The Blue Mountains

Wednesday November 3^rd.

A very early start for a trip into the Blue Mountains.

First stop was Featherdale Wildlife Park, where it’s possible to mingle with many of the animals – NOT the crocodile!

We saw lots more koalas, some of them even had their eyes open! We also fed more kangaroos, some swamp wallabies, which were very cute, and a very pushy emu.

  

Lunch was at a small town in the mountains – Leura. It is very peaceful and has many expensive antique and craft shops.

The highlight of the trip was Katoomba. Mike, Den, Chris and Ffion will recognise lots of the photos we took.

At Katoomba there is a stunning gorge and a rainforest below in Jamison valley. We had options of a trip across the gorge on the Skyway cable car and a rack and pinion railway or cable car ride into and out of the valley. So we did the lot!

First was the Skyway. We had amazing views of Katoomba falls and the Three Sisters rocks as we crossed. Marg is now so fearless that she stood on the opaque glass floor (which turns clear as the ride starts).

  

  

We chose the railway next. It is the steepest railway in Australia, (for the technically minded, it’s a 52° incline). It dates from the 1880s and was used as transport for the coal miners who worked down in the valley.

It hurtles through a tunnel at the start of the journey, while the theme music from “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is played  –  great fun!

There are lots of walks through the rainforest but we only had time for the shortest of them. This takes you past the original mine workings. It was really interesting – there was even a statue of a Welsh/Australian miner and his pit pony.

We came back up on the cable car, which was quite disappointing as it was packed full and we couldn’t see very much.

Stopping at Australia’s version of the Grand Canyon – Govett’s Leap – was incredible. We’re sure it doesn’t really compare but it was impressive anyway. We were really lucky to have had an unusually sunny day to appreciate the views.

Last on the list was a boat trip down the Parramatta river back to Sydney, but before that we had a quick tour of the 2000 Olympic site. The photograph shows Volunteer Walk, where the names of all 50,000 volunteer helpers are engraved.

Once on board our boat, we cruised past homes of the rich and famous, under the Harbour Bridge and into Circular Quay.

Back on dry land we wandered up into the Rocks area of Sydney and found a great Italian Restaurant, where we had the best meal we’ve had since we’ve been in Australia!

Marg finished her meal with a huge ice-cream which Thomas would have loved. Memories of Lido di Jesolo!