Business class: Luxuries included at Karijini

Karijini National Park’s first upmarket accommodation offering is experiencing strong demand from east-coast tour operators, with bookings for its permanent tents housing queen beds and some of life’s modern luxuries becoming increasingly difficult to secure.

Karijini Eco Resort marketing and sales manager, Amanda Hoyne, said she has started turning away east-coast coach companies wanting to secure large bookings for its 40 upmarket luxury tents, which include ensuites, during the next two peak seasons.

“We have found that all the coach groups that came this year have rebooked for the following years,” Ms Hoyne said.

Karijini Eco Resort opened in April and its peak season has only a few weeks to run. However, the resort will remain open during the low season (November to February), when extreme heat is expected and the threat of cyclones looms.

“It will be 45 degrees in the shade and then there is the cyclone season, but we will stay open and we already have got bookings,” Ms Hoyne said.

She said the bookings were largely from European travellers wanting to see the “cyclonic part” of the north-west.

Karijini Eco Resort offers a range of accommodation options other than its 40 luxury tents, including 82 campsites, five group campsites and 10 standard eco tents, which have shared facilities.

The resort offers barbecue-style self-catering bush kitchens and eating areas as well as a licensed restaurant, which has proven popular with the caravan brigade, Ms Hoyne said.

The restaurant is air-conditioned, providing welcome relief from the hot weather as well as time away from the camp stove.

The resort is managed by hotel operator Hospitality Inns and owned by the Gumala Aboriginal Corporation.

The corporation was created to represent the collective interests of the Niapiali, Bunjima and Innawonga people in their negotiations with Hamersley Iron (now Pilbara Iron) in the 1990s.

They signed the Yandi Agreement with the miner in 1996, which allowed Hamersley to develop the Yandicoogina Mine in the central Pilbara.

According to Gumala Aboriginal Corporation, the indigenous communities it represents were granted an income stream, in-kind assistance for community development, training and employment, heritage protection work, and support for pastoral station operations.

The Gumala Aboriginal Corporation is thought to be among the operators to express interest in developing the state government’s 3.5-hectare tourism development site in Tom Price.

Expressions of interest closed last month.

A pre-feasibility study undertaken by Tourism WA highlighted strong demand for a four-star development.

More than 100,000 people visit the Karijini National Park each year.

Gumala chief executive Larry Softley did not return calls from WA Business News.

Tourism Western Australia spokeswoman Natasha Mutch said there had been a number of bids received to develop the Tom Price site and the government would now progress to seeking formal proposals for the site’s development.

A committee including the Department for Planning and Infra-structure, the Shire of Ashburton, the Pilbara Development Commission and Tourism WA will provide recommen-dations to Planning and Infra--structure Minister Alannah MacTiernan.

The site is one of three released by the state government under its Landbank initiative, which aims to release 20 sites within two and a half years.

Last week it called for expressions of interest for a 6.1ha parcel of land in Denham, near Shark Bay. The other site released under the Landbank program was on Rottnest Island, which has since been awarded to Broadwater Hotels and Resorts to develop a 120-room 4.5-star hotel.

Ms Mutch said the government expected to release its next Landbank site in Albany some time next year.

Key areas targeted by the Landbank initiative and currently under assessment are Perth, Broome, Bunbury, Albany, Kununurra, Indian Ocean Drive, and caravan park developments in Broome, Busselton and Port Hedland.