The greatest off-road adventure in Australia? Rock art, nature and wild swimming along the Kimberley’s Gibb River Road

A 4x4 trip through the wilderness of Australia’s northwest encompasses otherworldly scenery, Indigenous art, and animals seen nowhere else on Earth

Reading Time:6 minutes

A family trip along the Gibb River Road through The Kimberley, a huge area in northwest Australia, offers a chance to connect with Indigenous art and culture and pristine wilderness, and encounter unique fauna. Photo: Carolyn Beasley

Published: 1:15pm, 9 Sep 2023

It comes as a shock to discover that the floating log is actually alive. My heart skips a beat before I realise it’s a freshwater crocodile, or “freshie”.

These prehistoric reptiles are considered harmless unless harassed, but their bigger cousins, the saltwater crocodiles, demand a different level of respect.

At 423,000 sq km (163,000 square miles) – more than twice the size of China’s Guangdong province or nearly 385 times the size of Hong Kong – the Kimberley, the northwestern corner of Australia, is home to just 39,000 humans.

Visitors come to this part of Western Australia for the wilderness, pristine gorge swimming, connection to Indigenous cultures and, in our case, to tackle one of Australia’s greatest adventures: the Gibb River Road.

The writer’s family at the start of their adventure on the Gibb River Road through The Kimberley, a huge area in northwest Australia. Photo: Carolyn Beasley

An unsealed four-wheel-drive road stretching for 660km (410 miles) between Derby (2,200km north of Perth) and Kununurra (830km southwest of Darwin), “the Gibb” is accessible only in the dry season, usually April to October. With three kids leaning into adulthood, the time for this bucket list trip is now.

To vastly reduce our driving time, we’ve started our trip in Broome, after a 2½-hour flight from Perth. We’ve hired a four-wheel-drive stocked with camping gear, solar panels and two rooftop tents that fold open in a minute.