Blue Mountains

Blue Mountains, Day 1:

We decided to spend our last few days in Australia in the Blue Mountains, a nice change from 3 weeks of staying along the coast. The Blue Mountains aren’t actually blue, but densely populated by Eucalyptus trees – something about when the light hits the trees, the oils and water droplets emit a blue hue. Whatever it is, it’s absolutely spectacular.

Steven took the hotel shuttle to the airport where he had to convince Hertz to let him take the car without his actual California driver’s license (he does have an international license but didn’t think to bring his CA one) and without a printed copy of the rental voucher. After some convincing and fake sob story about having his “money and license stolen,” he arrived back at the hotel in the little car just in time to check out.

We drove for about two hours to get to the Blue Mountains, all on the left side of the road…fortunately, Steven didn't kill us. There was significant traffic on the two lane highway to Katoomba, the main town where our hotel was located. Apparently, we weren't the only ones with the idea of going to the Blue Mountains over the Easter holiday.

We checked in to the 3 Sisters Motel and went into town for some lunch at Fresh, a cute little café with really good food. The town was nice, it reminded us of being stuck in the 1960s with antique and vintage shops at every turn.

We drove to Echo Point where the famous Three Sisters rock formation can be seen. There were so many people at Echo Point that we couldn’t park anywhere close by – as we were driving around, we noticed our hotel was about 3 blocks from the viewpoint, so we parked back at the hotel and just walked.

After fighting off the crowds, we soaked in the view, took some pictures, and decided to go for a hike around the area. What was supposed to be a short 30 minute walk turned into a two hour hike, but we took some more amazing pictures.

After getting back to the hotel, we had dinner and went to bed.

Blue Mountains, Day 2:

We woke up early and had our complimentary breakfast at the hotel. It is always the smallest hotels in the most obscure locations that provide the best services. We drove, initially on the wrong side of the road (Steven said he was still waking up), to Scenic World. Fortunately, we arrived just as the doors were opening so we could beat the crowds, and this turned out to be a wise decision.

It was a beautiful day and we rode to the canyon floor on the Cableway with just the operator, no other tourists, and Steven was able to get some good footage with the camcorder – without a bunch of heads in the way. After arriving at the canyon floor, we walked around the boardwalk for about an hour, admiring the enormous trees and spectacular surroundings.

We rode the Railway back up to the top – it’s the steepest railway in the world and they aren’t joking when they say it’s steep. The seats were cramped, a chain link fence was our roof, it was fast, and no one warned us we should be holding on to our belongings for dear life. Steven focused on hanging onto the camcorder as he recorded the ride up, while Stephanie was too terrified of dropping the camera and/or backpack to take any pictures, so you’ll have to trust us that the view was spectacular once again, albeit a bit frightening. The tracks were originally intended to transport coal, not people.

After getting to the top we noticed the increase in people as we took the Skyway across the canyon past Katoomba Falls. The ride was nice and there was even a clear glass bottom to look down to the canyon as we rode across.

We had lunch and then went to a chocolate factory near our hotel who claims to be famous for their hot chocolate, so of course we had to try. They provided us with chocolate chips, hot milk, a long spoon that doubled as a straw and the rest was up to us.

We then walked back to Echo Point for a free wine tasting of some local Blue Mountain wines, all of which were way out of budget but it was still nice to taste.

We headed back to the car and drove to a few more sites and lookout points in the area. The weather started to take a turn for the worse and we could hear the sound of thunder, so this was our cue to head back to Sydney.

The drive back was a nightmare – think driving back to Los Angeles from Las Vegas on Labor Day weekend. It took us about an hour to go 5 kilometers, apparently everyone had the same idea of heading back to the city after lunch. Once back in Sydney, the street on which we were supposed to exit never appeared and we had to navigate Sydney streets to get back to the hotel. Fortunately, the hotel was near the airport so we just followed the blue airplane signs back to our hotel. We checked in, had some dinner, and got ourselves ready to leave for Bali. Oh, and we spent about $30 AUD on 27 liters (a little over 7 gallons) - Americans definitely have no room to complain about gasoline prices.

And with that, our adventures in Australia comes to an end. It has been amazing, but we are ready to move on and begin our next journey.