Is Hamersley Gorge Spa Pool in Karijini National Park on your bucket list to visit? If you’re heading out to the Pilbara to see the unbelievable dramatic gorge, you might have similar questions like I did before hopping out of the car.
You might be wondering whether you can bring a camera, do you need a dry bag, or will you need to wear reef shoes and so much more!
So, after visiting it myself, I’m answering all the questions you might have and will let you know what to expect, how long it takes to walk there and much more.
1. Where is Hamersley Gorge?

Firstly, the Hamersley waterfall walk is located on the North West of the incredible Karijini National Park in the Pilbara, Western Australia. To get to the remote Hamersley Gorge, you can either fly to Exmouth and hire a car to do a road trip (it will take you at least 7h20m of non stop driving).
If you’re coming from Perth, it’s a long 15h30m drive north. If you’re coming from Port Headland, it will take you just over 4hr drive. And, if you want to fly instead, you’ll need to head to the tiny mining town of Parabudoo and hire a car for a 1h40m drive to Hamersley Gorge.
While it might sound like a bit of a mission to get to Karijini National Park, you could easily turn this bucket list place to visit into a fun road trip, stopping off at plenty of amazing places along the way which I’ll talk more about at the end of this guide.
2. What makes Hamersley Gorge special?

While Hamerlsey Gorge is arguably the most famous of all of the gorges at Karijni National Park, you might be wondering why? Obviously the Spa Pool blew up on Instagram, bringing in more and more people to what could be one of the most insta-famous swimming holes in the world.
It’s also known as being the easiest pool and gorge to reach in Karijini National Park and was the most popular out of the four gorges that I personally visited.
This is one of those dramatic gorges that you just have to make the effort to visit when in Karijini.
3. Before you plan your trip to Karijini National Park or Hamerlsey Gorge, do this

The number one thing you need to do before you plan your trip to Hamerlsey Gorge or Karijni in general is to check what roads and gorges are open.
With six gorges open to the public, it’s not unusual to come to Karijini Naitonal Park and discover that some of them are closed when you visit the park. During our visit, two of the gorges were closed and the road between Karijini Eco Retreat and Dales Campground was closed which meant we had to go almost back to Tom Price to get between the two.
The roads are being upgraded all the time, so while I can write about what I experienced, you need to check with the Western Australia Parks website and with the guys at the Tom Price Visitors Centre before heading into the park.
4. Can you drive a 2WD car, camper van or motorhome to Hamersley gorge?

So the first question I had in general was; is Karijini 2wd accessible? The answer is YES! We were driving our amazing Star RV van (you can get 10% off by adding the discount code LIS10) and made it to Hammersley gorge without any problems.
Before we started the drive to Hamersley Gorge, we popped into the Tourist Information Office in Tom Price to ask them if we would make it. They said the road is suitable for ALL cars. We double checked by saying, “even motorhomes?”. The answer is yes.
We felt really bad for the guys we saw at Cheela Plains Station Stay who told us they ended up paying a lot of money to do a tour into Karijini National Park because because they didn’t think they would be able to drive in their motorhome. To be honest, we started looking into tours too because we were unsure if we would make it.

They also told us that they spoke to someone who had driven to Hamerlsey Gorge and they said there was no way a motorhome would make it in. But, we decided to listen to the team at the Tourist Information Office and we decided to go for it.
Turns out the road isn’t that bad even though there isn’t sealed road access. Yes quite a bit of it is corregated but you can get through, especially if you drive slowly. Google Maps told us it was supposed to take us 50 minutes from Tom Price to get to the Hamersley Gorge walk car park, but it took us just over an 1 hour which isn’t too bad.
5. How long is the walk?

While I read that Hamersley Gorge walk is the easiest of the Karijini National Park walks, what does throw you is the times it states it takes to walk in them. For example, an 800m short walk is supposed to take between 1-2 hours? Yep, it’s actually right.

Now hear me out on this one. So while the walk actually only takes about 5-10 minutes, you’ll spend most of it just marvelling at the scenery. It is literally like being in another world, that the time will go so quickly, and before you know it, the Hamersley Gorge walk will have taken you a good 2 hours (it did for us!).
6. Do you need to wear hiking boots or reef shoes?

You absolutely need to wear hiking boots when doing ANY walk in Karijini National Park because there are always rocks to be walking over or climbing up.
When we parked up at the car park (just type in Hamerlsey Gorge into Google Maps and it will take you to the car park), I saw a tour guide and asked him, “do I need to wear hiking boots down there?”. He said I’d be alright in trainers. I then said, “how about thongs (flip flops)?” He said “maybe”.
But truth be told, I wish I wore my hiking boots because it is pretty slippery on the rocks.
We also bought reef shoes back in Exmouth but you can purchase them at the Visitor Centre in Karijini too. You definitely need them for this gorge because spa pool is beyond slippery.
Did our reef shoes stop us from slipping? No. But we’re still thinking that maybe they did help in some way.
7. What is the walk actually like to spa pool?

The Hamerlsey Gorge walk is actually pretty easy in comparison to other gorges in Karijini National Park. You simply walk down the rock staircase which will take you two minutes before you’re at the bottom of the gorge in a beautiful natural amphitheatre. There is a newly constructed lookout at the top for anyone who has mobility issues to see into the gorge (you won’t be able to see the spa pool from here).
Now, what I haven’t heard anyone else mention is that this dramatic gorge is utterly breathtaking. The spectacular rock formations are a deep red. As you follow the swirling pattern in the rocks, the colour changes into a light grey that you’ll spend ages just staring at how amazingly beautiful it is.

