The Blue Mountains

After leaving our host family, our next destination was the Blue Mountains. But before that, we had to go shopping again (where we noticed that the prices were sometimes significantly lower than in New Zealand) and we also had to visit the bank because we couldn't find our NAB bank cards anymore. We actually thought we had left them in Sydney so they wouldn't get lost in New Zealand, but now we couldn't find them anywhere. Very mysterious and somehow embarrassing. So we had to apply for new cards. As fate would have it, we found the cards again one day later, so we had to go to the bank again to cancel the new order. Totally stupid, but we were glad that we had the old cards again, they still worked and we could finish the matter without much fuss. A good house doesn't lose anything, as Andi likes to say!

After getting the errands done, we took a scenic route to the Blue Mountains National Park in order to avoid toll fees. The mountains are located west of Sydney and are famous for the Three Sisters rock formation and the blue haze of the mountains. The color comes from the thousands of eucalyptus trees in the valleys, whose oily emissions, combined with dust particles in the sun, create this blue color for our eyes.

We arrived in the Blue Mountains around half past 4 and then decided not to do any more walks because we were pretty exhausted. Besides, it was really hot. However, we still drove to a lookout, the Evans Lookout. Here we could get a first impression of the Blue Mountains. The view was magnificent and the mountains looked really beautiful!! I couldn't see much more blue than in other mountains, but still it was a very nice view.

Afterwards, we drove to a free campground in Blackheath Glen Reserve, right next to the Blue Mountains NP, although it was a pretty windy road down into a valley. The place itself was quite nice, although not overwhelmingly beautiful, and it wasn't very crowded. Our dinner consisted of kangaroo meatballs, salad, and garlic bread. Andi really wanted to try kangaroo, so I finally let myself be persuaded and we bought the meatballs. I didn't like it very much. It tasted quite strong somehow. But at least we've tried it now.

After dinner, we went to bed and the next day, after breakfast, we drove to the Visitor Centre in Katoomba. Katoomba is the tourist capital of the Blue Mountains, although it doesn't have many residents itself. We arrived there at 10:00 am and picked up information about various walks in the mountains. Then we visited the Echo Point Lookout, which is located right next to the Visitor Centre and offers a beautiful view of the Jamison Valley and the Three Sisters. There were quite a few tourists already!

After the lookout, we walked back to the car (we had parked a bit further away to avoid paying) and got our backpack for the hike. Then we started! We walked a total of 4.5 hours in a loop around the Three Sisters, through the valley, then up to the cliffs and back along the path. We even had lunch right next to the Three Sisters with a magnificent view. On the steep steps of the Giant Stairway to the famous rocks, we encountered many tourists, but after that, they rapidly decreased and we could enjoy the path just for ourselves. We really liked the forest down in the valley and the view from the Cliff Walk above was super beautiful. The climb back up from the bottom was really exhausting though! The Giant Stairway, which we had walked down, had 900 steps and now we had to somehow walk back up. We could have made it easier for ourselves and taken the Railway, but we preferred to save the $19 per person. In the end, the ascent was okay because there were viewing platforms with a view of the Katoomba Falls where we could rest along the way. We also met a tour group whose guide pointed out two holes in the steep ground, which apparently house Funnel Web Spiders. The holes had thin nets in front of the entrance, which indicates that the cave is inhabited. It was really interesting to see that, although suddenly we felt a lot of respect for the hole. You can't mess with the world's most poisonous spider!

After our walk, we were really tired and worn out from the hot weather, so we drove to the Gingerbread House in Katoomba and treated ourselves to a milkshake. Next to the cafe, they also have a shop that sells all sorts of things related to gingerbread houses. They had really cute stuff there.

After the milkshake, we took care of some organizational matters like counting the money we spent in New Zealand and transferring new money to our Australian account. At 6 o'clock, we returned to the same campground as the previous day. Tonight we had tuna wraps with avocado, salad, and various sauces for dinner, and then I did some blogging.

The next morning, the alarm went off at 8:00 am. Unfortunately, the weather didn't look great, not cold, just densely cloudy. After breakfast, we drove to Govetts Leap Lookout and actually wanted to go for a short walk there. We quickly realized that this wasn't going to happen because it was incredibly foggy. At the lookout, we couldn't see anything beyond the plants on the slope below us! It was really intense, such dense fog is rare. A few hundred meters from the lookout, there was a Visitor Centre and we drove there briefly to ask the locals if the fog might dissipate. They couldn't say for sure, but they said it might get better in the afternoon. Unfortunately, the Google weather report said exactly the opposite: the probability of rain in the afternoon was even higher than it is now. Well, what to do? Since we didn't want to just sit around and wait, we drove to the Wentworth Falls, which were located a bit further away and maybe wouldn't be so foggy. Actually, the weather there was a bit better and we did a short walk to a viewing platform from where we had a nice view of the waterfall. It was also cool to see how the fog hung over the mountains and moved into the valley, while we were below the cloud layer and had a pretty good view of the valley. So it was worth coming here after all.

Now we had already seen all the attractions in the Blue Mountains National Park and also spent a few nice days in the forest, so we wanted to continue our journey. So we headed back towards Sydney and then south. Somehow, Andi and I were pretty tired and felt weak, so around 4 we made pasta with pesto for lunch in a park in a western suburb of Sydney. Before that, we weren't even hungry. After eating, we went to McDonald's for an ice cream, but then we got stuck there and didn't leave until 10 o'clock in the evening because there were power outlets and we could do productive things on our laptops.

We then drove to a rest area for the night and slept there around half past 11. The days in the Blue Mountains, the long hike, and the hot weather apparently exhausted us more than we thought. Let's see if we can regain our energy in the next few days!