Sunday March 12, 2023
After a good night’s sleep and now having moored the ship Starboard to dock and Sydney Bridge, and Port towards the Opera House, so the bow pointed to land, mainly it necessary to “back out and spin around to face the exit of the harbor upon our departure. I am sure these a very sophisticated nautical terms that I have just used!!! We were able to exit directly into the very modern cruise terminal that has no shops and entry into the area is highly restricted. We were up early to catch the coach to the Blue Mountains. We met up with the excellent Guide – Michael and the very informative driver Colin, who participated in the commentary by giving us some fascinating information about the aboriginal nations and the 360 language groups that have inhabited Australia for 50,000 years. Of these only about 100 are still spoken and all have oral histories as they did not use a writing system. Today there is an effort to transliterate the indigenous languages to maintain the remaining languages for posterity. Original humanoid people originated in Africa but som nomadic family groups, moved towards India and what is now South Asia and as Australia was roughly located in what is today the Indian Ocean, it was a relatively short distance by dug out canoe to what is today the Island of Australia. Over the 50,000 years due to tectonic plate movement, Australia sits where it is now in the southern ocean, and was isolated for many centuries. These nomadic family groups emanating from different parts of Africa and then with normal language mutation, the various groups took up areas of the country and evolved from hunter gatherers to subsistence farmers to a structured society, with each group having little to do with other groups. Since the driver had given us some of this information on the coach, we were able to get together privately with him and gather even more information. He is working with some of the aboriginal elders and populous in trying to understand and bridge the gap between the relatively “new” (late 1700’s) White people that took over their lands. We got the overall feeling from the various states that a great deal of effort is being made to understand and respect the abominable population all over Australia. One story Colin told us was that it was like an insult to talk about a boomerang returning to the thrower. Boomerang is actually a “throwing stick”. This Throwing Stick was used by hunters to throw at prey to stun them and knock them down so the hunter could get to it and use a knife to kill the prey for the family meal. It was never intended to come back, just lie by the stunned animal, until the thrower picked it up. Another use was to throw the stick to divert the prey into nets that would capture the animals allowing the hunter to kill it in the net with a spear or knife.
The Blue Mountains are an area of 11,400 Sq Km about 1 hour drive from the Central Business District (CBD) of Sydney. It forms part of the Great Dividing Range of mountains that are situated North / South on the Eastern side of Australia. The Jamison Valley is filled with eucalyptus trees which give off the blue haze that permeates the valley. At an elevation of 3,900 feet, the first stop after driving slowly through the charming town of Laura, was at Echo Point to see the eroded sandstone pillars that are known as The Three Sisters that lie 914 meters above sea level. The local Gundungurra people tell of the legend that three sisters fell in love with three boys of a neighboring tribe. The village elders forbade the union so the local shaman converted the sisters to stone to protect them from aggression from the other tribe. However, was broke out between the tribes and in the.battle, the shaman was killed so was never able to turn the hex around bringing back the sisters to life. Thus they remained as these three rugged outcropping pillars. The view over the valley was spectacular. The other legend that this tribe also tells is of the creation story of the valley / Blue Mountain region, which is that the Dreaming creatures Mirigan and Garangatch, half fish half reptile fought an epic battle that scarred the landscape and formed the Valley.
