Go where the signal fades.
Every guide is built to one high standard, for Australia's best-kept secrets.
Magnetic Island
Magnetic Island National Park takes in the granite hills, bays and fringing reefs of Yunbenun, an island about 8 km off Townsville where wild koalas and Second World War fortifications sit within a 20-minute ferry ride of the mainland.
Wollumbin National Park
Wollumbin National Park protects the 1,157m central plug of the ancient Tweed Volcano in the Tweed Valley, 12km south-west of Murwillumbah — the summit is closed to visitors, but the rainforest, picnic areas and caldera views are not.
Windjana Gorge National Park
Bandiln͟gan (Windjana Gorge) cuts 3.5km through the Napier Range — a Devonian coral reef laid down about 350 million years ago — in Bunuba Country off the Gibb River Road, where freshwater crocodiles bask on the sandbanks in the dry season.
Danggu Geikie Gorge National Park
The Bandaraln͟garri (Fitzroy River) has cut a 30 metre gorge through the Geikie Range — a Devonian barrier reef laid down about 360 million years ago — 20km north of Fitzroy Crossing on a sealed road, in Bunuba Country.
Mungo National Park
A dry lake in far south-west New South Wales, ringed by the 30km Walls of China lunette — 42,000-year-old burials in its layers, a 70km self-drive loop and short walks on the lakebed.
Border Ranges National Park
Border Ranges National Park protects 31,683 hectares of the caldera rim of the Tweed Volcano on the NSW–Queensland border, crossed by the 42km gravel loop of the Tweed Range Scenic Drive and Brindle Creek Road.
Girraween National Park
Girraween National Park protects 11,800ha of granite domes, balanced boulders and wildflower heath on the Granite Belt, about 260km south-west of Brisbane on the Queensland–New South Wales border.
Great Sandy National Park (Cooloola)
The Cooloola section of Great Sandy National Park between Noosa and Rainbow Beach — coloured sand cliffs, beach driving, the 102km Great Walk and the Noosa Everglades on Kabi Kabi and Butchulla Country.
Moreton Island (Mulgumpin)
A 37km sand island in Moreton Bay, 40km off Brisbane — wrecks to snorkel, dunes to climb and beach camping on Quandamooka Country.
Mount William National Park
The quiet northern end of the Bay of Fires — orange-lichen granite, lagoon beaches, forester kangaroos on the heath and an 1889 granite lighthouse at Tasmania's most easterly point, about two hours from Launceston.
Alpine National Park
Alpine National Park is Victoria's largest national park, a high plateau carrying the state's tallest peaks — Mount Bogong at 1,986 m and Mount Feathertop at 1,922 m — with open High Plains, cattlemen's huts and remote 4WD valleys reached from four different gateways.
K'gari (Fraser Island)
The world's largest sand island off Queensland's Fraser Coast — 123km of dunes, perched lakes and rainforest behind 75 Mile Beach, reached by 4WD and vehicle barge on Butchulla Country.
Undara Lava Tubes
Undara Volcanic National Park holds one of the longest lava tube systems on Earth, about 300km south-west of Cairns in Queensland's Gulf Savannah, and you can walk into the tubes only with a guide.
Yengo National Park
Yengo National Park holds the sandstone plateau between the Hawkesbury and the Hunter — more than 640 recorded Aboriginal sites, a flat-topped mountain of great spiritual significance, and unsealed roads that keep most visitors on the edges.
Daintree National Park
Daintree National Park (CYPAL) holds two sections of World Heritage rainforest on the Far North Queensland coast — Mossman Gorge, about 80km north of Cairns, and Cape Tribulation, where lowland forest stands on the sand beside the Great Barrier Reef.
Whitsunday Islands National Park
Thirty islands 25km east of Airlie Beach inside the Great Barrier Reef — Whitehaven Beach's silica sand, the Hill Inlet lookouts and boat-only island camping.
Kangaroo Island
Kangaroo Island holds Flinders Chase National Park's granite coast, a fur seal colony at Cape du Couedic, Australian sea lions at Seal Bay and the 61km Kangaroo Island Wilderness Trail, 16km off the Fleurieu Peninsula and reached by a 45-minute ferry from Cape Jervis or a 30-minute flight from Adelaide.
Lord Howe Island
Lord Howe Island holds Mount Gower's 875m summit, the world's southernmost true coral reef, seabird colonies and the endemic woodhen on a World Heritage volcanic island 700km northeast of Sydney, reached only by a flight of under two hours.
Port Campbell National Park
Port Campbell National Park packs the Great Ocean Road's most famous run of limestone sea stacks, arches and gorges into a few kilometres of clifftop between Princetown and Peterborough.
