Blue Mountains – a blue oasis outside the big city

During our time in Sydney we left the city by train for a two-day trip to the Blue Mountains 50 kms west of Sydney. The Blue Mountains consist of sandstone and over millions of years water carved big gorges up to 760 meters deep and formed huge plateaus. Most of the vegetation is eucalyptus forest, the gorges often contain sheltered rainforest. Over the edges of the plateaus plenty of water runs into the gorges forming untamed streams, which were beautiful sights during our hikes. The name Blue Mountains is derived from the blue tinge the range takes on when viewed from a distance.

We obviously like the Blue Mountains very much.

The deep gorges of the Blue Mountains.

A creek falls down the cliff.

On the day of our arrival in Katoomba we explored the area by foot and had a look at the Three Sisters, a famous rock formation, which you can climb by crossing a bridge over a huge abyss.

The three sisters are on the left side.

I am standing on the bridge above the abyss.

On the second day we took the bus in order to walk on the Grand Canyon Walk. Unfortunately, we had not much luck on that day. First, the bus driver forgot to let us out on the right “bus station”. We had to ride along for over half an hour longer. Second, when we arrived at the beginning of the hike a group of school girls had entered the trek shortly before us. What should have been a peaceful and quite walk turned out to be loud and sometimes extremly slow, while we tried to overtake 150 school girls. There was no tranquility and it was rather hard to enjoy the amazing landscape. When we arrived at the second half of the walk, the school girls left and we had some wonderful views of the gorge and waterfalls.

This is the creek on the floor of the Grand Canyon

I am climbing back my way to the clifftop.

A usual image: Yves taking a picture.

We left on the next day and headed back to Sydney. We really liked the Blue Mountains and its landscape, but we were happy to leave our hostel, as it was awfully crowded and the carpet in our room smelled as if something had died there a long time ago.