Why the smartest travellers are heading north in Australia this winter

If you think Australian winter adventures begin and end on the ski slopes, it might be time for a little northern exposure. Across Australia's top end, in Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia, winter is prime time for an adventure or four. This is the place for a warming winter hike furnished with swimholes, an exploration of wild landscapes in the calm of the dry season and the seemingly paradoxical fun of water sports in the outback.

The freshest thing in the tropics this year is the Ngaro Track. Not to be confused with the Ngaro Sea Trail - the combo kayaking and hiking route through the Whitsunday Islands that is one of Queensland's 10 Great Walks - the Ngaro Track will launch this winter, providing hikers with a backstage look at one of Australia's pin-up beaches: Whitehaven.

Named for the region's First Nations Ngaro people, the 32-kilometre track, which is slated to open in the middle of this year, is designed to be hiked over three days, with the white stripe of Whitehaven Beach as its dazzling starting line. From here, the one-way hike will range across Whitsunday Island to Chance Bay and Torres Herald Bay before ascending to one of the island's highest points - 348-metre Whitsunday Craig - for an elevated peep over the Whitsundays. The hike finishes at Hill Inlet and its famous view over Whitehaven Beach.

Two purpose-built camps with tent platforms, communal shelters and even hammock posts are being constructed for the track, and hiker numbers will be limited to 45 at any one time, so plan ahead.

Keep an eye out for opening dates at the Queensland National Parks website. parks.desi.qld.gov.au

Deep in the Queensland outback, there's a gorge so narrow and well hidden that it took property owners nearly a century to realise its presence. Slip between its walls on a stand-up paddleboard (SUP) and it seems a reasonable oversight.

Guided SUP tours head up and back the navigable 800-metre length of the geological paper cut. As the tour sets out from near the gorge's mouth, the chasm is wide and, on my visit here, I was busy scanning the rocky banks for the freshwater crocodiles that were sunning on those banks earlier in the day. But with evening approaching, the sun was no longer reaching the gorge floor and, accordingly, the crocs were also nowhere to be seen.

Midway through the gorge, you paddle beneath Cobbold Gorge's glass bridge, and it's here that the gorge walls begin to close in, until soon you can almost reach out and touch rock to either side. Cliffs rise up to 30 metres above the boards, creating conditions as still as a painting, where the only sound is likely to be your paddle and the occasional clunk of a board bumping against rock.

It's a deeply peaceful hour on the water. cobboldgorge.com.au

Ask me to name a favourite Australian coastal walk and hands-down it's the Thorsborne Trail on Queensland's Hinchinbrook Island - which is probably the reason I've hiked it three times. Though it's only 32 kilometres in length, this beach-hop along the ocean coast of Australia's largest island national park is best stretched out to a leisurely four days, allowing plenty of time to swim beneath waterfalls, lounge on beaches and take a side trip to Nina Peak for the trail's best elevated view.

It's the water as much as the walking that's the lure of this tropical hike, with camp sites positioned in easy reach of waterfalls and swimholes - from Zoe Bay, it's a stroll to a deep pool at the base of Zoe Falls (the infinity-style pools atop the falls are even better), while the camp at Mulligan Falls is in earshot of another fine swimming pool. And can you even find the hidden-in-plain-sight Blue Pools?

There's a sense of exclusivity to the hike - the Thorsborne's camp sites are the only accommodation on the island, and hiker numbers are limited to 40 at any one time. Absolute North Charters (hinchinbrookislandferries.com.au) runs hiker ferry services to the island from Lucinda. parks.desi.qld.gov.au

Drive through Western Australia's Kimberley region and the one thing you miss on the long stretch between Derby and Wyndham is the coast, with no roads reaching to the shores. And yet among all this emptiness, there's a vast amount of goodness.

The only way to really get an interactive look at the Kimberley coast is aboard a small-scale expedition cruise between Broome and Darwin. Typically, these ships carry low numbers of passengers and spend large portions of the days ashore, piling into zodiacs and absorbing the Kimberley's unquestionable magic.

When I sailed here, it was a collection of memorable experiences. In Talbot Bay, tawny nurse sharks patrolled the ship as zodiacs darted to and from the tidal Horizontal Falls. We watched the 400 square kilometres of Montgomery Reef emerge from the Indian Ocean as the tide fell - a phenomenon Sir David Attenborough has called "one of the greatest natural wonders of the world". We scaled cliffs to swim in croc-free pools atop King George Falls, walked into the wreck of a plane crash and scrambled into Wandjina rock-art sites no art gallery could ever top. Almost every stop would be a world-class sight if there were easy ways in, but you'll be thankful that there aren't. silversea.com

Got the family in tow? Then the adventure du jour should be the plethora of natural pools in Litchfield National Park. In this crowd-favourite Northern Territory park, waterfalls pour over the edge of the Tabletop Range escarpment, filling basins with blessedly cold water.

