My favourite place

Masterchef’s John Torode on wonders and wildlife in Western Australia

I’m an Australian – I grew up in Melbourne and Sydney – but as a kid you don’t learn much about the Kimberley. It’s a region at the top of Western Australia three times the size of England, with a population of about 40,000; an extraordinary expanse of land, full of history and natural wonders, that has been inhabited for tens of thousands of years by the indigenous people of Australia.

I took a trip there last July, and the places that really stuck in my mind are Raft Point and Montgomery Reef, which I visited on a 10-day ‘expedition cruise’, where you get to discover stuff with geologists and marine biologists. You travel along the coast, which is a 1,400mile stretch between the town of Broome and Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory, dropping into different places.

Raft Point is among the greatest examples of ancient indigenous art we know of. It is very isolated; the nearest town is more than 150km [93 miles] away. Wandering around was humbling and mind-blowing. Over thousands of years the paint, made from natural colourings, has become part of the rock.

From there you can go out to Montgomery Reef, which I think should be classified as one of the wonders of the world. It’s 150 square miles, and when the tide goes out the reef appears out of the sea by about 14ft. As a

result you’ve got all these rivers that you can get little boats up, and that’s where the wildlife is. There are egrets picking bits and pieces off the exposed reef, there’s the odd eagle, and the water’s full of dugongs and turtles. There are manta rays, and dolphins chasing fish, and the area is also one of the most important nurseries for humpback whales in the world.

I was struck by a sort of lightness, a euphoric feeling. The marine biologist said he wasn’t quite sure why, but that it might be because reefs produce oxygen. When you’re out there, there’s huge amounts being pumped out, and you’re breathing in amazing clean air. You are in the middle of nowhere, with no pollution whatsoever.

It’s hard to get your head around the scale of Australia.

I also went to a farm inland called El Questro, which is a million acres with stunning gorges, waterfalls and springs. That’s small – the one next door is three and a half million. El Questro

was once a cattle station and has now become a tourist destination. You can stay in a luxurious homestead, camp or ‘glamp’.

One of my favourite experiences was going heli-fishing: the pilot will drop the helicopter down next to a river, and you fish from the bank. We caught a barramundi that was 2ft long. The pilot gutted it and put it in an ice box, and after watching the sunset we flew back to a place called Home Valley Station, which is run by indigenous people. There they cooked the fish, and we ate it with a cold beer.

I spent about three weeks travelling around the Kimberley, and I probably just touched the surface. My wife, Lisa [Faulkner, the English actor and presenter], and I intend to go together, though it does take a bit of planning due to the kids’ commitments and school holidays. I reckon I could go back for four months and be very happy. Masterchef returns on Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 9pm on BBC One

Above Torode in the Purnululu National Park, the Kimberley. Below Ancient art at Raft Point

Enjoying the view at El Questro