The Blue Mountains that Aren’t (mountains, that is..)

When we planned our Australian itinerary, we imagined we’d be pretty tired of moving every day or so after we left Melbourne, so even though it was a little hard on our budget, we slotted in 4 nights in the Blue Mountains to catch our breaths before we moved on to the Asian leg of our trip.

We didn’t really have a clear idea of what ‘The Blue Mountains’ entailed as far as things to do and see, just that Tom’s cousin Catherine had recommended them and I knew it was a place that Sydneysiders went during the summer, though I’d never been there when I lived in Australia.

It turns out the Blue Mountains are pretty cool. And vast. And not really mountains at all. But are kind of blue-ish.

In fact, the Blue Mountains is a massive plateau that has eroded away by rivers and streams forming deep temperate rainforest covered gorges between and among the ridges.

It’s a bit like the Grand Canyon if  the entire  canyon were covered in forest except it isn’t just one canyon, it’s many. Mostly you drive from lookout point to lookout point and view various canyons, often with long waterfalls cascading down from the plateau rim and take walks along the rim and/or into the rainforested areas below.

With its lookout points and enormous vistas, it reminded us a little of Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah, though instead of looking at weird and colorful rock formations, you are looking at vast gum forests and distant rivers.

We were staying at a cute Airbnb in Katoomba that had some period charm and a fantastic newly remodelled bathroom (but not enough light for our tastes).

It was very near Scenic World, which, while undeniably touristy, afforded the chance to soar above the forest on a glass bottom gondola, walk along the rim trail, descend into the forest on the wildest little railway, take a walk through the rainforest on extensive boardwalks and ascend back up again on a gondola.

Most of these things can be done for free, but involve a lot of climbing up and down, which the cable car and gondola help you avoid.

The scenery and walks were very enjoyable, and the plunge at 52° vertical on the old coal railway was a real heartstopper!

On our final day, we took a hike along one of the points of the plateau that overlooks a formation known as ‘Ruined Castle’. We could see it in the distance, and the more intrepid hikers who had scaled its heights. In contrast to the crowds at Scenic World, we did not encounter anyone else on this trail, which wended through an area that had been badly burned in the wildfires of 2019-2020.

The area had not recovered substantially, unlike the coastal areas we had visited earlier in our journey but the walk was still very scenic and enjoyable.

That evening we ventured out to see one of the Blue Mountains famous landmarks, the Three Sisters lit up. That wasn’t all that impressive, but it was a moonless night and the stars were absolutely stunning, so it wasn’t a wasted effort by any means.

Our three days in Katoomba and the surrounding area were just what we needed to refresh, relax, enjoy a bit of nature and do our laundry. But one thing happened there that we really didn’t expect. On our third night, I was reading in the living room when I heard a tremendous bang and at the same time a strong jolt that shook the cottage and made it creak. My first thought was that a car had hit the building, but then I realised I had just felt an earthquake! It was only about a 4.0 but was quite shallow and centred in the Blue Mountains, which is why it had been so noticeable. Much to his disappointment, Tom, who had been in the shower, did not hear or feel a thing.

We departed early on our final morning in order to return the Chery rental car by 11am. We thought we’d left in plenty of time, but I insisted on driving through a car wash (so I could take decent pictures of it on return, as we have been burned in the past by rental companies claiming damages we couldn’t prove weren’t ours) and we ran out of time to fill the car up.

When we got to the off-airport return center, we had literally two minutes to spare before incurring another day’s rental fee, but still faced paying the penalty price for them to fill the tank—according to our contract, over twice the going rate at a petrol station. For some reason the woman at the counter took kindly to us and said she’d only charge us 1.80AUD, which was CHEAPER than we would have paid at the pump, so win-win for us!

We dropped our bags at our nearby hotel and took the train into Sydney where we spent our final few hours of free time in Oz.

We took the Manly Ferry and walked the promenade to the (very crowded) beach, then back again and over to The Rocks, where we explored the old buildings and browsed among the market.

I bought a souvenir for myself- a small framed echidna formed in 3-D decoupage from an Australian postal stamp that was a reminder of our lovely stay in Paradise with Bill and Catherine.

Then it was time to head back, do some more laundry (for which we had to upgrade our room, so questionable whether it was worth it…) and pack up for our next big adventure—ASIA.