Ningaloo Reef is the largest fringing coral reef in Australia and one of the healthiest and most accessible coral reef systems in the world. Moreover, the reef is one of only two coral reefs in the world that have formed on the western side of a continent and is considered WA's premier marine conservation icon.

The shallow lagoons formed by the reef and the deeper offshore waters create a diverse array of habitats for a multitude of colourful corals and more than 500 species of fish. Many other creatures are found in the marine park, including whales sharks, turtles, dugongs, dolphins, manta rays, humpback whales and orcas.

The Ningaloo coast World Heritage Area is in the hot and tropics north-west Australia where summer temperatures often exceed 45C. For this reason, most visitors prefer to come during the winter months (April-September) when temperatures range from 20 to 30 C. Indeed we are currently travelling in May and here is plenty of tourists, mostly locals.
We stayed in the area for 5 nights and 6 days because we are beach lovers and there’s a lot to explore!

Indeed, within the Ningaloo Coast, World Heritage Area lies Cape Range National Park, dominated by a rugged limestone range, where arid coastal plains and beautiful sand dunes predominate.
Access roads to individual sites include both sealed and unsealed roads, therefore most of these roads are suitable for two-wheel-drive vehicles.
The best thing about the Park is that it is possible to camp in close proximity to the Ningaloo Reef. There are several campsites available but it is essential to book your campsite online prior to your arrival (https://www.dpaw.wa.gov.au/news/item/2336-online-bookings-for-all-campgrounds-at-cape-range-national-park) especially during the peak season when everything is fully booked!

We’ve been lucky enough to have had the opportunity to stay at the Mesa Camp for one night, in the occasion of Marica's birthday that we celebrated with an amazing aperitivo (cheese, olives, crackers, Kraken and coke!) at sunset. We just loved it here!! Despite the strong wind at night, the view from the sand dunes behind the campsites is unbelievable, especially at sunset! And we couldn’t help but come back to the dunes in the middle of the night to watch at the starry sky, probably the best we have ever seen so far!

A good alternative to stay in the nearby of the range is Yardie Creek station, which is a lovely cattle station and we paid 16 dollars per night per person for an unpowered site.

The best areas where to snorkel in the Park are Turquoise Bay, Oyster Stack and Lakeside. We really enjoyed the first two even though there were strong currents and it was not always easy to swim especially if without fins. We found so many colourful fish and swam in crystal clear waters. The most annoying thing, like almost everywhere in WA, is the crazy amount of flies and horse flies everywhere at any time until sunset, so you need to constantly walk with a flies net on your face!

Moreover, Exmouth is a very famous destination for the whale shark tours where you can swim with these giants of the ocean. However, the cheapest tour is about 400 dollars per person which is way out of our budget at the moment. Maybe the next time!

One more beautiful spot to explore the Ningaloo barrier reef is Coral Bay, located south to Cape Range National Park. Here you’ll find two caravan parks always pretty full during the high season and quite expensive as well (we paid 46 dollars per car per night). This bay is perfect to relax and enjoy the tropical atmosphere on the white sand. The shallow water is perfect to snorkel even for the little ones.

If you want to stay in a more authentic Australian campground, you will need to drive for less than 1 hour to get to the beautiful kettle station of Bullara. We stayed here 2 nights paying 14 dollars per person per night. It’s a family-run kettle station and we met so many lovely people here, not to mention the originality of every single piece of the campground! And if you stay here, you really can’t miss the delicious scones with jam and cream (gluten-free option available) that Edwina makes every morning.
Such a delightful stay!