Saturday, May 06, 2017

Squires Down Under - Blue Mountains

Day 6 - Blue Mountains - November 17, 2017

Today was one of my favorite days of the whole trip.


We grabbed our car from the valet (I probably shouldn't have rented a car for the previous 3 days, because we never used it. Instead, I just paid a lot of money for overnight parking each night).


We drove to Scenic World in the Blue Mountains, about an hour outside of Sydney.  We're on the skyway that spans across a valley.


A small waterfall from the skyway.



A view of the Blue Mountains from the other side of the skyway.



You can see the skyway in the picture above.




Looking through the glass floor.



Scenic World also has the steepest incline railway in the world that takes you down into the valley.  I think the steepest portion has a pitch of 52 degrees.



The three rock formations above are known as the Three Sisters.


While we had the girls sitting in the train car for this picture a big group of Asian tourists showed up and were so excited to see the girls.  They started chattering and excitedly took lots of photos of the girls.  Alison and I were trying to walk away, but they wouldn't let the girls leave until they had gotten all of their photos of these lovelies.


Riding her trusty steed.


Bucking her bronco.


Calming her cob.


A nice strong stud.


There was a Subway in Katoomba (the town nearest to Scenic World).  We grabbed a couple of sandwiches to eat on our little hike.


Down in the valley there were extensive boardwalk paths through the eucalyptus forests.  It was so beautiful and the air was nice and fresh.


Lots of old mine equipment and shafts.


Tim Tam break.


There was a cableway that takes you up and down the mountain (in addition to the railway).  We rode the cableway back up.



Once we got home, both Alison and I were craving some placenta cream.  Alas, we hadn't bought any so we were left unsatisfied.


We rode the inclined railway back down and up one last time.


After Scenic World we drove to the Featherdale Wildlife Park.  Lots of wallabies.


We met our friend Victor the Koala.


They had a bunch of other koalas as well.




We bought some chow for the wallabies and kangaroos.








This koala was on a roll.  If you want to hear the sound a koala makes, listen to the video below.




A small kangaroo.


Soft little marsupials.


The kangaroos weren't too interested in our ice cream cones full of dried grasses.


We were some of the last people at the park, so we went back to the koala station and were able to feel Mr. Victor's fur.








After the wildlife park we drove to the Sydney Temple.  The gates were locked because the temple was closed for cleaning, but a friendly worker saw us and came and opened the gates for us.



After the temple, we drove to the famous Manly Beach.  It was really windy and pretty cold, so we took our pictures, and then found somewhere for dinner.




Nachos.


Quesadilla.


Sleepyhead.


This is the koala grunting his heart out.

Tomorrow: Bondi Beach and then we fly away to New Zealand!

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