ADVENTURE : KATOOMBA : DAY I + II

Hello!

As you may (well, you probably don't!) already know, over the holidays (over 5 weeks ago! talk about procrastinating!) my family and I visited Katoomba - in the Blue Mountains. It was a super fun and beautiful place to visit, so I will be sharing some photos I took along the way...

*THIS WILL BE A VERY LONG POST - BE WARNED*

I had to narrow 1000 photos down to 300 and I'm finding it hard to pick which of the 300 to leave out... :(

Expect part II (Day 3 - Jenolan Caves + Day 4 - Cliff walk & macro photography + some little extras) by next week. If I have not posted by then, assume the zOMBIE APOCALYPSE IS UPON US, AND RUN, RUN MY CHILDREN! or i could just be busy, you never know.

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D A Y I - L E U R A E V E R G L A D E S

& ECHO POINT

On this day we could not enter our house until 2 PM (cleaning- oh and it is not our house :) ), so we decided to go take a look at the Echo Point lookout. It was about 11 AM so we had plenty of time to spare. In the middle of the Jamison Valley sat Mt Solitary which, at the time had a few clouds floating nearby. It was truly a beautiful sight.

am I the only one who wants to climb Mt Solitary? It seems beautiful.

Of course we had a look at the three sisters, too. The dream-time story goes that three sisters, Meenhi, Wimlah and Gunnedoo from the Katoomba tribe had fallen in love with three brothers from the Nepean tribe, though tribal laws prevented them from marrying. The brothers did not agree with this and captured the sisters, causing a major war between the tribes. In order to keep them safe, a witchdoctor from the Katoomba tribe cast a spell on them, turning them to stone. The witchdoctor died during the battle, although he had intended to change them back afterwards. This left the sisters forever cast in stone, never to return to their original form. You can also read the story (and alternative story) here.

It's a looong way down- yikes!

My little sister taking a photo.

We then had a walk around a track that went from Echo Point to Katoomba Falls (I'm not sure about that), and here are a few photos i took along the way.

The cutest little bird.

a man with an apparent death wish

On the way to the Leura Everglades, we visited a small park...

some darn lovely trees

a pair of ducks

magpie

another magpie

cute lil trees.

We went for a short drive and ended up at the Everglades. We still had an hour to burn.

waterfall

view from a lookout

cute almost horizontal tree

We were then permitted to enter our house and boy, it was huge. There were 2 lounge rooms, a dining room and a kitchen combined, and just that area was about the size of my entire house. There were 4 (or 5?) bedrooms, and one had a bunk bed, another had 2 singles, and the rest had king sized beds. They even folded the toilet paper into little triangles!

D A Y II - S C E N I C W O R L D

& ECHO POINT (again)

Before we went to scenic world, we stopped by Echo Point to see how it would look early in the morning. To my surprise the valley was filled with fog, and this time Mt. Solitary was surrounded by pale, fluffy clouds. The morning sunshine was slowly creeping through the valley. It was definitely a sight i wouldn't have wanted to miss.

this turned out a bit odd, but I still really like it

the right side of the valley

a little rocky-ledge

all that fog

Now for scenic world - I didn't take many photos of the more exciting stuff (scenic railway goes at like 100000000000 km an hour making it impossible to take photos), but I got plenty on the bushwalk and some on the cable car (or as my sister says, airboat). It was a pretty fun (and terrifying!) experience.

scenic railway

Here's scenic railway from above. Again, no photos on the railway, because it was far too fast. The ride was possibly one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. at first its all calm and on a nice, flatish slope, but then nope, it drops 310 metres in a matter of seconds at 52 degrees, being the steepest railway in the world. Some kids in front of me set their seats to cliffhanger (64 degree incline) and were screaming the entire time. As loudly as possible.

from the scenic railway platform

the railway

Katoomba coal mine office

where i spotted a lyrebird. s/he was trying to sound like a chainsaw

at the bottom of sceneic railway, you could decide whether to take a walk, or go back up the railway. We walked for about 30 mins, slowly making our way to the scenic cableway. Here's a photo of the cable car from below.