In the wake of a historic land settlement with traditional owners, Western Australia’s iconic El Questro embarks on an exciting new chapter.

Carved out by one of the four rivers that feed El Questro’s hypnotic landscape, the Chamberlain Gorge is accessible only by water, with boat trips. (Courtesy of El Questro)

Mission nuns once used these red gidgee-gidgee seeds to make their rosary beads when the real thing wasn’t available,” explains my guide, Vincent “Vinnie” Antony. “While they look decorative, they’re highly poisonous.”

Our safari-style vehicle is parked above an ancient river gorge inside El Questro Wilderness Park, deep within Western Australia’s remote Kimberley region. The views encompass a great sweep of rugged and wild countryside, with the auburn ridges of the Cockburn Range in the distance. Vinnie is busy extolling the uses of the Kimberley’s native bush when he hands me a pea-size black seed. “The kapok tree has multiple uses, from its easy-to-carve wood to its petals and leaves, which are loaded with antioxidants,” he says. “And these seeds yield oil for soap making and fertilizer. They’re also excellent eating, either raw or roasted.”

I take a tentative bite. The texture is rubbery and it tastes like a mushroom — not bad.

This “Bush Culture and History” excursion with Vinnie is one of many private tours included in my stay at El Questro Homestead, one of Australia’s most exclusive lodges. Accompanying us are four Indigenous Australian high school kids from the little outback town of Wyndham. Here to acquire hands-on career experience as part of a recently conceived collaboration with El Questro, they’re excited about the prospect of becoming tour guides on their ancestral homeland.

The students’ enthusiasm is understandable. It has been more than 30 years since this former cattle station was transformed into a tourism destination, and in all that time, El Questro has never offered Indigenous-led tours, primarily because of disputes between the local community and earlier operators. This changed in November 2022, when, less than two years after purchasing the 2,800-square-kilometer pastoral lease from a U.S. hospitality company, Australian-owned holiday park operator G’Day Group co-signed a landmark settlement that has returned more than half of the property (165,000 hectares) to its traditional owners, the Ngarinyin people. The new freehold reserve has, in turn, been leased back to G’Day Group on a 99-year term in order to continue El Questro’s tourism enterprises and provide economic opportunities and jobs for the local community.

“We are proud to partner with the Ngarinyin people to build a successful future together at El Questro,” says G’Day’s Adelaide-based founder and CEO Grant Wilckens. “Since signing the agreement and finalizing the land transfer in mid-2023, we’ve been working hard behind the scenes to establish the foundations of our long-term partnership and identify significant cultural sites on the property.”

Guests of El Questro can now look forward to experiencing age-old Ngarinyin rituals and immersive cultural encounters. Among them is a cleansing smoking ceremony, an introduction to the significance of natural pigments like charcoal and ocher, and rounds of storytelling and song-sharing that honor the land as the words echo through the air.

High school students from the Kimberley town of Wyndham getting some hands-on guiding experience with El Questro ranger Vincent Antony. — High-school students from the Kimberley town of Wyndham getting some hands-on guiding experience with El Questro ranger Vincent Antony. (Photo: Nannette Holliday)

Laced by four rivers, the austere beauty of El Questro Wilderness Park promises plenty of natural sights for visitors, be it an inviting waterfall or a hidden spring-fed swimming hole. At the turn of the last century, the first ranchers in the area were hopeful that the land would be similarly suitable for large-scale cattle grazing, but El Questro’s forbidding terrain of ravines, ridges, and gullies made that a challenging proposition at best.

Will Burrell knew this when he first arrived here by helicopter in 1991. A wealthy young British aristocrat, he and his soon-to-be wife Celia Shelmerdine purchased the run-down cattle station for a million Australian dollars (about US$780,000 in exchange rates of the time) to create a sprawling outback resort. They envisaged guests being pampered with luxurious accommodations and gourmet meals after a day’s adventures in the wilderness.

I reflect on their vision as I sit on the Homestead’s timber deck overlooking the Chamberlain River, the sundowner in my hand blending effortlessly into the burnt-orange sky. The Burrells sold El Questro in 2005, but the property retains much of its original magic.

The Homestead is El Questro’s most luxurious accommodation offering, with just 10 rooms and standalone suites that start at about US$2,000 a night, all-inclusive. A 20-minute drive away on the banks of the Pentecost River, The Station has self-contained bungalows and camping sites beginning at a much more affordable US$40 a night. There’s also a glamping operation at Emma Gorge, with 60 safari-style tented cabins on the doorstep of one of the Kimberley’s most spectacular canyons.

With its new lease secured, G’Day is embarking on major enhancement and expansion plans across the property. More than US$20 million will be spent on new infrastructure, extensive refurbishing, recycling facilities, carbon-neutral electric cruise boats, and improved water, waste, and land management practices.

*Left to right*: The view from a helicopter tour over El Questro; visitors learn about the use of ocher among Indigenous Australian communities. (Photos: iStock.com/Luckyviks; Courtesy of El Questro)

El Questro general manager Geoff Trewin shows me where the new Homestead villas will be built, increasing the total guest count from 18 to 30. Farther down the road, a swanky day spa with sweeping Chamberlain River views is in the planning stages, while 25 new rooms are slated for The Station.

“The most significant change is our new range of cultural experiences and tours in partnership with the traditional owners,” Trewin says. “It’s a testament to our commitment to respecting and preserving El Questro’s cultural heritage.

“Our celebrity hideout status will still be maintained, though. After all, no one knew Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban stayed here until she happily blamed the magical thermal waters of Zebedee Springs for her pregnancy.”

I can’t attest to any mystical fertility powers at Zebedee’s palm-fringed rock pools, but the warm thermal waters and peaceful forest setting did soothe my soul — or was it the champagne being poured? The springs are open to the public every morning, but come afternoon, they’re the exclusive preserve of Homestead guests.

Roughly the size of Morocco, the Kimberley region is so vast it’s impossible to see everything at once, even on my helicopter flight the following day. From high above, I see treeless plateaus dotted with emerald waterholes, waterfalls cascading furiously down black and ocher cliff faces, and tall palms clumped like emerald umbrellas in deep rainforest valleys. The hypnotic wilderness stretches to the horizon in every direction. Zooming back over the Homestead, I look down on manicured lawns that appear as an accidental brush stroke on nature’s canvas. When the helicopter lands on the tennis court, a staff member hands me a cool lavender-scented cloth and a glass of champagne. I feel like a celebrity.

This has long been El Questro’s star attraction: the combination of epic wilderness and abundant luxury. Now, with Ngarinyin people back onboard as joint custodians of the land, the destination is even more appealing.

El Questro’s exclusive Homestead retreat is perched above the Chamberlain River. (Courtesy of El Questro)

This article originally appeared in the August/September 2024 print issue of DestinAsian magazine (“Gaining Ground”).

This Kimberley Retreat Now Reveals the Area’s Indigenous Culture

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