Description
There is so much to see in the
Alice Springs region that you really need to plan your route carefully. With a 4WD you get the opportunity to avoid backtracking and can reach all the major and lesser known sites over a comfortable 1 week period. If you are a particularly keen walker, photographer or artist you would certainly want to allow 2 weeks or more. Most sites have various tracks to explore ranging from easy walks of just a few hundred metres to overnight hikes. There are countless opportunities for soaking up the surroundings on foot but if you are in a rush, excellent bitumen roads links all the major attractions to within a day's drive of
Alice Springs.
This route we describe here is 2WD accessible as it follows the bitumen Larapinta Drive out of
Alice Springs passing John Flynns Grave,
Simpsons Gap and
Standley Chasm, then swings east on the Namatjira Drive to
Ellery Creek Bighole,
Serpentine Gorge, Ochre Pits,
Ormiston Gorge,
Glen Helen Gorge. A good dirt road continues the trek to
Redbank Gorge, Gosse Bluff and
Hermannsburg with a 4WD only diversion to
Palm Valley.
2WD Accessible Sights (Walking tracks at all,
camping at most)
The walking in the West McDonnells is excellent with quite a few choices depending on your level of fitness or temperature of the day. Walking close to some of the rocks can get incredibly hot in middle of the day, yet there are some gorges better visited at midday when the sunlight shines directly on the rocks and lights up the sheer walls with intense red colours (such as
Standley Chasm).
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West MacDonnell Ranges
From: Palm Valley (Mpulungkinya)
To: Alice Springs
Distance: 297.86 km
Direction: 71 °
Average Speed: 48.2 km/hr
Travel Time: 6 hours 10 mins
Using the Map
Our treks have a moving map facility, to take a virtual tour click on the Play button in the Moving map control (see Moving Map help)
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Permits
None
Things to See & Do
Preparation
Fuel Supplies & Usage
Usage is averaged from
TrekFuel (* specific to trek) submissions and calculated based on trek distance.
Best Time To Visit
Closest Climatic Station
Alice Springs Airport
Distance from Trek Mid Point 59.1km E
| | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun |
Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
| Mean Max. °C |
36.3 | 35.1 | 32.7 | 28.2 |
23.0 | 19.9 | 19.6 | 22.6 |
27.1 | 30.9 | 33.7 | 35.4 |
| Mean Min. °C |
21.4 | 20.8 | 17.5 | 12.6 |
8.3 | 5.1 | 4.0 | 6.0 |
10.2 | 14.8 | 17.9 | 20.2 |
| Mean Rain mm |
38.0 | 42.3 | 31.9 | 16.8 |
19.4 | 14.4 | 14.7 | 9.5 |
8.3 | 21.9 | 26.7 | 37.5 |
Best time to travel Ok time to travel Travel NOT recommended
Camp Sites & Accommodation
Ellery Creek Big Hole - NT
Ellery Creek Big Hole is located 88km west of Alice Springs or 43km east of Glen Helen. 2km north of the Highway. Beautiful clear, deep waters of Ellery Creek Big Hole. 150m swim to the other side where you can get out on a white sandy beach and walk a little further up the gorge. A nice walk from back of campsite throughout higher terrain and back along creek bed to main waterhole.
