A Step Off The Beaten Path

Sydney Harbor Bridge and Opera House

16 years ago, Lori and I fell in love with Australia as we traveled through its many diverse and spectacular regions. Since then, we’ve longed to return.  Our unexpected air miles fiasco turned into a blessing, as our family was treated to an 8-day teaser of the this magical land. We had the good fortune to stay and travel with friends this time around. And it was a whirlwind of fun!

The day after we arrived, we piled into a rented minivan and headed due west for about 2 hours to Katoomba and the World Heritage listed Blue Mountains. Lori and I were especially excited to see this area as we had neglected to visit it during our first stay here. We stopped first at Echo Point to take in the breathtaking views of the valleys and the 3 Sisters (a set of 3 rock towers).

Echo Point. See the 3 Sisters along the left

We ate a tasty lunch in Katoomba (don’t you just love that name?) before spending the afternoon at Scenic World, a rather uninventive name for a pretty nifty park. Many years ago, a coal mine existed along the edge of these mountains. After the mine closed, it was turned into a tourist attraction. It boasts the steepest incline railway in the world at 52 degrees and offers incredible views of the surrounding valley from sky gondolas and cable cars. At the bottom of the railway is a beautiful rainforest walkway. We could have easily spent a couple of days here!

All aboard the scenic railway!

Alas, we needed to continue west (and a little south) to check in to our hotel at the Jenolan Caves, just a little past the Blue Mountains. The Jenolan Caves are unreal! Over 340 million years old, they are a huge cave system formed out of karsts. That’s when limestone layers of earth have been pushed up, tilted and folded by the slow movement of the continental plates. With lots of drainage underground, the cave system includes dozens of wondrous caves of varying levels and sizes – some including ponds and even a small river. This famous site has attracted tourists since the 1860s and are now very well developed for visitors of all ages, but not so much so that they lose their natural appeal. It’s a kid paradise! We chose to explore the Imperial Cave in the morning and the Lucas Cave in the afternoon, and I would definitely recommend them both as they each have different highlights to share. We saw heaps of stalactites and stalagmites, crystals, straws and shawls (bacon-shaped ribbons of crystal that cascade down a cave wall).

Evan pauses next to a cave pool deep in Imperial Cave

A beautiful crystal shawl lit from behind in Lucas Cave

After caving, I took Anna and Evan on a nature hike to nearby Blue Lake. It gets its blue color (and hence its name) from all the calcium carbonate that dissolves into the water as it passes through the caves. This mineral reflects the blue/green color spectrum causing the water to appear almost aqua in color. The lake itself is formed by a small dam of the Jenolan river and is quite small with very clear, shallow water – perfect conditions for my favorite monotreme (egg laying mammal), the platypus. These little guys are extremely elusive and it’s rare to see them in the wild. However, the cave guides mentioned that a couple of them called Blue Lake home, and we decided to take a chance in the hopes that we may get lucky and see one. I don’t think we were there 5 minutes before Anna spotted one! Remarkably, it continued to dive and surface half a dozen times where we could watch it. And because of the water’s clarity, we could even watch the platypus dive down and root along the sandy bottom for food. What a treat! And definitely a highlight for all of us.

You may have to use your imagination, but that brown blob floating in the upper middle of the pic is a platypus!

The next day, we made our way back Sydney. We made a couple stops along the way. The first was a bakery where we indulged in one of Australia’s favorite foods, the meat pie. The kids were in heaven.

Meat Pies!

Our 2nd stop was at the Featherdale Wildlife Park, home to many of the Australia’s most beloved animals. We saw koala’s, kangaroos, wallabies, echidnas, wombats and more! So fun!

Evan scratches the belly of Rory, the baby wombat

Daddy scratches Cooper the Koala’s rear end (they told me that’s the only safe place to pet him!)

Feeding a pademelon!

Finally home, we enjoyed some tasty Indian food with our friends. As much as we enjoyed the food in Thailand, it sure tastes great to eat something other than Thai food!

Morning Breaky – Tea and crumpets. Seriously, why don’t we have these in the US?! They’re delicious!

You can’t come to Sydney and not see the major sights:  Sydney Harbor and the Harbor Bridge, the amazing Opera House, Circular Quay and a ferry ride to Darling Harbor. I think the flurry of activity from the previous days finally caught up to all of us. We were pooped!

Gage on the ferry to Darling Harbor with the Opera House and Harbor Bridge behind him.

We spent our last couple days having picnics in parks or visiting beaches north of Sydney . . . and eating!  I’m starting to sense a theme here 🙂

Last night out to dinner with friends. I had my favorite – grilled Barramundi 🙂

Finally, it was time to say goodbye to Sydney and our friends. They were such wonderful hosts – So happy to have stayed in touch and to have reconnected after all these years! (We’ll see you soon!!)

Australia is so big and amazing, we could easily make a nice, long trip out of it. Hey, that gives me an idea . . . 😉   So, we boarded our 13 hour flight from Sydney to LAX airport where we are currently enjoying our 8 hour layover (yeah, you read that right!) before we catch flights to Las Vegas, then Miami, and finally, Quito. We may be zombies when we arrive.  South America here we come!