Can Mountains Be Blue?

(steve)

After three weeks in the city, we decided it was time for a long-weekend getaway. (We haven't gone to the Uni for five full days in a row yet, so why break the streak.) After soliciting ideas, we rented a car, dug out the camping gear, and headed east to the Blue Mountains. Now, keep in mind "mountain" is a relative term. With a soaring height of 3500 ft, we weren't in any danger of altitude sickness on this trip. The local mountains were recently described to us as "growing down." We didn't really know what that meant until we got there. Nevertheless, we played conservative and packed in the cold weather gear, even though the forecast was for sunny days. The plan was to camp both nights, with some day hikes thrown in for good measure.



The highway to Blue Mountain National Park spiraled up through rolling hills outside of Sydney. The landscape was dominated by eucalyptus (gum trees). Our first stop was 90 miles east in a town called Katoomba at Echo Point. This is the site of the Three Sisters rock formation. We gazed out over the Jamison Valley and found a beautiful vista reminiscent of the high country in Arizona. Looking around, there was definitely a blue tint to the surrounding hills and cliffs. The blue tint is caused by the release of a fine blue mist from the gum trees that ends up filling the valleys. As for "growing down," the area is best described as a series of valleys and canyons in the hills. There aren't any easily distinguished peaks to point at, but lots of shear 1000 ft cliffs to fall off of. You don't really notice you've gained elevation until you step up to the edge.



The next stops were at a series of overlooks (Evans Lookout, Govett's Leap, and Perry's Lookdown) for the Grose Valley, further up the road. We ended up spending the first night camping at Perry's Lookdown, right at the cliffs edge. The spot gave us a really nice sunset. That night, the temperature dropped significantly and we were glad of the warm gear foresight. The next day we hiked down about 2000 ft to the bottom of the Grose Valley to look at the Blue Gum Forest. Let's just say the boots felt a little small (and heavy) after sitting in the corner for the past month. The forest was lovely, filled with 100+ ft trees and lots of birds flitting between the branches. We ended up seeing a pair of lyre birds, more cockatoos, and loads of crimson rosellas (bright red parakeets) as well as other assorted small birds.



After camping the second night in the Megalong Valley (where it got even colder than the first night), we drove back to walk in the Grand Canyon arm of the Grose Valley. This canyon provided a different landscape to before, with a more tropical feel to the plants.



With our time almost at an end, we stopped in the villiage of Leura and treated ourselves to a nice lunch. While in town, we noticed another sign that fall is in full swing in the southern hemisphere, as the trees were showing lots of color.

While Sydney has been great, it was good to get outside and get dirty again.