Back in January while in Canberra we had a bit of time to kill and wanted to go out and explore the area while had the chance. I had been looking up things to do in the ACT (Australian Capital Territory) and we decided to check out Namadgi National Park. We had no idea there was a national park even in the ACT…it’s quite amazing how big of a place the territory is. The park is even about 1 hour in driving time from our location in Canberra.
We took off down the road and made our way to the visitor center for Namadgi Park. Namadgi National Park is quite large comprising over 106,000 hectares and nearly half the land in the Capital Territory. Namadgi is the Aboriginal name for the mountains in the area and the one of the parks that encompasses the alpine region in Australia. The park protects several geographic, historical, and culturally important areas.

They gave us some advice on several hiking trails in the park. They seemed to be pretty slow that day and were happy to chat with us about the park. Several were climbs up some of the hills and one sounded really cool, a hike out to a Aboroginal rock painting. It was a bit further down the road, but it definitely sounded very cool so I opted we go for that.
The way to the trail went down several roads through the park, and it wasn’t long before the trails turned to dirt roads. There are a lot of dirt roads around Australia, so this was not a completely uncommon sight.

Sometimes the roads were a bit suspect in the quality of travel. A few points along the road they had been flooded and we at first needed to get out of the car to make sure that the water was not high enough to cause any damage to our car.

We soon also realized that we were not as alone as we expected to be. It was amazing seeing all these kangaroos everywhere.


We finally made it to the trailhead, being the one car actually in the parking lot. We still weren’t sure what the trail would have in store for us though.

I have been to Australia several times in the past. I have visited several different parts of the country around Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland…but this place just felt different.


The scenery around us was just absolutely stunning. We felt very far away from where we started in Canberra, and even further away from home than we had felt in a very long time. It made me imagine discovering a place like this for the first time, being out there in a huge open area, with wild animals stalking through the grass.

We were walking around just taking in the imagery when with a bang we heard a large group of kangaroos take off almost directly behind us. It appeared they weren’t the only animals out there wandering about, and we saw a couple of wild dogs trying to chase down the Roos.

Part of the time too I felt that we were on display here. That the kangaroos were engaging in a little “people watching”. It was surprising both in how many there were, but also how close they were to us in general. They never let us get too close, but you could see them watching and looking. A few seemed to be like guardians for the other kangaroos resting up under the trees to escape the hot sun.


We almost gave up since it was so darn hot and a lot further of a walk then we had expected, but we did eventually get to the “payoff” for the hike. Under a boulder area there we saw the rock artwork.

It was really cool get to the chance to see the Rock Art. I had never seen anything like it before in my life so that was an even better part of the experience. However it probably would not have been as great of a hike had it not been for how beautiful the trip to it had been. Overall it was an amazing trip through the park. I really hope to get back at some point if i find myself in the region and see more of the surrounding area.
Just want to throw in a few more photos from the way out.



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