We then proceeded to our next stop which lasted 2 hours which is Scenic World. This is a party natural, partly man made adventure park. At some point around 1685, coal and shale were found in the valley and a major mining operation took place. After getting our paper wrist bands that had a bar code allowing you through the various turnstiles, we first queued to get onto the Scenic Railway which is the steepest railway line in the world and is almost vertical. It has an incline of 52 degrees and entering the 60 passenger train through hatch type doors, one sits almost lying back, 4 to a row, before the hatch, which has an upper part made of glass and a lower part of metal mesh, closes and the adventure / drop stars. The run lasts about two minutes before one is at the base of the cliff and in a forest that has a Scenic Walkway – a 2.4 Kilometer board walk network through the trees plus a number of other hiking trails. We followed the guide and did the 10-20 minute walk where there are various artifacts left over from the mining, as well as the entrance to the mine and a wide variety of plants, trees and animals. At the end of this boardwalk or one of the other walks, one gets into the Scenic Cableway – an 84 person gondola / cable car that takes you back up 545 meters to the top after 90 seconds, past a single monolith ragged pillar that used to be part of the main mountain range and still has vestiges of being an ideal lookout. However on January 28th 1931 “The Dog Face Rock” collapsed with a further collapse on May 2nd, 1931 cutting off the ability to access the promontory. It is estimated that in some 20 years then entire “Orphan Rock” will no longer exist. While in the jungle below, there are various alternative walkways and several storm shelters as out of nowhere, there could be a major downpour, as Nelson experienced in 2016!.
Once back at the main building, there is a cafeteria, shops and other facilities. We opted for the third “ride” which was the Scenic Skyway, a rectangular box cable car with a glass bottom, that crosses the Jamison Valley 270 meters (900 feet) above the canopy of trees that lie along the Katoomba River through the valley. On reaching the East Side which is near the Echo Viewpoint of the Three Sisters, we proceeded down some 120 steps to the top of the Katoomba waterfall – a beautiful sight, then the 120 steps back up to the Scenic Skyway to the central point. There are many other walks along defined trails through the valley if one has more time. Just to complete what we did, took the best part of 2 hours on the go the entire time. Of particular note – If you have problems with mobility and climbing up and down a total of some 400 steps in the period of 2 hours, you should consider alternatives like just taking the cable cars up and down and over the gorge. If you have issues with height fright, you may want to stay in the lodge and admire the view with a great cup of tea. However, if you have an adventurous spirit, this is a day you will never forget, not only for the rides, but the sheer beauty of the place.
All safely back on the coach, including a blind / visually impaired man from Liverpool England and his wife, we traveled a few minutes into the Katoomba town where we had each “pre-ordered” (via the guide) our choice of steak or chicken to the restaurant at what was the California Inn and Bar and now called the Mountain Heritage / Mountain Falls Retreat, where Molly the proprietor greeted us. It is an “old worldly” hotel very reminiscent of the UK TV show “Faulty Towers” set in Torquee, England. We expected Basil Faulty (John Cleese) to appear any moment and the Spanish waiter to give us the go-around!!! However, none of this happened and we enjoyed a nice lunch at one long table and a view over the Blue Mountains. After lunch we passed the Kingsford Smith Memorial Park which remembered the man who took the first flight from the USA to Australia in his mono-winged “Southern Cross”, bak through Laura and to Sydney. Since there was no traffic, we got back early so the guide took us through the Olympic Village from the Sydney Olympics, seeing the main (now) Accor Stadium, Qudos Bank Arena, and other buildings before dropping us off back at the ship. A really terrific day and we were very lucky with the weather as it was clear and sunny all day, except for a rain storm for about 1/2 hour when we were in the coach on our return to Sydney. It was interesting reading Diana’s book on World 2016 raise, that when they did the same Blue Mountain cruise, they went first to an animal sanctuary, then to the same restaurant and finally to the Scenic World. We missed out the Animal park and it was never mentioned. In the evening we watched the dramatic Sail Away in the last light of day / rarely night as the departure (or arrival) into Sydney harbor, as previously mentioned, is one of the most spectacular views anywhere in the world. The evening entertainment was a spectacular young Australian lady – Amber Jade – who played the Clarinet, the Saxophone and sang beautifully. She is from Sydney and shared that she came on with her husband and 2 year old child. A very impressive performance. There was a major changeover at Sydney as 800 gusts got off, 1,000 got on and many staff changes with “Grumpy” – Jeff Hughes and all his band getting off and a totally new band starting. There are also many new faces amongst the crew, including our excellent South African head waiter Shafiq being replaced by a Lithuanian by the name of Gin.
Roger & Anne Travels 