Parking
Start in the Weano day-use area and follow the Oxer Lookout path across the plateau. A small car park near the lookout gives a shorter access for visitors who need less walking; it is not the start used for the full mapped route.
Overview
About Oxer Lookout Trail
Why go
- Four gorge junction from a railed platform
- A shorter separate access is available near the lookout
Heads up
- Final steps and minor obstacles need secure footing
- Published distance figures differ
Map & elevation
The route
Loading the Karijini map
Full mapElevation638–676 m
Plan your hike
Before you go
Parking
Safety
The highest, rockiest slopes around here are a summer buffet for grizzly bears.
Karijini Tour Guide
Your drive to Oxer Lookout Trail, narrated.
Parkwolf is a GPS audio tour guide for Karijini National Park. As you drive, it chimes in with what’s ahead: hidden gems, upcoming stops, history, geology, and wildlife, right through your car’s speakers.
See the Karijini audio tourRecorded for this trailhead
Oxer and Junction Pool Lookouts0:00 / 0:33
“Up ahead are Oxer and Junction Pool lookouts, where you can see the depth of these gorges without climbing into them. I'd make Oxer the priority: four gorge heads meet below walls that drop around a hundred metres.”
Plays as you drive up to this trailhead in the Parkwolf Karijini Tour Guide.
More stories near here in the app
- Weano and Hancock Gorges
- Knox Lookout: Two Gorges Meet
- How a Bee-eater Handles Lunch
- The Scales in a Moth's Pattern
- 141 audio storiesacross Karijini’s roads, triggered by GPS as you drive
- Wildlife heatmapsfor Dingo, Rock Wallaby, Mulga Snake, and 13 more
- Works offlinemaps, 22 trails, 30 places, and audio download before you lose signal
- CarPlay readysimple controls built for the drive
“Fantastic app with many points of information… It’s great to just turn on while you’re driving and it gives you an audio tour of the national Park. We love it!!!!”
Trail guide
Hiking Oxer Lookout Trail
A short walk with an abrupt payoffOxer Lookout Trail is an out-and-back from Weano day use across the plateau to a railed…
Oxer Lookout Trail is an out-and-back from Weano day use across the plateau to a railed platform above the gorge junction. The connected mapped approach works out to about 1.37 km return (0.85 mi); published figures also give 800 m return, so treat the distance as approximate. Allow 30–45 minutes for the longer approach and time at the view. This route ends at Oxer Lookout, not the separate Junction Pool viewpoint.
Getting to the platformThe path crosses the plateau on a sloping access track.
The path crosses the plateau on a sloping access track. Near the end, minor obstacles and a series of steps lead to the platform. The gorge depth stays partly hidden until the rim opens in front of you, so take care as you reach the edge. A small car park near Oxer Lookout provides a much shorter access for visitors who cannot manage the full Weano approach; that is a separate start and does not match this route’s distance.
Four gorges at onceFrom the railed platform, look across the meeting of Weano, Red, Hancock and Joffre gorges.
From the railed platform, look across the meeting of Weano, Red, Hancock and Joffre gorges. Sheer walls drop around 100 m or more to a floor of layered rock and pools. For a photo, include both the opposite cliff and some of the shadowed gorge below; the depth is what makes the red walls feel enormous.
Iron-rich wallsThese gorges cut through the iron-rich rocks of the Hamersley Plateau.
These gorges cut through the iron-rich rocks of the Hamersley Plateau. Uplift steepened the streams, which carved down through the resistant rock over millions of years; the exposed banded iron formations give the walls their strong horizontal layers. Dogs and other pets are not allowed in Karijini National Park.
Wildlife
Wildlife in Karijini
44 sightingsDingoMost seen around 6 PMSighting map
18 sightingsRock WallabyMost seen around 6 AMSighting map
15 sightingsMulga SnakeMost seen around 7 PMSighting map
36 sightingsHamersley Rock MonitorMost seen around 9 AMSighting map
13 sightingsWestern BowerbirdMost seen around 7 AMSighting map
34 sightingsChildren's PythonMost seen around 8 PMSighting mapSighting maps show where each species has been reported across Karijini. Wildlife moves, so no sighting is guaranteed.