Mitchell River National Park (Mitchell Falls)
Four-tiered Mitchell Falls (Punamii-unpuu) drops off the Mitchell Plateau in the far north Kimberley — Wunambal Gaambera Country, reached by rough 4WD track and an 8.6km Class 5 walk.
Dhilba Guuranda-Innes National Park
Dhilba Guuranda-Innes National Park holds the south-western tip of Yorke Peninsula in South Australia — sealed roads to two operating lighthouses, more than 40 offshore shipwrecks, the gypsum-mining ruins of Inneston and seven campgrounds, all about 284km and 3 to 3.5 hours' drive from Adelaide.
Mount Remarkable National Park
Mount Remarkable National Park protects about 16,500 hectares of red quartzite gorge, river red gum creek country and ridge tops in the Southern Flinders Ranges of South Australia — three separate hubs at Alligator Gorge, Mambray Creek and Melrose, with the Heysen Trail running through.
Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park
Tasmania's wild-rivers park on the Lyell Highway: Frenchmans Cap, the Franklin River and roadside rainforest walks between Derwent Bridge and Queenstown.
Oxley Wild Rivers National Park
World Heritage gorge country on the eastern edge of the New England Tablelands — 240m waterfall drops, short rim walks to big views, and low-range 4WD camping on the Macleay rivers.
Glass House Mountains National Park
Glass House Mountains National Park protects the volcanic plugs that rose through the coastal plain about 25 to 27 million years ago and now stand 70km north of Brisbane, with short, steep walks to views over the peaks.
Great Otway National Park
Cool-temperate rainforest, waterfalls and fossil-bearing sea cliffs behind the Great Ocean Road — including Victoria's just-over-110km Great Ocean Walk from Apollo Bay to the Twelve Apostles.
Dorrigo National Park
Dorrigo National Park protects World Heritage Gondwana rainforest on the Great Escarpment above the Bellinger Valley — an hour's sealed-road climb inland from Coffs Harbour, and the centrepiece of the Waterfall Way.
Morton National Park
Morton National Park holds about 1,997km² of sandstone escarpment, gorge and plateau country running from the Southern Highlands to the South Coast — waterfall lookouts and step-free boardwalks in the north, declared wilderness ranges and a 720m summit in the south.
Fitzgerald River National Park
Fitzgerald River National Park protects nearly 300,000 hectares of south-coast heath between Bremer Bay and Hopetoun — one of Australia's largest and most botanically significant parks, with southern right whales calving off Point Ann from June to October.
Cape Range National Park
Cape Range National Park drops a limestone range straight into Ningaloo Reef — gorge walks with rock-wallabies on one side, snorkelling you wade into from the sand on the other.
Pilliga Forest
More than half a million hectares of cypress and eucalypt woodland in north-west New South Wales — 2,000km of public access trails, weathered sandstone caves carrying Gamilaraay rock art, and a gorge lined with sculpture.
Grampians (Gariwerd) National Park
Grampians (Gariwerd) National Park protects five sandstone ranges rising out of western Victoria's farmland — 168,000 hectares of escarpments, plateaus and sheltered gullies about 260 km and three hours' drive west of Melbourne.
Kosciuszko National Park
Australia's highest country in the Snowy Mountains of southern New South Wales — Mount Kosciuszko at 2,228m, the glacial lakes of the Main Range and the headwaters of the Snowy River.
Blue Mountains National Park
Sandstone cliff country and more than 140km of walking tracks about 90 minutes west of Sydney — the Three Sisters, the Grand Cliff Top Walk, Wentworth Falls and the Grose Valley.
Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park
Glacial lakes beneath a dolerite peak at one end and Australia's deepest freshwater lake at the other — 2 hours from Launceston in the north, 2 hours 40 minutes from Hobart in the south, and 65km of world heritage walking between them.
Tasman National Park
Australia's highest sea cliffs — dolerite columns ending at Cape Raoul, Cape Hauy and Cape Pillar — plus the booked 48km Three Capes Track and Fortescue Bay camping, 90 minutes from Hobart.
Tarkine (takayna)
Australia's largest tract of cool temperate rainforest — myrtle beech, sassafras and Huon pine-lined rivers — spread across north-west Tasmania and reached on the sealed Tarkine Drive from Smithton and Stanley, with Corinna and the Pieman River at its southern edge.
Tjoritja / West MacDonnell National Park
Tjoritja / West MacDonnell National Park holds 161 km of the MacDonnell Ranges west of Alice Springs (Mparntwe) — gaps, gorges and cold permanent waterholes on sealed road, with the Larapinta Trail running the ridgelines above.
Royal National Park
Australia's oldest national park and the world's second oldest, 33km south of Sydney: 26km of coast track, lagoon swimming at Wattamolla, and more than 1,700 recorded Aboriginal sites on Dharawal Country.
