Inside Sal Salis luxury safari tent accommodation in Ningaloo

I’d wondered about the virtues of spending circa $2000 a night to stay here — it’s one of those bucket-list things to tick off and it absolutely blew my mind.

It’s golden hour at one of Australia’s most exclusive glamping properties.

Champagne corks pop and canapes circulate, but I wasn’t expecting to see whale on the menu. Yet this pre-dinner soiree is a feast of blubber, flukes and fins. In the ocean, a stone’s throw from Sal Salis’s alfresco lounge deck, the humpbacks are at play.

Spumes of vapour billow from the sea, tail flukes rise and fins slap. Some whales even leap clear of the water.

I’d wondered about the virtues of spending circa $2000 a night per couple (all-inclusive) to stay at Sal Salis, Ningaloo’s pin-up property on Western Australia’s central coast. But in this moment of whale wonderment, I get it.

Sal Salis is an exclusive beach safari camp on the shores of Ningaloo Reef. Picture: Catherine Best

Sal Salis is one of those bucket-list stays your Instagram feed pines for (Pippa Middleton honeymooned here).

The tented wilderness camp comes with a hefty price tag, not because it pushes the envelope for opulence – there are no white tablecloths, suited bellboys or fussy furnishings here – rather because of its remoteness and connection to nature.

It is one of those bucket-list stays your Instagram feed pines for. Picture: Catherine Best

It helps that Sal Salis is slap bang on the shores of one of Australia’s most pristine and secluded coastlines, with World Heritage-listed Ningaloo Reef lapping at its front door and the limestone crags of Cape Range National Park looming out back.

It’s on the shores of one of Australia’s most pristine and secluded coastlines with Ningaloo Reef lapping at its front door. Picture: Catherine Best

This is a property that measures luxury in exclusivity, steps to the beach and genuine disconnect from the modern world.

There’s no phone reception and the only inkling of a device comes from the satellites blipping overhead.

But you’re hard-pressed to spot them among the gazillion stars. The 16 luxury tents are perched in the dunes 50 metres back from the beach and are set just far enough apart that you won’t hear your neighbour thump when they fall out of their hammock in blissful repose (as I did).

Inside the $2k-a-night-tents

The tented wilderness camp comes with a hefty price tag of $2,000 a night per couple. Picture: Catherine Best

Inside these canvas love nests (children aged under 10 are not allowed), there’s everything you need and nothing you don’t.

A jarrah king-size bed splays beneath a vaulted canvas ceiling.

At the rear is the ensuite with a (very civilised) composting toilet, rustic vanity and nature shower that drains straight onto the sand (the amenities are organic and eco-friendly). Best of all, the bathroom wall is mesh, so you can commune with the corellas while washing your hair.

It truly is something else. Picture: Catherine Best

There’s everything you need and nothing you don’t. Picture: Catherine Best

At night I open the canvas windows to let the sea breeze send me to slumber. Breakfast is served in the lounge; I opt for smashed avo and poached eggs, devoured atop a bar stool overlooking the water.

It sure beats Weetbix in the ’burbs. The days drift into a languorous rhythm as the mercury nudges 40C.

Sunset drinks on the lounge deck. Picture: Catherine Best

Mandu Mandu Gorge at sunset. Picture: Catherine Best

I pad down to the sugar-white beach (there’s only two people on it) and flop into a cabana. I snorkel over coral gardens teeming with fish and contemplate mustering the energy for a kayak or SUP (all-included).

In the late afternoon I help myself to the open bar as the sun slinks over the ocean.

Dinner is served on a long communal table where dishes like salmon gravlax and confit duck leg materialise out of this salty sanctuary between dessert and sea.

Your own beach cabana on the beach. Picture: Catherine Best

At dinner, the staff provide a rundown of activities available the next day – ranging from snorkelling excursions at nearby Turquoise Bay to guided kayaking jaunts.

One morning, we rise before dawn and hike up the rust-red cliffs of Mandu Mandu Gorge for sunrise.

We visit a turtle rookery where scores of female green sea turtles bob and rest in the ocean’s shallows, seeking respite from their randy male suitors.

On our last day, we join a humpback whale cruise to chance a swim with the majestic mammals.

We snorkel over kaleidoscopic forests of coral, eyeball turtles, reef sharks and a manta ray, but unfortunately we don’t spy any whales. Not to worry, they’ll be back at sunset, waltzing in the water to their own time.

This writer was a guest of Sal Salis