I joined a growing travel trend on a Kimberley cruise with kids

It’s coveted and it costs a lot - so is it crazy to consider cruising the Kimberley with kids? Despite her hesitations, this traveller took her boys on board - and didn't look back. 

Some might call it insanity. Taking two kids on a week-long cruise. To far-flung, people-free lands. At around $10,000 a pop (double for adults). I see their point.

Exploring eastern Australia’s remote Kimberley aboard a luxury expedition ship is lusted after as one of life’s top-tier bucket-list experiences, on a par with a Kenyan safari or Alaskan adventure. Yet most people wait until they’re retired to do it. I’m not one of those people.

Increasingly, I’m not alone. Multi-generational travel is trending, and even True North – arguably Australia’s most exclusive, chopper-topped cruise vessel – is happy to have all ages on board. Always has been. It’s just that, until now, hardly anyone has taken up the option. But in the past two years, the original Kimberley explorer has seen a serious up-tick in families bringing several generations along.

Already this dry season – April to October – True North has hosted a group of 12, comprising grandparents, parents and grandkids, then a family with teens, and a repeat customer who brings a different grandchild on each trip. Others have commandeered the entire True North II boat to edge towering, rusty red cliffs and nose the bow into splintering waterfalls with their nearest and dearest (starting at $424,000 for 10 nights and holding 22 people; 11 such charters are booked for 2026). Once, it was a view few people under 70 would ever get to see. Now, True North is blocking out select adults-only voyages to manage the competing demands.

Fleur Bainger with sons Sebby and Jasper on a chopper ride from True North.

I am, nonetheless, worried about how fellow passengers might feel about my two boys, aged eight and 11, climbing aboard. Perhaps they’ll avoid us at dinner? Tut-tut at the kids’ queue blindness? Or worse, trip over them? I word up the boys on a no-whinging policy (my rule, not the boat’s). They’ll try every cheffy dish before we take the toastie back-up plan. And be on best behaviour. Agreed? I book flights to Broome.

The first sign things might actually go well occurs as we spring onto the back deck. “Keep your shoes off; we go barefoot on this boat,” pipes a crew member, clasping my hand and hoisting me from the tender boat. “Do you mean we don’t need to wear shoes for a whole week?” asks the youngest, eyes saucer-wide. I nod and he fist pumps the air.

Within seconds my tin lids are kicking back in cradle-like swivel chairs, sipping lemonade and munching Kettle chips like seasoned, five-star travellers. “They’re free, Mum!” I’m told, with more jubilation. Attempts at explaining “all-inclusive” fail. Details, darling.

True North cruising Montgomery Reef.

We awaken to glowing amber bluffs out flatscreen-sized windows. Craggy, Buccaneer Archipelago islands are visible from bed (the usual king converted to two singles, plus an extra, fought-over floor mattress). Sleepy eyes stretch as we witness one of the world’s last true wilderness areas – much of it accessible only by small expedition vessel. Even for me, on my fourth coastal cruise (lucky travel writer that I am), the dawn panorama produces awe-struck wonder. It’s just like the first time I saw Uluru, aged seven.

The Kimberley bears that same magical ability to bring out the child in everyone – regardless of age. “I was screaming like a little girl,” laughs Diane Haagsma, a 72-year-old, who jumps off a ledge into a black gorge pool as a crew member holds her hand. Surfacing in delight, she admits not realising she was still capable of such a playful act, nor the four-points clamber up and down rock walls to get there.

A dewy morning on deck on Porosus Creek. Picture: Fleur Bainger

Another guest of similar vintage, Chris Sadler, feels renewed with each adventure, from hiking through spinifex to see 20,000-year-old rock art “that doesn’t have little ropes in front of it” to spotting sea turtles in channels cutting through Montgomery Reef. “It’s like when I go skiing – I always think of that as being like a six-year-old,” she says.

Mother-of-three Mel Ecseri feels her 40s fall away at King Cascades, terraced falls that teem over long grasses. “The sound of the waterfall took me back to being a little kid, when you have time, freedom and no stresses,” she says. “In that moment, I realised there are no emails here, no texts, no kid wrangling, no timetable and nothing else to think about.”

True North at King Cascades.

She and her husband are cruising with his parents, celebrating the family patriarch’s 80th birthday. “It’s been amazing to watch them do things they’ve forgotten they can do,” Mel says. “And we’ve talked the whole time about how our kids would love this.”

Daily adventures see the clock roll back. On my kids’ first-ever chopper ride, the pilot executes aerial “speed bumps”; after word gets around, he grants others the thrill. All ages giggle over comical mud skippers, scarlet crabs and multi-horned caterpillars. Smiles are equally wide as we coast over whirlpools and boils through the Horizontal Falls. The delighted cries as my son hooks his first fish carry across the water, sharing the joy.

One day we eat breakfast burgers while spotting crocs in the lee of a looming red rock escarpment resembling the Roman Colosseum. Another, we raft up the tender boats – with a “bar boat” in the middle – for a citrus-stained sunset.

A tender on Porosus Creek at dawn. Picture: Fleur Bainger

Is spending thousands on kids to have a once-in-a-lifetime experience worth it? With the funds, the agility and the way youthful innocence allows you to see things through new eyes, absolutely.

But let’s hear it from the kids. As we depart the ship, my eldest turns to me and says, “I want to do this again. Can we do this again, Mum?” Ah, to be a child again.

The writer and her family were guests aboard True North, with support from Tourism Western Australia. True North’s seven-night Kimberley Snapshot Cruise costs from $19,595 per adult and $9797 per child. Helicopter flights are additional.

Originally published as I joined a growing travel trend on a Kimberley cruise with kids