Noosa National Park
Noosa National Park protects the headland, bays and forest at the edge of Noosa Heads on the Sunshine Coast, 160km north of Brisbane, with more than 15km of walking tracks and a 5.4km one-way coastal walk to Sunshine Beach.
Lamington National Park
Lamington National Park protects 21,176ha of World Heritage Gondwana rainforest on the McPherson Range, about 110km south of Brisbane and split into the Green Mountains and Binna Burra sections.
Springbrook National Park
Springbrook National Park holds a rainforest plateau on the eroded northern flank of an ancient shield volcano about 100km south of Brisbane, where Twin Falls and Purling Brook drop off rhyolite cliffs and Cave Creek falls through a cave roof lit by glow worms.
Cape Le Grand National Park
Cape Le Grand National Park puts granite peaks, white-sand bays and kangaroos on the beach 50km east of Esperance on Western Australia's south coast.
Coorong National Park
The Coorong is a 150km Ramsar lagoon on Ngarrindjeri Country, shut from the Southern Ocean by the Younghusband Peninsula — flat walks, pelican colonies and low-tide 4WD beach driving, two hours south-east of Adelaide.
Bay of Fires
Orange-lichen granite, white sand and clear water from Binalong Bay to larapuna (Eddystone Point) on Tasmania's north-east coast — free beach camping, informal coastal walks, and St Helens 30 minutes away for fuel and food.
Murray-Sunset National Park
Four salt lakes that turn pink, free bush camps and unsealed mallee tracks in Victoria's largest national park, 550km north-west of Melbourne.
Mount Hypipamee
A granite-walled volcanic shaft almost 70m across with a green lake 58m below the rim, plus Dinner Falls on the headwaters of the Barron River — two short walks from one car park on the Kennedy Highway.
Nitmiluk National Park (Katherine Gorge)
Thirteen sandstone gorges cut into the Arnhem Land Plateau on Jawoyn-owned country 30km north-east of Katherine, seen by cruise, canoe and more than 100km of walking tracks.
Litchfield National Park
A sandstone plateau falls off the Tabletop Range into a chain of waterfalls and clear plunge pools about 120km south-west of Darwin — most of it on sealed roads, with 4WD-only sandstone country and a multi-day plateau walk on the edges.
Maria Island
Tasmania's car-free island national park, reached only by passenger ferry from Triabunna: 300-million-year-old fossil cliffs, painted sandstone, two summits over 600 metres, wombats on the grassy flats and a World Heritage convict settlement you can sleep in.
Kalbarri National Park
Kalbarri National Park holds the Murchison River's 85km gorge through red-and-white banded sandstone and a run of Indian Ocean cliffs — Nature's Window, the Skywalk and the Z Bend, all on sealed road 590km north of Perth.
Walls of Jerusalem
A walk-in-only alpine park on Tasmania's Central Plateau, where dolerite walls rise around tarns and thousand-year-old pencil pines — 1 hour 40 minutes from Launceston and three days on foot.
Stirling Range National Park
Stirling Range National Park lifts 65km of jagged quartzite-and-shale peaks straight out of the Great Southern wheatbelt — Bluff Knoll at 1,098m is the highest point in southern Western Australia, with Grade 4–5 climbs, spring mountain bells and weather that turns alpine without warning.
Mount Buffalo
Mount Buffalo National Park is a 31,000-hectare granite plateau above the Ovens Valley in north-east Victoria — tors, gorges and alpine lookouts 325 km from Melbourne, with free entry all year.
Beowa National Park
Two sections of rocky Far South Coast either side of Twofold Bay — the 32km Light to Light walk between a historic tower and a State Heritage lightstation, camping, and whales from the headlands.
Mount Kaputar
The eroded heart of an extinct shield volcano in north-west New South Wales — organ-pipe basalt at Sawn Rocks, lookouts over the Namoi plains, snow gums and Grade 4 climbs above Narrabri.
Conondale
Conondale National Park protects 35,700 hectares of rainforest and open forest in the Conondale Range behind the Sunshine Coast, where Booloumba Creek falls through gorges of rock pools and the 56km Conondale Range Great Walk begins.
Chillagoe-Mungo
Chillagoe-Mungana Caves National Park protects a limestone belt about 5km wide and 45km long west of Cairns, where ranger-guided caves, Aboriginal rock art galleries, self-guided caving and heritage-listed smelter ruins sit in dry savanna woodland.
Blackdown Tableland
Blackdown Tableland National Park is a sandstone plateau rising abruptly from the plains between Dingo and Bluff, 183km west of Rockhampton — 47,950 hectares of gorge, spring-fed creek and Ghungalu cultural country at the north-eastern edge of the central Queensland sandstone belt.
