Coen Free Camping; amazing riverside camps

The drive to the tip of Australia at Cape York is fairly long, and you’ll have to pull over and take a break at various stages. We had limited plans, but stumbled across the Coen Free Camping options that sounded fantastic, and ended up spending two nights in a truly fantastic location.

Camping near Coen in a free camp site — We scored a truly awesome spot north of Coen

Great Camping at Coen — Metres from the water, with great views

Where is Coen?

You’ll find the town of Coen heading up the Peninsula Development Road, to Weipa or the top of Cape York. It’s roughly 400km from Cooktown, and is one of the larger places that you drive through on the way to the Cape. From Coen, its 260km to Weipa, and around 440km to Bamaga near the tip of Australia, but you have to cross the Jardine Ferry to get there.

Coen is up the PDR — Coen is on the way to the top of Cape York or Weipa

Where are the free camping areas?

Heading north of Coen only a couple of minutes drive, you cross a small bridge, and the free camping starts immediately on your right hand side (East side). There’s a number of tracks that head off towards the river, with the first one literally metres away from the bridge. If you miss one, don’t stress, as you can take the next one, or turn around at picnic area.

Coen Free Camping — There’s a huge number of areas where you can camp

The picnic area is the last of the free camping areas that are published, and you can drive down and turn around if you want to check the other spots out.

The free camping is on both sides of the river, and you can cross at the picnic area fairly easily, and then drive on the far side of the river to a huge number of other camp sites.

Cross the river and camp if you want — If you have a 4WD, you can cross the river and camp on the other side in a heap of places

Exploring the camp sites around Coen — We spent a good 30 minutes driving around looking at different sites

Alternatively, if you want a free camping spot south of Coen, the Stewart River camp is absolutely magic, although it has limited spots. We thoroughly enjoyed a night here, with even more peace and quiet, and just as good views as the northern Coen camp sites.

Watch the vlog

Want to see more? Here’s our vlog of this brilliant Free Camp near Coen:

Do you need a 4WD?

Every single free campsite near Coen requires a 4WD to access, with exception of the flat, gravel section at the picnic area that is hugely popular for those with big rigs. This is easy enough to get to, and there’s plenty of flat room to pull up and camp.

Camping in the picnic area — If you don’t have a 4WD, camp near the picnic area on the gravel

Can you get a caravan in?

There were a lot of caravans camping in these areas when we stayed, and yes, its easy to get a caravan into the main camping area at the side of the picnic area. However, if you want to get a bit more adventurous, it depends on your setup, driving ability and whether you want to risk damage.

Squeezed a caravan down to camp — We managed to squeeze my folks van down to the beach, but its really tight

We checked out every single free camp, and most of them were really pushing to get caravans in due to big holes, side angles or lack of room with trees overhanging. That said, my Dad managed to get his 18’6 Kokoda Digger off road van into the bottom of the northern most camp, called Ang-Gnarra Aboriginal Corp on Wikicamps. This was really tight on the bottom curve, with the edge of the van nearly scraping along the bank, and it had a pretty decent hole at the bottom of the picnic area to contend with.

If you are unsure, or not wanting any damage, park your caravan on the flat area next to the picnic area, and enjoy an easy, risk free camping location!

Camping by the river at Coen — If you have a smaller setup you can get to lots of different places

We had an amazing campground

I mentioned above that we scored a truly awesome campground, and we ended up staying two nights here, which was fantastic for the kids to relax and unwind a bit. We looked at all of the other campgrounds, and asides from the one next to the picnic area they were all a struggle to get my folks van into.

We ended up camping metres from the beautiful river, splashed around, walked and had a great time. We could have crossed, but with the trailers and soft sand it just didn’t make sense.

Ripper camping in Cape York — This was a favourite camp site in Cape York for us

Our kids enjoying the water — Our kids loved the shallow water

I did manage to upset a wasp nest looking for firewood and ran like the wind, getting stung a number of times, but chuckled about it not long afterwards. The Ang-Gnarra campground is beautiful, if you can get it, and if you can’t, you can head across the creek (that was really solid) and find yourself something else awesome.

If you have a smaller setup, the first few camps closer to Coen looked great too.

Great camping on the PDR — If you are after magic camping, you can’t go too wrong here

Cherabin and gold

We managed to get a number of Cherabin here, using a crab net from WA which is much less effective than a proper yabby net, and had quite a bit of fun doing so. These are delicious freshwater critters that we don’t really hear much about in WA.

Cherabin in a bucket — We managed to get a few Cherabin, which were delicious

Also, there’s gold flecks in the river, and when a fellow camper asked us if we’d found any, I thought he was pulling my leg. As it turns out, its true, and if you were keen to do some panning you might find something.

All in all, the Coen Free Camping is great, and was one of our favourite free camps around the Cape York area. If you’re looking somewhere to pull in and relax, this is a brilliant option.