The Gibb River Road…Done and Dusted

July 2025

Having just completed the Gibb River Road ( GRR) I’d like to propose two new names for it. Name 1. Six plus Gorge Road. Name 2. Spare Car Parts Road. More about name two later. The impetus behind proposal 1 comes for the fact that Gorges are the main attractions along this 650km stretch of dirt. Amongst the group a couple stood out.

Manning Gorge. To reach Manning Gorge you must first stop at the Mount Barnett Roadhouse to pay camping fees. On the day we were there it was like a Westfield Shopping Centre two days before Christmas….people everywhere and grumpy staff. The staff can afford to be grumpy as they have the monopoly. The Gorge really is beautiful and a bit of fun to get there.

First you have to cross Manning Creek. You put your days livery in a half 44 gallon drum and swim or walk it across. We had to swim. It was a refreshing start and end to the walk, which given the warm temperatures in this part of Australia was not unwelcome. Two .5 kilometers later you reach the Gorge and it really is magnificent.

Tunnel Creek is also a bit of fun. Headlights on you scramble your way across some water bound rocks to enter the tunnel which cuts through the Napier Range. To get to the end you have to wade and sometimes swim across cold water in the dark of the cave. I felt like a Bondi iceberg swimmer sans the sunburn. Freshwater crocs can be found in the cave and they were spotted the day we traversed it. We figured given the number of people doing the same thing our chances of having an unpleasant encounter with said Crocs was considerably lowered.

We knew the GRR would be busy and as our time on it covered the school holidays over several states, it really was. At one campsite we counted roughly 200 cars plus two tour groups! Moving camp was a cross between the Dakar Rally and the Tour De France. To have any chance of getting a good camping site you have to race your fellow campers. It starts at sunrise. Teams throw furtive glances at their opposition as they decamp. An early pack up is essential if you want to get ahead of the group. You then hit the road where the dust kicked up by the large number of oncoming travellers, also racing to their next campsite, can make it hard to see. You are awarded the yellow jersey if you make it to your destination before your fellow competitors and find a site where you can’t be crowded out. We narrowly missed the jersey a couple of times but most times we were largely ‘golden’.

On the road we met some lovely and at times interesting people. About half way we met a young Japanese man I will call Fred. Fred is a 22 year old Japanese national who had broken down. Driving a low clearance Suburu without 4WD tyres his chances of making it to the end were slim at best. With temps reaching 35 degrees we knew we couldn’t leave him there but as the back of our car was packed tighter than James Packer’s wallet we couldn’t fit him in either. We managed to flag down a couple of lovely caravaners travelling together. One was a mechanic. Hoorrahh! A quick once over he proclaimed in his laconic Australian accent, ‘ cars rooted mate.’ Not sure Fred understood that phrase. A quick calculation about how much time and money it would cost to tow and fix, we decided for Fred, that he should abandon the car. We told him to collect his belongings, pushed the car off the road and told Fred to wave goodbye to it. Poor Fred looked grateful and confused at the same time. One of the caravaners gave him a lift to the Mt Barnett Roadhouse (aka Westfield Shopping Center) and he was last seen heading to Kununurra with a 20 something female he had managed to bum a lift with. His unplanned donation to the residents and travelers of the GRR being spare car parts, a jerry can of fuel and whatever else he left in the Subaru. (*I did contact the local Council and the local police to let them know the car had been abandoned).

Perhaps the strangest thing we saw was a woman pushing some sort of pram contraption down the middle of the GRR. She slowly emerged from the dust kicked up by oncoming traffic. She had tried to make herself more visible by adding a couple of flags to her unsuitable wheeled thing but I doubt a road train would have had enough time to slow down and avoid her and her flags if they met at the wrong point. Plus she wasn’t wearing a mask! The dust! So much dust! I hope she made it to her destination. If she was planning on getting to the end of the road she had roughly 360kms to go.

Let’s not forget the tow trucks of which we saw a few. We heard they can cost up to 10k and some require up front payment. We just hoped we wouldn’t need one.

The condition of the road was mixed. We entered it from the Derby end and often commented on how remarkably good it was. Then we left Mt Barnett Roadhouse and it all turned to s*$t. Bull dust potholes, endless bone rattling corrugations, some moderately deep creek crossings and rocks, rocks, rocks ensued. My rock doctor normally likes rocks but he didn’t like these ones. At one point when we had pulled off the road to have lunch we saw a car heading towards Derby. Ten minutes later we saw it heading back towards Kununurra. We wondered if the occupants had had enough and were retreating to the nearest bitumen.

Few cars escaped the road unscathed. At each stop along the road we saw people…usually men, bent over bonnets, under cars, tapping, prodding, pushing, banging, zippy tying and gaffer taping things on car. We had to zipppy tie our fog light to the bull bar as we’d lost the bracket somewhere…….Looking around we saw this was a common problem. Many cars were missing brackets and like ours most were missing on the right side. Why the right? We anticipated the loss of the second bracket and took it off before the road did the job for us.

We had planned to drive to Mitchell Falls but was never very comfortable with this idea. After talking to people who had done it, we decided not to drive it. One person told us it took them six hours to cover the 260km in from the GRR. A group of dirt bike riders who had only made it to the Drysdale River Roadhouse described it as ‘hell on earth’. After The Plenty, Tanami and now the Gibb we decided we’d had enough so opted to fly into Mitchell Falls instead. We caught a charter tour from Ellenbrae Station and had a very pleasant day with our four travel companions plus our multitasking pilot Andrew who was also our 4WD driver and on ground tour guide. It was money well spent and cheaper than breaking down on the drive in.

For those planning on doing the Gibb, here is a suggested packing list of what to bring and what not to bring:

Not to Bring

Drones, loud music and generators. Heads up owners of any of these camping bandits. They are all extremely intrusive and nobody likes them in campgrounds except you.

To Bring

Zippy ties, gaffer tape, air filter, coolant, windscreen repair kit x2….. make that 3

Maps

Patience

An alarm clock so you’re up and ready for the Tour De Gibb

Hat, sunscreen, back packs, sturdy shoes, multiple water bottles.

Fuel, water.

Togs, water shoes, small towel to put in backpack.

Voltarin to use when the road throws your back out.

Optus sim (more coverage than Telstra)

Starlink so you can google how to fix the car and to watch the footy…..but please keep it down. Not everyone loves Collingwood.

Finally, if you bring a sense of fun and wonder and a can do attitude, you’ll be alright mate!

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