Days 90 and 91

The drive from Port Macquarie to the Blue Mountains meant that we had to go through sydney, and we were lucky enough to cross the Harbour bridge. Helena added comedy to the situation when she spotted the opera house, and piped up with "there's that other thing!" Our cottage in the Blue Mountains was very nice and had a large garden where we were frequently visited by cockatoos and crimson rosellas. As it was a beautiful clear evening the guy who owned the cottage advised us to go and see the view from Echo Point. We weren't disappointed as it provided excellent views of the whole national park area including the famous three sisters (unfortunately not June, Joanne and Jayne).

In the morning we decided to head to the giant staircase where we made it down as far as the three sisters before mum decided it was way to steep to go any further. So we trudged back up to the top and decided to do a different walk instead which took us around the mountain top to some waterfalls. we were again lucky to get some great views of the surrounding mountains, and we learnt that the reason they are named the 'blue' mountains is due to rising vapours from the gum trees refracting the light to create a blue haze. After a picnic lunch near the waterfalls we headed back into Katoomba village to visit the chocolate shop :p In the afternoon we drove to the nearby Wentworth waterfall area, and tagged along on the end of a tour group to walk to some scary cliff edge view points. This provided different views of the area but they were just as spectacular. Overall we thought the Blue Mountains were a great detour for a few days, and after all the walking we felt a few pounds lighter.