Mount Augustus is located roughly 1,000 km north of Perth, in the

Mount Augustus National Park Mount Augustus National Park is located 852 km north of Perth, 490 km by road east of Carnarvon and 390 km northwest of Meekatharra, in the Gascoyne region of Western Australia. Mount Augustus itself, the feature around which th ...

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

. The name is also given to the neighbouring pastoral lease,

Mount Augustus Station Mount Augustus Station is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in Western Australia. It is situated about south west of Paraburdoo, Western Australia, Paraburdoo and north west of Meekatharra, Western Australia, Meekatharra in ...

. The local Wadjari people call it Burringurrah, after a

Dreamtime The Dreaming, also referred to as Dreamtime, is a term devised by early anthropologists to refer to a religio-cultural worldview attributed to Australian Aboriginal religion and mythology, Australian Aboriginal mythology. It was originally u ...

figure, a young boy who was speared and turned into a rock. It has been a sacred site for thousands of years. It is a prominent

inselberg An inselberg or monadnock ( ) is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain. In Southern Africa, a similar formation of granite is known as a koppie, an ...

that stands above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an mean, average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal Body of water, bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical ...

, or approximately above the surrounding plain, and covers an area of . It has a central ridge which is almost long.

Monolith–Anticline distinction

Mount Augustus is widely claimed in tourist promotional and information literature as the "world's largest monolith", but the claim does not originate from the geological literature, nor is it substantiated by any other scholarly research. Mt. Augustus is more than twice the size of

Uluru Uluru (; ), also known as Ayers Rock ( ) and officially gazetted as UluruAyers Rock, is a large sandstone monolith. It outcrop, crops out near the centre of Australia in the southern part of the Northern Territory, south-west of Alice Spri ...

. Unlike Uluru, which is a

monolith A monolith is a geological feature consisting of a single massive stone or rock, such as some mountains. Erosion usually exposes the geological formations, which are often made of very hard and solid igneous or metamorphic rock. Some monolit ...

and, in general, devoid of plant growth, Mt. Augustus is an asymmetrical anticline.

1894 gold rush

There was a gold rush in the 1890s due to local geology.

Flora and fauna

Wattles, cassias and eremophilas dominate the plant life and the animal life include

emu The emu (; ''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is a species of flightless bird endemism, endemic to Australia, where it is the Tallest extant birds, tallest native bird. It is the only extant taxon, extant member of the genus ''Dromaius'' and the ...

red kangaroo The red kangaroo (''Osphranter rufus'') is the largest of all kangaroos, the largest terrestrial mammal native to Australia, and the Largest mammals#Marsupials (Marsupialia), largest extant marsupial. It is found across mainland Australia, exce ...

goanna A goanna is any one of several species of lizard of the genus ''Monitor lizard, Varanus'' found in Australia and Southeast Asia. Around 70 species of ''Varanus'' are known, 25 of which are found in Australia. This varied group of carnivorous r ...

euros The euro (currency symbol, symbol: euro sign, €; ISO 4217, currency code: EUR) is the official currency of 20 of the Member state of the European Union, member states of the European Union. This group of states is officially known as the ...

and birds of prey. There are over 100 species of birds on and around Mount Augustus.

Walking tracks

The climb to the summit and back can take up to 5 hours, and there are two trails (one class 4 and the other a class 5) to get there. There are a number of walking tracks to explore. There have been a number of deaths on the summit walking trail. An inquest into the deaths by government authorities suggests to close the summit trail between September and March for the sake of unwary hikers who do not appreciate the treacherous conditions.

Aboriginal history and rock engravings

Evidence of early Aboriginal habitation is depicted in the rock engravings around Mount Augustus. Many of the Dreamtime stories of the local Aboriginal Wajarri people can be viewed in the rock engravings at Mundee, Ooramboo and Beedoboondu. All of these are accessible on the loop walking trail.

Notes