Mitchell Falls & Plateau

The Wunambal people know the four-tiered Mitchell Falls as Punamiiunpuu, one of the Kimberley’s most iconic landmarks and a place of great cultural and spiritual significance. Carved through sandstone by the Mitchell River, this faraway falls cascades 97 metres over four distinct tiers, each emerald pool flowing into the next.

In 2015, Western Australia’s state premier announced that the plateau, together with neighbouring Prince Regent and Lawley River National Parks, would soon be known as Kimberley National Park: a five million hectare slice of pristine wilderness that would eclipse the Northern Territory’s Kakadu as Australia’s biggest ever sanctuary, although the plan was scrapped once a new government was voted in a few years later.

Access to the Mitchell Plateau is via a long, corrugated and strictly 4WD-only gravel road. Alternatively, some of the cruise companies offer scenic helicopter flights over the Mitchell Falls as an optional extra to the cruise itinerar