Cape Hillsborough
Cape Hillsborough National Park holds just over 1,000 hectares of rainforest, volcanic headland and beach 50km north-west of Mackay, where wallabies and kangaroos come down onto the sand to feed around first light.
Main Range
Queensland's Main Range National Park — not the Main Range walking track in Kosciuszko National Park, New South Wales — is the volcanic escarpment of the Scenic Rim, 116km south-west of Brisbane, where the Cunningham Highway climbs through Cunninghams Gap and World Heritage rainforest rises to Bare Rock at 1,168m.
Hinchinbrook Island
Hinchinbrook Island National Park is an uninhabited island 8 km off Cardwell in North Queensland, crossed on foot only by the 32 km Thorsborne Trail between Ramsay Bay and George Point.
Paluma Range
Paluma Range National Park sends waterfalls and rainforest creeks off the ranges between Townsville and Ingham, with a cool misty village at the top of Mount Spec Road.
Capertee Valley
Capertee Valley is a broad, escarpment-ringed basin about three hours west of Sydney on Wiradjuri Country, where Capertee National Park's sandstone Valley Lookout, the ruins of Glen Davis's oil-shale works and 242 recorded bird species sit inside one quiet, largely unsealed driving loop.
Wallaman Falls
Wallaman Falls drops Stony Creek 268 metres in a single unbroken plunge into a gorge in Girringun National Park — an hour's drive inland from Ingham in Queensland's Wet Tropics.
Conway
Conway National Park covers the Cape Conway peninsula south of Shute Harbour — the largest area of lowland tropical rainforest in Queensland outside Tropical North Queensland, with ridge lookouts over the Whitsunday Passage and beaches you walk to instead of cruise to.
Wooroonooran
Wet Tropics World Heritage rainforest across the Bellenden Ker Range between Cairns and Innisfail — Queensland's highest peak, tiered waterfall walks, a 19km through-walk and riverside camping.
Bunya Mountains
Bunya Mountains National Park protects the world's largest stand of ancient bunya pines on a cool plateau above 1,100m that rises abruptly from the Western Downs, about 200km north-west of Brisbane.
Eungella
Eungella National Park protects the cloud-wrapped Clarke Range plateau above the Pioneer Valley — 80km west of Mackay, where the Broken River's viewing platforms give one of Australia's most reliable looks at a wild platypus.
Bungonia National Park
A limestone gorge and karst cave system on the Southern Tablelands escarpment, 190km south-west of Sydney — around 200 wild caves, a slot canyon on Bungonia Creek and lookouts over the Shoalhaven valley.
Warrumbungle National Park
An eroded shield volcano in central-west New South Wales — the 90m Breadknife dyke, Grade 4 walks along the crater rim, and Australia's first Dark Sky Park overhead.
Purnululu National Park
Banded orange-and-black sandstone domes in the East Kimberley — a UNESCO World Heritage geological landform reached by 53km of rough, high-clearance 4WD track.
Freycinet National Park
Pink granite peaks, a white-sand crescent and a 27km peninsula circuit on Tasmania's east coast — 2.5 to 3 hours from Hobart or Launceston, and walkable in anything from 20 minutes to three days.
Wilsons Promontory
Wilsons Promontory is mainland Australia's southernmost national park — a granite peninsula of turquoise bays, white-sand beaches and wombat-grassed flats about three hours' drive from Melbourne.
Flinders Ranges
Ikara-Flinders Ranges National Park protects 95,000 hectares of folded quartzite and gorge country 450km north of Adelaide — Ikara (Wilpena Pound), the Brachina Gorge Geological Trail and the fossil ground that gave the Ediacaran Period its name.
Karijini National Park
Karijini's gorges cut 2.5-billion-year-old banded ironstone deep into the Hamersley Range — slot canyons, cold permanent pools and Class 5 walks in the Pilbara.
Kakadu National Park
Australia's largest national park and a dual UNESCO World Heritage property three hours' drive south-east of Darwin — Bininj/Mungguy country of floodplains, stone country and rock art galleries you walk through, not just look at.
Carnarvon Gorge
A 20km sandstone gorge system with permanent water, ancient cycads and some of Australia's most significant Aboriginal rock art.
Francois Peron National Park
Francois Peron National Park drops red Peron sandstone dunes straight into the turquoise water of the Shark Bay World Heritage Area — Cape Peron, Skipjack Point, Big Lagoon and basic beach camping, all behind high-clearance 4WD tracks about 850km north of Perth.
Barrington Tops
Barrington Tops National Park holds Gondwana rainforest, sphagnum swamps and snow-gum woodland on a basalt plateau over 1,500m, about 3.5 hours' drive north of Sydney.
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