Bobs first blog in the Blue Mountains

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Alright,

Bob here, We decided to get away from the city for a few days, so we jumped on a train and headed for the Blue Mountains - to a little town called Katoomba to be precise. We are in a hostel/Guest house called No.14. It is too nice to call a hostel really, its a sort of home from home. We are apparently a few thousand feet up and the air is very fresh and smells of Eucalyptus. Yesterday it was raining so we hired a car and drove for about an hour to the Jenolan Caves. The drive was awesome we had to climb the mountain then descend on a long winding road I enjoyed it but Maria was holding on for dear life with her eyes closed. (she'll deny this but its true!) There was quite a few caves to choose from but going by the guide book we entered the Lucas cave which is the best all rounder. It has 910 steps and at its deepest is 54 metres, they have held weddings and concerts in there!! enough said it was amazing. We left the caves just before sundown and headed back up the winding road but as we progressed it got darker and at one point I couldn't see anything as they don't have street lights and mist just appears on every corner.

In the evening we went for a bite to eat in town which was great value and huge(I know what your gonna say Bobby loves his food!!) and that was that.

Today we covered the Three Sisters which is three large rock formations that you can view up on lookouts. From where we are trees look like bits of Lego. Anyway we headed for those and then descended down the great stairway which is basically a lot of very steep steps and hard terrain to nearly floor level and then made our way along the designated paths taking in all the scenery along the way including some waterfalls. We figured we probably covered about 6 miles so decided to take the scenic railway back up which holds the record for most vertical railway as it runs of the top of the mountain and straight down the side of the rock a bit like oblivion at Alton towers but much slower. Anyway we have just got back and are now totally shattered.

Tomorrow we are heading back to Sydney. We found a guy on Gumtree advertising a spare room at his place, he works day and night shifts and it looks nice and is cheap. We also have access to all facilities at his including internet so should be cool. We are planning to stay there for a week before heading up to Cairns.

And that's you all updated - Maria has just come down from the room and told me how proud of me she is for doing this Blog with out being nagged. I'm so good!!

Anyway lots of love to everyone and you all take care yeah!

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Photos

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The Three Sisters, viewed from Echo Point.

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At the top of The three sisters about to make our descent.

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Katoomba Falls

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View from the other side after we trekked from floor level.

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View from the front carriage of the scenic railway

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Driving in to the entrance of the Jenolan Caves

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Inside the Lucas cave

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Natural Limestone formation known as the broken column

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Bad Perm

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The blue lagoon just outside the entrance to the caves

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We pulled over to take this on the scary trip back.

Comments

[Nicky]

Woohoo! I'm v envious of you guys, but enjoying reading your updates so far... keep 'em coming! Happy travels xx

[SI]

driving
Well ben, what can I say, I am very impressed that you wrote all that yourself. In Maria's defence, I clung onto the handle with my eyes shut and you were only driving me from Basildon to Wickford.