What an amazing place. I’ve been almost everywhere in this country at least once and the gorges at Karijini National Park in Western Australia top the list as far as natural beauty goes. Walking through Hancock Gorge, running your hands along the smooth rock walls, wading through icy cold, clear water and imagining as you do how long it must have taken the rains to carve it all out is a special experience. It’s certainly beautiful but it’s also dangerous. More than a few have died either by drowning in flash floods or falling off cliffs. Just getting to where I shot this is tricky, especially weighed down with my camera gear and there were lots of times I thought I was going to fall off those inch wide slippery ledges. Tricky, but worth it. When I was finished shooting and slowly inching my way out again, feeling lucky not to have fallen, a guide for the park, covered in a mess of ropes, carabiners and assorted climbing gear came practically skipping past me, hands in pockets, hopping from ledge to ledge. I watched him go past, gripped a bit tighter, and kept inching along.
Image ID: 1570
