Zebedee Springs

Zebedee Springs rises from the base of the Cockburn Range inside El Questro Wilderness Park, in Western Australia's East Kimberley, where a series of clear, spring-fed pools sit at a steady 28-32°C beneath a canopy of ancient Livistona palms and pandanus — remnants of a much wetter prehistoric climate that now survive only in these permanently watered gorges. The short walk in from the car park crosses monsoon-forest terrain that feels transplanted from another era, ending at cascading rock pools where water trickles from pool to pool down the sandstone. To protect the springs' ecology and the surrounding forest, access is restricted to a single morning window, 7am to noon, each day during the dry season. El Questro itself began as a million-acre cattle lease in 1903 and today operates as a wilderness tourism destination across the traditional country of East Kimberley Aboriginal groups, for whom permanently flowing water sources like Zebedee have long held particular significance in an otherwise seasonally dry landscape.