Around 14km from Cervantes, Nambung is home to the eye-popping Pinnacles Desert, a vast, alien-like plain studded with thousands of jaunty limestone pillars. Rising eerily from the desert floor, some of them 3.5m tall, these columns are remnants of a compacted seashell layer that once covered the plain and, over millennia, has slowly eroded. The one-way Pinnacles Desert Dr loop road runs through the formations, but it's more fun on foot, especially in the crepuscular evening light when crowds evaporate.
The park's slinky black interpretation centre delivers the low-down on the Pinnacles, and sheds some light on the rest of the park's ecology: huge sand blows, banks of low scrub and wandering emus. Nearby Kangaroo Point and Hangover Bay are good for a post-Pinnacles picnic, with barbecues and tables; Hangover has the better swimming (a good hangover cure).