of Australia's highest. Knowing we were from Colorado, he added, "It's big for us!"
Although it was difficult to see the trees, Aaron identified them as paperbarks.
Aaron had hinted he'd take us back via the Windjana Gorge, a stunning 3.5-km-long gorge carved by the Lennard River through an ancient 350-million-year-old coral reef in the Kimberley. Its towering 300m cliff walls were once part of a prehistoric underwater barrier reef. Like Purnululu National Park, the gorge is sacred to the local Bunuba people, with a deep history tied to the 1890s resistance leader Jandamarra.
The gorge and Windjana National Park were a big draw for boaters and crocodiles alike!
One of Australia's biggest boondoggles was just below us. Curtis Air Base, just south of Derby on the Dampier Peninsula north of Broome, had built an AUD 260 million runway for military exercises. The issue was that only a handful of people are needed to keep the dingoes out!
Aaron said that when he spots this section of the Great Northern Highway north of Broome, he just follows it all the way back, especially when storms are bad.
From 4,500 feet away, we could see huge flames shooting into the air, although I couldn't capture them on my phone.
Never had I been lucky enough to see a sunset from a plane!
The lights on the Broome airstrip had just been put on for our flight at 5:38, but a Qantas jet arrived seven minutes later!
As much as we liked the hike into the Bungle Bungles and Bec's cultural tour, the highlight of the day had been the flight in the Kimberley! For me, a big part of that was Aaron's superlative commentary throughout the trip.
Steven and I finished off the exciting day with dinner at Matso's in Broome.
Next post: An early morning pickup to view dinosaur footprints, the bird observatory, and camels on the beach!
Posted on September 14th, 2026, from our home outside of Denver for the last time until December! I've written often in this space about this summer's excessive heat in Denver. Now you know why - Denver has recorded 65 days at or above 90°F in 2026 as of September 13! That compares to our normal annual average of 44 days. Please take care of yourself and your loved ones.
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