Driving Directions
| Palm Valley (Mpulungkinya) to Lower Mount Hermannsburg |
13.03 km |
N |
5° |
33 min |
| Lower Mount Hermannsburg to Larapinta Drive & Boggy Hole Access |
5.67 km |
NE |
44° |
10 min |
| Larapinta Drive & Boggy Hole Access to Hermannsburg |
0.54 km |
NW |
303° |
|
| Hermannsburg to Albert Namatjira's House |
5.23 km |
W |
273° |
10 min |
| Albert Namatjira's House to Gosses Bluff Meteorite Impact Crater |
56.18 km |
W |
287° |
1 hr 19 min |
| Gosses Bluff Meteorite Impact Crater to Gosses Bluff |
0.3 km |
W |
271° |
1 min |
| Gosses Bluff to Tylers Pass |
21.54 km |
N |
17° |
31 min |
| Tylers Pass to Namatjira Dve, West MacDonnell NP Boundary |
24.14 km |
NE |
64° |
24 min |
| Namatjira Dve, West MacDonnell NP Boundary to Glen Helen Gorge |
20.51 km |
SE |
117° |
24 min |
| Glen Helen Gorge to Glen Helen |
0.92 km |
N |
343° |
3 min |
| Glen Helen to Finke River, Namatjira Dve |
0.88 km |
N |
344° |
|
| Finke River, Namatjira Dve to Ormiston Gorge and Pound |
9.48 km |
NE |
44° |
9 min |
| Ormiston Gorge and Pound to Neil Hargrave Lookout |
30.48 km |
SE |
128° |
33 min |
| Neil Hargrave Lookout to Ellery Creek Big Hole |
18.37 km |
E |
101° |
17 min |
| Ellery Creek Big Hole to Point Howard Lookout |
11.98 km |
E |
104° |
19 min |
| Point Howard Lookout to Hugh River, Namatjira Dve |
21.63 km |
E |
92° |
16 min |
| Hugh River, Namatjira Dve to Namatjira Rd & Larapinta Dve |
9.42 km |
E |
97° |
6 min |
| Namatjira Rd & Larapinta Dve to Iwupataka (Jay Creek) |
5.9 km |
NE |
41° |
4 min |
| Iwupataka (Jay Creek) to Alice Springs |
41.65 km |
E |
75° |
45 min |
| Palm Valley (Mpulungkinya) to Alice Springs |
297.86 km |
|
|
6 hr 10 min |
Distance is GPS recorded driving distance (not straight line), Direction is straight line from start to end, Time is calculated from actual GPS driving data.
Plenty Highway
Part of the "Outback Way", the Plenty Highway is the most direct route from central Queensland across to Alice Springs in central Australia. It is a wide stretch of very red sandy soil that when wet can be impassible - 4WD only.
[Feature Story]
Hay River
Suitable only to 4WDers with a strong sense of adventure and experience in remote desert travel. This track is largely unmarked and good map-reading skills are essential.
Trek Search
ExplorOz Trek Notes are detailed, factual reviews of destinations in Australia to which you can plan a self-drive camping trip. This page will enable you to access over 100 of these trek notes, using various search methods and at a glance you can see what treks we have in each area across Australia.
Outback Way
Linking Laverton in WA to Winton in QLD, the Outback Way was coined to promote the development of a 'third strategic link' across Australia, and is fast becoming one of the most iconic outback tourism and adventure drives in the country.
Owen Springs Reserve
An easy short trek out of Alice Springs with good bush camping and a historic value of early European explorers to Central Australia.
Old Andado Track
The Old Andado Track traverses fascinating terrain that includes mountain ranges, rocky gibber plains, desert sand dunes and floodplains in the Red Centre just south of Alice Springs.
Finke to Uluru via Old Gunbarrel
An alternative route to access the wonderful Uluru - Kata Tjuta National Park, this trip from Finke east of the Stuart Highway takes in the Lambert Centre - the planimetric gravitational centre of Australia, and a short section of the Old Gunbarrel Highway before intersecting the main route of the Lasseter Highway near Curtain Springs.
The Tanami Track
The Tanami Track is essentially a great short-cut linking the Red Centre to the Kimberley. Although once a notorious 4WD track, it is now a graded dirt highway.
Chambers Pillar
Chambers Pillar is a natural sandstone formation used by our famous early explorers as a navigational point. You can still read their signatures and inscriptions carved into the rock. It is also a beautiful photographic subject in a remote 4WD area.
Boggy Hole
Finke Gorge is located within the Finke Gorge NP south of the West MacDonnell Ranges in the Alice Springs region. The most popular attraction is Boggy Hole, a permanent billabong of the Finke River. This is a good 4WD route to Uluru and/or Kings Canyon.
Simpson Desert via Geosurveys Hill
From the stone workings of our ancient aboriginal past to the routes undertaken for the old oil exploration surveys, this very remote one-way trek starting at Mount Dare to Birdsville is for experienced desert travellers ONLY.
