Blogs from Katoomba, New South Wales, Australia, Oceania - page 7

Getting back to Sydney at lunchtime we headed over to ther Chinese friendship gardens in Darling Harbour, which were quality, really nicely laid out, you could spend hours just chilling out in there, we had about one hour, but then the call of the pies was just too much so we headed out to quench that pastry thirst. Once refuelled we headed to the Australian Museum, I wasn´t holding out much hope but it turned out to be great, especially the instalations of the Aborigional culture and the dinasours. The best, however, was the area devoted to the most dangerous animals of Australia, of which it has an inordinate number, seriously, we all know of the sharks, spiders and crocs, but they also have jellyfish, fish, snakes and any other number of bizarre things that can ... read more

From Sydney we took the short 2 hour train journey to Katoomba, inland and west of the city. It is the gteway to the Blue mountains, a huge area of amazing canyons, gorges and countryside. We checked into our hostel, The Flying Fox and got stared at for ages by 2 guests, very odd, it is a bit like a place out of ´The league of Gentlemen´. Anyway, dumped the bags and got out quick before they freaked us out too mucjçh and headed down to Echo point to discover a walk we could do that afternoon. We settled on the rainforest walk, an hour and a half up and down mission into nd round the valley. It starts with a descent of 960 steps to the valley base, some are metal stairs that have been ... read more

Leaving Sydney we head off to the train station to catch our train to Katoomba in the heart of the Blue Mountains. A two hour journey, with about 22 stops before ours - and it was packed. We found our YHA, dropped off the bags and decided to go for an afternoon walk - well this turned into a 4 hour hike. We started at Echo Point where you look out into the valley below and the distant mountains, as well as a close up view of The Three Sisters, three large rock formations, which are part of the aboriginal dreamtime. Then its off down the Giant Staircase, which is basically 900 narrow steps grafted onto the back of The Three Sisters. Then a 2.5 Km walk over uneven and hilly terrain on a well marked ... read more

Hi All, we're just back from a very relaxing and well deserved long weekend away in the Blue Mountains. We hired a car and booked a couple of nights in a pretty B&B just 90 minutes from Sydney. The blue mountains are known for the blue haze that rises from the forest of Eucalyptus trees. It's a bit like walking around in a forest of Vicks Vaporub. The weather forecast wasn't great but we reasoned it was better than hanging around in a wet and windy Sydney. The weather was changable but by and large it was nice and sunny althought I'm glad we didn't rent a convertable. We ended up with a monster of a car, a Holden Statesman, with a V6 3.6 litre engine. It was 17'5" feet long and a good 6'6" wide. ... read more

FINALLLY!!! i SO NEEDED THIS RUSH! I went abseiling for the first time ever today with a great group of people!! I abseiled down 18 storeys of overhaning rock in the Blue Mountains. The views were breathtaking or maybe me being a whee bit terrified also took my breath away but either way.. it ROCKED! I was basically hanging in mid-air attatched to rope hoping & swinging down along the edge. I decided to also pull my legs up above me and lean back so I could go upside down. ya know.. to get the views from a different angle ;-P I abseiled about 6-9x and each time i had to lean back was enough to make me scream a little!! haha. Like.. the begining is always the hardest. standing on the edge with the rope ... read more