At the bottom of the steps, you’ll see a pool in front of you that follows down into the gorge to your left. We actually started walking down that way beore checking with other hikers that the path was actually in the other direction to the spa pool. So, you’ll need to turn right at the steps and start to follow the water upstream.

From here, you’ll need to climb over some boulders which isn’t too bad, but I did see people with baby carriers and I wondered if it was a good decision to bring babies to Karijini in general because the rocks are slippery. The walk is literally about five minutes and before you know it, you’ll come to a big pool. From here, you either just jump in and swim to the spa pool at the end which will take you two minutes, or you try and walk around the rocks.
We just ended up swimming over to the spa pool at the end of the pool.
8. What is the spa pool like?

We actually weren’t that impressed with the spa pool, like it is beautiful but I’ve certainly seen similar pools in the Blue Mountains in Sydney. What you need to know is that this pool is mega slippery, like ridiculously slippery. If you ever see photos of people perched high up by the pool, I literally have no idea how they have done that because it’s like walking on ice.
Interestingly, when I went into the pool, I felt a very strong and bad energy in the pool. I didn’t last long in there before I jumped out, as it felt like I shouldn’t be in there. Not sure if anyone else has ever mentioned this, but the energy was super strong that I shouted out a “woah” when I went in.
I wasn’t surprised to learn at the Karijini Visitors Centre that the Traditional Owners regard Karijini as a bad place. But contrary to that, I met a local Aboriginal woman at the Visitors Centre who learnt to swim in Hamerlsey Gorge as a child which is pretty incredible.
9. Should you bring a floatie?

We were going to buy floaties but we didn’t bother in the end. Truth be told, we wish we did. Loads of people had pool noodles which are easy to fold up to put on the outside of your rucksack. While you can easily swim over to the Spa Pool, it would be a nice to have for some of the other gorges, especially Joffre Gorge.
And don’t worry about there being any crocodiles in Hamerlsey Gorge or in Karijini for that matter, there aren’t any!
10. What about cameras or phones?

One thing that we were really baffled about was whether to bring our cameras down into Hamerlsey Gorge. We had no idea if we would be wading or having to swim in water to get to the Spa Pool. But, you won’t be, until the very end when you swim to the Spa Pool for two minutes if you don’t walk on the rocks.
The thing is, I wish I knew that I could have easily brought my camera down and left it on the rocks while we swam over to the Spa Pool.
You’ll be able to keep an eye on your stuff and it’s not like you’re leaving it for hours out of sight. This is a key thing to know. We just stripped off into our swimmers, left our bags on the rock formations and jumped in the water.
With that in mind, we are gutted we didn’t bring our proper cameras down into this gorge because it is absolutely amazing.
We used our Insta360 and I took photos and videos on my phone. I bought an iphone waterproof case, but I didn’t use it as I was too worried it wouldn’t work. When you see professional photos at this pool, it is from people walking around the rocks to take them. If you do this, be very, very careful.
11. Best time of day and year to visit

We visited at 3pm so we didn’t see the turquoise water at Spa Pool that Instagram pictures show you. Maybe this was because of the light, but with that in mind, I would have visited between 11-1pm for the sun to be right above the gorge. I think this would have been the best time to see the water come alive here.
You also need to come to Hamersley Gorge between April – September as it will be way too hot otherwise. The temperatures frequently rise into the 50C here during Summer, while when we visited it was around 35C. The water wasn’t too cold compared to what we were expecting.
12. What to bring with you

We brought three litres of water with us for this walk and I don’t think we even drank one between us. That being said, bring more than enough for at least 1 hour to spend in the gorge.
- Wear hiking boots, but bring reef shoes with you.
- You don’t need a dry bag, but bring a rucksack and a floatie if you’re not great at swimming for more than a minute.
- Wear a hat and most of all wear a fly net over your hat. The flies here are instense. You need to wear light clothing as the flies seem to love dark coloured clothing. If you don’t wear a fly net, you’ll probably last five minutes before heading back to the car.
- If it is raining or starts raining when you’re in Hamersley Gorge, leave immediately because flash flooding occurs instantly (the rock formations won’t soak up the water and before you know it, you could be in trouble).
13. How to logistically plan your visit to Hamersley gorge

When planning your trip to Karijini National Park, I would recommend going to Hamersley Gorge first. This is because the gorge is on the outskirts of the park. Then stay at Tom Price Caravan Park that night, fuel up in the morning, then head into the park and stay at Karijini Eco Retreat to hit up the gorges around there, before staying a night in Dales Campground.
More Karijini Guides to read

To plan your trip as best as possible, check out our other Karijini National Park guides!
- 10 Tips for Visiting the Amazing Knox Gorge in Karijini National Park WA
- 12 Tips for Visiting Joffre Gorge Karijini National Park WA
- 13 Tips for Visiting Hamersley Gorge, Karijini National Park WA
- 7 Tips for Visiting Dales Gorge in Karijini National Park WA
- Ultimate Guide for Exploring Karijini National Park