Purnululu National Park
The Purnululu National Park is a World Heritage Site in the East Kimberley region of Western Australia. The national park is located approximately south of Kununurra, with Halls Creek located to the south. Declared a World Heritage Site in 2003, the park was inscribed as follows:
The World Heritage status of the region was created and negotiated in 2003, and the adopted boundary of the existing national park. Since its listing, the Government of Western Australia has reserved additional areas located adjacent to the World Heritage Area, including the Purnululu Conservation Park and the Ord River Regeneration Reserve. The site was gazetted on the Australian National Heritage List on 21 May 2007 under the.
The national park is managed by the Western Australian Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions in conjunction with the traditional Aboriginal owners.
Indigenous Peoples
In 2022, the Federal Court of Australia recognized both the Purnululu and Gajangana Jaru native title claimants as the traditional owners of the area. Purnululu National Park was the second conservation park to have traditional owners recognized after the Native Title Act 1993 was amended to allow recognition. The Bungle Bungles Aboriginal Corporation hold native title in trust for the Jaru, Gija and Malngin people.
In 2024, the Gija community and Western Australian Museum published an interactive display of the Gija creation story and on an installation in the park.
Features
The Bungle Bungle Range, lying fully within the park, has elevations as high as above sea level. It is famous for the sandstone domes, unusual and visually striking with their striping in alternating orange and grey bands. The banding of the domes is due to differences in clay content and porosity of the sandstone layers: the orange bands consist of oxidised iron compounds in layers that dry out too quickly for cyanobacteria to multiply; the grey bands are composed of cyanobacteria growing on the surface of layers of sandstone where moisture accumulates.
Geology
The Bungle Bungle Range is one of the most extensive and impressive occurrences of sandstone tower karst terrain in the world. The Bungle Bungles were a plateau of Devonian sandstone, carved into a mass of beehive-shaped towers with regularly alternating, dark gray bands of cyanobacterial crust. The plateau is dissected by deep, sheer-sided gorges and slot canyons. The cone-towers are steep-sided, with an abrupt break of slope at the base and have domed summits. How they were formed is not yet completely understood. Their surface is fragile but stabilized by crusts of iron oxide and bacteria. They provide an outstanding example of land formation by dissolutional weathering of sandstone, with removal of sand grains by wind, rain and sheet wash on slopes.
Access
Access to the park by road is via Spring Creek Track, from the Great Northern Highway approximately south of Kununurra, to the track's end at the visitor centre. The track is long and is usable only in the dry season by four-wheel-drive vehicles. Safely navigating it takes approximately three hours. Access by air is less demanding; helicopter flights are available from Bellburn Airstrip in the national park, and from Warmun roadhouse. Scenic light aircraft flights are also available out of Kununurra and Lake Argyle.