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Published: January 5th 2007
In the New Year we decided to go to Katoomba, in the Blue Mountains, for a couple of days before moving on to Melbourne. It was only a 2 hour train ride from Sydney. It was a bit of a shock to the system when we were greeted by cold weather and rain!
There are only a few hostels in Katoomba and all the ones that we knew were good were full. The one we had to stay in was really expensive and horrible! There wasn't much to do in the rainy weather and we wanted to stay out of our hostel for as long as possible so we went to 'The Edge' cinema to watch 'Happy Feet' (awww). The cinema screen was massive - 6 stories high, one of the biggest in the Southern Hemisphere. We went out for dinner and had what claims to be Australia's best vegie burger...it probably was, we think!
The next morning we were lucky enough to find a room in another place (No. 14, if you are interested!). It was so lovely! It was so cosy and even had a fire in the lounge!
We bought a day pass for the Blue Mountains
We all love a bit of cake!
We enjoyed a mid-morning Devonshire tea at the very quaint Bygone Beauties tearooms in Leura. Charlie is raising the pinkie on the scone instead of the tea cup - dóh!Trolley (an adapted tram car from Brisbane) bus, which allowed us to hop on and off the bus along the route. It was a really good way to see all the major sights and the less well-known ones without having to rely on a tour company to show you them along with 50 other people spoiling the peace and quiet that we had when we visited look-outs and waterfalls. The Blue Mountains region is notoriuos for its sudden changes in the weather - as we found out. It wasn't the clearest of days, but on moment we could see right across the valley, the next we were in the middle of a cloud! It all added the the relaxing atmosphere though. It was such a peaceful place and the air was so fresh! Some of the highlights were the the Jamison Valley - imagine the Grand Canyon with trees, not quite as big, but apparantly older (250m years), Several awesome lookouts, Leura Cascades, and the Three Sisters - a rock formation. Our ticket also gave us a return trip at Scenic World, a sort of natural theme park taking advantage of the environment. We chose to go to the bottom
Misty mountains
We were half expecting a huge silverback gorilla to come rushing out from somewhere...but then we remembered we were in Australia. of the Jamison Valley in the 'Scenic Train', which is the worlds steepest incline railway at 55 degrees - it doesn't sound like much but when you are looking over the edge about to go down it feels like 90! It took about 90 secs to decend the 1,000ft. Then we went for a short walk throught the rainforest and then we went back up in a cable car.
On our last morning in Katoomba we went to a nice little place called Leura. There are lots of nice little craft shops etc there. It was more like England than Australia. We had the BEST Devonshire tea ever in a lovely little tea house filled with 3000 teapots and thousands more collectables. We had warm scones straight from the oven with homemade jam and cream and proper tea made with tea leaves. It was so nice but it made us homesick as it was so cosy-it especially made us miss my nan as she would love it in Leura!
In the afternoon we got the traion back to Sydney and then hopped on the bus for our 12 hour overnight journey to Melbourne...
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Mum
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Waterfall
Yes, it looks a peaceful place. You can almost hear the water as you study the photo. Quite theraputic! Love Mum xxxx