A week in the Blue Mountains wasnt actually on our agenda, but after realising that Coogee was so expensive to stay in around xmas, we decided it was the cheapest option. We were staying in a quaint little town called Katoomba, which is a 2hour train journey from Sydney central. We were staying in a place called Katoomba Mountain Lodge which had a blacony with a gorgeous view of the valley during the morning! Blue Mountains was basically a chill out session before we hit the madness of Sydney, New Year and Xmas in Bondi. On the day of arrival we basically got our bearings, went to visit the three famous rocks...the three sisters at a viewing point called Echo point. There were loads of walks that we could do around the mountains, so we sussed out which was the best then prepared ourselves for the next day...where we were hardcore walkers and took a long trek down the mountain, across the edge of them and then right back up to a place called the Ruined Castle, which was pretty much the highest point around us, which had the most gorgeous 360 degrees view of the mountains. The walk was such hard work...defo brought me back to my D of E days, but so well worth it...just unbelievable! There was one point when we lost the path, but thanks to Sals walking experience we managed to get back on it. We also say THE biggest lizard on the way back, which was kinda in our way. It was over 1m long...so we obviously had to wrestle that to get past it!!! The day after our 18Km trek....non of us could hardly walk...so it was very much a chill out day. We got a tram tour of the surrounding areas. We went to see some waterfalls and attempted to see Wentworth falls too, which were a bus journey away from Katoomba, but soon found out it would take another small trek to get there, so we decided to pass, seeing as our legs were struggling to walk up the bus let alone trekking! The next day Sarah and I had booked to do half a day abseiling and half a day canyoning....I was sooo excited about this. Basically in the morning we were taken near the Three Sisters and taught how to abseil. Doing a 5m, 10m, then a 30m abseil. In the afternoon we were taken to the canyon, where we walked down to the bottom, got changed in to our wetsuits...looking good! Basically canyoning is where you wade through the water at the bottom of the canyon. You then have parts where you climb rocks, then do water jumps, swim for a bit. It was absolutely awesome.....the canyon was just so pretty as well. The big finale was the abseil down the 30m waterfall at the end of the canyon. This was absolutely spectucular.....quite scarey, as at one point there wasnt much wall to abseil down, so pretty much just hanging by a rope. Also the water made it really slippy, so a couple of times I was hanging...but all good. Such asn awesome experience...and I would so do it again! After having a week of scenery and chilling out we were all up for some beachage...so we headed over to Bondi the day after canyoning. I am so glad we made the effort to go to Blue Mountains though...it is such a pretty place and it was a nice change from the beaches on the coast. Next stop Bondi baybeee!