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Published: August 6th 2007
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Good old Catchphrase, the Aussies would have been good at it. That is how they name things. The harbour here is actually called Port Jackson, but the name was a bit complicated so everyone refers to it as Sydney Harbour. On the banks of said harbour is the Sydney Opera House and the bridge that crosses the harbour is, yes you have guessed it, the Sydney Harbour Bridge. The most popular beer in New South Wales is Tooheys and they sell two main products, Tooheys Old and Tooheys New. Presumably because one has been around longer than the other. Then there are the mountain ranges: the Snowy Mountains are the mountains which get most of the snow and the Blue Mountains are, erm, blue. Yup they really are blue, which is a good job as the Canadians beat them to it with the Rockies.
Interesting Fact: The blue tinge they get when viewed from a distance is due to the release of volatile oils from the eucalyptus forests.
Part of the reason for the excursion out of the city was the arrival of Mummy and Daddy Ellis out on a 3 week trip down under - I didn't want
them seeing sights I hadn't (although they have beaten us to Uluru). We hired a car, booked a cute little cottage in the mountains and hit the road. It isn't actually that far, only a few hours drive, so we were able to stop off at the lovely Fetherdale Wildlife Sanctuary to meet some friendly Kangaroos and Koalas ("when in Rome" as they say).
The Blue Mountains are delightful and feature some lovely little towns, especially Leura which is where we stayed. In fact, this is where a lot of the Brits living in Sydney head for each July for a pseudo Christmas dinner. There are all year round Christmas shops and everything. My only beef is that calling them mountains is a bit cheeky when most of them are only about 800m high. In Europe they would definitely be hills, but I guess it is all relative. The Blueys are also home to the rock formation known as the Three Sisters.
Interesting Myth: Aboriginal legend states that three sisters fell for three men from a neighbouring tribe, but marriage was forbidden by tribal law. A battle ensued and a local witch doctor turned the sisters to stone
The Blue Mountains
Are they really blue? for their protection. Unfortunately the witch doctor was killed in the fighting and no one else cold turn them back. Doh!
Over our two day stay we took in some excellent views, did some great walks, traveled on the worlds steepest railway and ate some excellent food. Lovely jubbly.
This Week’s Likes:
Catching up with the olds - we had a lovely few weeks with you both
The most amazing, mouth wateringly stupendous hunk of beef filet that we flash fried, cut into tiny slithers and coated in an exquisite red wine sauce. Boy it was good! And cheap too!
Petting and feeding the wildlife at
Featherdale Wildlife Park - especially the 1 month old little orphan joey.
This Week’s Dislikes:
More bad weather. Since easter we had been having a lovely spell - basking in the sun and swimming in the sea. Mum & Dad landed and for the week preceding our Blue Mountains visit it
rained and rained and rained. Luckily it cleared up for the weekend.
Wet firewood, meaning our chance to toast marshmallows on an open fire was dashed.
The BBQ that had run out of gas. A terrible discovery that
we made only after doing the shopping! All was OK in the end - see this week's second like.
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Jim
non-member comment
True, but when you walk through London...
Start of at, say, Haymarket, where there used to be a haymarket. Then you come to Piccadilly Circus - okay, that one's pretty good. But two seconds later you get to Green Park. You go down past Green Park, to Hyde Park Corner, on the corner of Hyde Park of course. Then up Park Lane to Marble Arch, one of the most brazen examples ever of just-couldn't-be-bothered naming. And so on. Tower Bridge, London Bridge, Tower of London, Whitehall (okay the Hall burnt down, but still), Westminster Abby. Sounds great, except Minster also means abbey so it's actually just the abby that is the abby over in the West.