It's a simple task to join the mobs at busy stops such as Florence Falls and Wangi Falls, but it's more fun to build a sense of exploration into a visit. Buley Rockhole is no secret, but it has enough swimholes to spread the load, while even the hour-long climb to Tjaetaba Falls puts off most visitors - reward for those who do make the effort is a spa-sized infinity pool seemingly etched into the cliffs above the waterfall.

The walk from Wangi Falls to the remote cliff-edge campground at Tjenya Falls is twice as far again, meaning it sees few visitors beyond those hiking the multi-day Tabletop Track, but the sunsets from the cliff edge here are among the best in the NT.

Then there's Walker Creek, potentially my favourite campground in Australia. To access its seven individual campsites, you have to walk up to 1.8 kilometres from the car park (hauling in all your camping gear), but every camper gets a private natural pool at this resort made by nature. Book ahead. nt.gov.au

Even tour boats can only get you so far in Katherine Gorge. To see beyond gorge two in this incredible 13-gorge system, you must paddle. Hire canoes are picked up in gorge two, and while most paddlers settle for a half- or full-day on the water, this NT gorge reveals most to those who commit the time to overnight trips.

In a canoe, you can get as far as the ninth gorge, almost 10 kilometres upstream from the launch, with the walls of the Arnhem Land escarpment like a tunnel almost the entire way. Few day paddlers get beyond the fourth gorge, and it's here that I think the gorge - the centrepiece of Nitmiluk National Park - hits its spectacular best as you paddle past the imposing wedge of Smitt Rock and into utter solitude.

I paddled inside the gorge for two days, and we comfortably made it as far as gorge seven, turning back to spend the night on an elevated beach campsite squeezed between the cliffs in gorge six.

If it sounds idyllic, there is a sting. To progress between gorges, you need to drag your canoe over rocks and boulders for up to 800 metres. They are tough and tiring portages, but they're sure worth it. nitmiluktours.com.au

When snow turns southern mountains into ski slopes, the NT is just getting its hiking season into stride - it's the best winter hiking destination in Australia.

At its literal heart is the Larapinta Trail, a 223-kilometre hike that runs the length of the West MacDonnell Ranges, connecting Alice Springs to shapely Mt Sonder. It alternately runs high on the range, and then across its toes, dipping regularly into cooling gorges and swimholes.

For most hikers, the Larapinta is about a two-week commitment, and it can be hiked guided (including shorter highlight stretches) or independently, a task made easier by the possibility of food drops at three storage rooms along the trail's course.

For a shorter multi-day hike, Nitmiluk National Park's Jatbula Trail is the prime contender. From the edge of Katherine Gorge, it follows the Arnhem Land escarpment for 62 kilometres - typically five to six days of walking - to Leliyn (Edith Falls). It's the camps as much as the hike that are memorable, with each one beside beautiful watercourses and pools. A tip from my own time here: set out early each day and spend the afternoons in the cool of the pools.

In Kakadu National Park, day walks are more the norm, with more than two dozen short trails on offer. Personal favourites include the newly reopened Gunlom, the Barrk sandstone walk, which makes a 12-kilometre loop up and over Nourlangie, and the far-flung Yurmikmik walks to the quintessential Top End pool at Motor Car Falls - with a permit, it's well worth continuing the two kilometres on to Kurrundie Falls. nt.gov.au/parks; kakadu.gov.au

At the end of a hot adventure, there needs to be some reward, right? In Queensland's Gulf Savannah, two hours' drive from Cobbold Gorge, nature provides it in the form of Talaroo Hot Springs. At this mound spring, rain that fell 20,000 years ago on the nearby Newcastle Range boils back to the surface, creating a steaming, Rotorua-like experience owned and operated by the Ewamian traditional owners.

A guided walking tour through the steaming springs includes a stop at the so-called Foot Soak Pool, where you can indeed dangle your feet into the 43-degree water, as well as take a dip in the public pool. Private, spa-like soaking pools are also available.

The adjoining campground is its own wellness centre of sorts, with four glamping tents set apart from the standard camp sites - two of the glamping tents have outdoor bathtubs looking over the hot springs area.

A wander down to the banks of the Einasleigh River is a beautiful way to watch an outback day end, and if you're still craving activity, Talaroo's newest addition is an eight-kilometre cycling trail, suited to mountain bikes, that loops past scar trees with some excellent birdwatching opportunities. talaroo.com.au