Qualla: Gundabooka National Park

Gundabooka National Park: Introduction

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jarrod, CC BY 2.0. Drive south from Bourke into country most maps treat as empty, and a mountain breaks the flatness. Mount Gunderbooka rises some five hundred metres above the surrounding plains, a rugged red range standing alone where you expect only saltbush and horizon. To the Ngemba and Paakantyi people this is not scenery but a sacred place, and the proof is painted into a great rock overhang in its folds: dancers, hunting tools, hand stencils and the animals of the Dreaming, set down on stone by people who have known this mountain far longer than the word "national park" has existed.

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Image: Jarrod | CC BY 2.0

Gundabooka National Park: A Mountain Alone

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Stitchingbushwalker, CC BY-SA 4.0. Gundabooka National Park covers roughly 640 square kilometres of the real outback, the kind of place where the nearest supplies are around 50 kilometres north at Bourke or 110 kilometres south at Cobar, with nothing in between. The land runs from the banks of the Darling River up...

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Image: Stitchingbushwalker | CC BY-SA 4.0

Gundabooka National Park: The Painted Overhang

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Caroline Jones, Public domain. The heart of the park, and the one Aboriginal site open to visitors, is the rock art at Mulgowan, reached by the Yapa walking track. Beneath an enormous overhang, the stone carries paintings of animal figures, dancers, hand stencils and hunting tools - a record of life and belief...

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Image: Caroline Jones | Public domain

Gundabooka National Park: Whose Country This Is

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit PotMart186, CC BY-SA 4.0. The Ngemba and Paakantyi peoples jointly manage Gundabooka with the National Parks and Wildlife Service - a partnership that puts the land's traditional custodians at the table where its future is decided. The mountain that draws photographers is, to them, sacred ground; the over...

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Image: PotMart186 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Gundabooka National Park: Outback on Its Own Terms

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Shiftchange at English Wikipedia, Public domain. What makes Gundabooka worth the dirt-road drive is exactly what keeps the crowds away. There is no town here, no fuel, no demand for guides, no easy version of this place. The roads in are mostly sealed now, the legacy of government upgrades early this century, but the last stret...

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Image: Shiftchange at English Wikipedia | Public domain