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29 October 2009, Aboriginal Australia

Aboriginal Coastal Experiences

Key facts

  • Torres Strait Islands are home to over 6,000 people, offering a cultural link between the Australian mainland and Pacific Islanders. Each of the Torres Strait Islands has a distinct culture, customs and in some cases, even language.
  • Over 60 per cent of Cape York’s inhabitants are of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent. The Torres Strait Islanders are Melanesian peoples related to the Papuans of adjoining New Guinea, and are sea-faring people with their own distinct culture.
  • Head of Bight, 300 km west of Ceduna on the Eyre Peninsula, is where white sand beaches meet the Bunda Cliffs of the Nullarbor Plain, forming the Great Australian Bight, a geographical feature of national environmental significance to Australians.

Full story

Take a trek into an ancient rainforest on Australia’s east coast, a canoe ride through a tranquil lagoon, or learn to craft spears and catch fish in the traditional way in our tidal rivers or remote beaches.

Stay in the most beautiful camping sites in the world and wake up to kilometres of pristine coastline.

Go cruising through wetlands with Aboriginal guides, stay in an Aboriginal wilderness lodge or watch whales from Aboriginal lands where the desert plains meet ocean cliffs.

Or explore inspiring coral cays, uninhabited reefs and crystal clear waters with our northern Indigenous peoples, the traditional custodians of the land, who know its resources, its stories and its sacred places…

Uniquely Australian

  • Stay in a log cabin or thatched beach shelter at Kooljaman Wilderness Camp at Cape Leveque on the remote Dampier Peninsula of Western Australia. Perched on the tip of the cape, 220km north of Broome, Kooljaman is a multi award-winning stylish wilderness camp owned by the Bardi communities of Djarindjin and One Arm Point, a place where visitors can link to a rich local heritage stretching back thousands of years. Spend a day with an Aboriginal family swimming, snorkelling, reef walking and exploring old mission ruins on nearby Sunday Island.  
    Experience Esperance with a local Aboriginal guide who’ll take you on an intriguing journey as they interpret and share the area’s cultural history, significant history and environment from an Aboriginal perspective. Enjoy encounters with wildlife or taste some traditional Aboriginal ‘bush tucker’ on a Kepa Kurl Tour.  
  • Take a fascinating cultural walk (Wula Guda Nyinda) with local Aboriginal guide, Darren ‘Capes’ Capewell, an expert on the local Aboriginal culture, birds, plants and animals, at Monkey Mia on the shores of Shark Bay, a world heritage area in Western Australia.   Visit the Wardan Aboriginal Centre in the Margaret River coastal region of Western Australia, run by the Wardandi people.  
  • Stay at Coorong Wilderness Lodge or Camp Coorong, both Aboriginal-owned and operated, in the spectacular South Australian Coorong which adjoins into the Great Southern Ocean. Experienced guides can take you walking through ancient middens that extend as far as the eye can see, boating, canoeing, and bird watching.
  • Explore Tang Dim Mer (in Rocky Cape National Park) in North-West Tasmania, with its coastal middens or sample mutton bird (seabirds that are traditional Tasmanian Aboriginal food) on a Jahadi Indigenous Experience ‘With Spirit’.  
  • See the beautiful shell necklace collection at Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery in Launceston.

Contacts

Tourism Australia
Phoebe Grealy
Media Coordinator - Destination
P. 61 2 9361 1364
E. pgrealy@tourism.australia.com
W. http://www.media.australia.com

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© Tourism Australia 2009

The information on this website is presented in good faith and on the basis that Tourism Australia, nor their agents or employees, are liable (whether by reason of error, omission, negligence, lack of care or otherwise) to any person for any damage or loss whatsoever which has occurred or may occur in relation to that person taking or not taking (as the case may be) action in respect of any statement, information or advice given in this website.

Tourism Australia wishes to advise people of aboriginal decent that this website may contain images of persons now deceased.