Alligator Gorge; a truly epic place
South Australia has continually surprised us, with some attractions, 4WD tracks and camping destinations that were nothing short of magic, and Alligator Gorge was another place that kept the bar high.
We picked an interesting day to visit with a heap of fog about, and plenty of water flowing down the gorge, which changed it from an amazing place to something even better.
Where is Alligator Gorge?
This stunning spot is about 20 minutes drive out of Wilmington, up and down some pretty steep sections of road. It’s inside the Mt Remarkable National Park, and you’ll drive through the entry station on the way in.
What’s at Alligator Gorge
Before we visited, we read a comment on Wikicamps, which likened Alligator Gorge to Karijini National Park, but without the crowds. I reckon that’s a fairly accurate comment. The gorge itself is stunning, with some incredible scenery, and if you can get it when there has been some rain its even more amazing.
We thoroughly enjoyed weaving our way around the rocks, and then walking down through the gorge to see spectacular views.
In actual fact we didn’t do the entire narrows walk as we didn’t have shoes suitable for getting really wet, and the water was flowing fairly quickly at about 30cm high in places. It would have been too risky for the kids with the likelihood of someone slipping over too high.
I did remove my shoes and walk down the gorge for some time though, and was shocked at how stunning it is. I’ll let the photos do the talking!
Does it cost to visit Alligator Gorge?
The actual gorge is free to visit, but you do need a national parks pass to get there. If you haven’t got one, you can buy access for the day, or a longer pass. We ended up with an annual pass as we were intending on spending more than 2 months in South Australia.
The road into Alligator Gorge
It’s worth mentioning that the road into Alligator Gorge is really steep in both up and down directions, and there are signs saying no caravans to be towed in. In reality, you probably could tow one, but it would work your vehicle really hard and its not worth the risk on many levels.
You’ll go up and down a number of times, before doing a final descent down to near the gorge, which has a huge number of dips in the road for the run off of water, and you are limited to about 10km/h for some time.
We didn’t get to see much of the views with the fog around, but the little we could see was stunning, and I’m sure you’d get some pretty neat views on a clear day.
Hikes at Alligator Gorge
There’s a couple of hikes at Alligator Gorge. There are two walks that are short; Allys Lookout and the Gorge Lookout Walk which are 15 and 20 minutes return (and probably a lot less).
The hikes include the Gorge Circuit, or the Narrows as many people refer to it, which is 2 hours return and 2km. From there, you have Alligator Gorge Ring Route Hike at 7km and 4 hours return, and Alligator Gorge to Mambray Creek, which is 26km return and 10 hours.
Put Alligator Gorge on your list
We were thoroughly impressed with Alligator Gorge, and if you can see it after a bit of rain you’ll be blown away. It really is stunning in every possible way you look at it!
