The Blue Mountains

Katoomba is the name of the small town up in the Blue Mountains where I stayed for five days. The weather was nice every day, and while I only planned on staying for two or three nights, that changed when I realized how much there was to do. Bushwalking is the cheapest and best way to see the area, and so I spent a lot of time doing it. Many of the walks are along the cliffs that overlook the mountain range, the three sisters rock formation being the most popular area, although I did venture down to the Grand Canyon of the Blue Mountains. Down in the canyon the climate is cool and ideal for the rainforest type enviorment. The following day I went Abesaling (or repelling) and Canyoning. The first part of the day we abesailed down cliffs, getting use to the mechanics, motions, and equipment. In the afternoon we headed down into some canyons to repel down a 90 ft. waterfall. Dressed in full wetsuits, with our gear in a waterproof bag on our backs, we hiked through the canyon floor, headed towards our waterfall. At somepoints the water was only ankle deep, but at others, we were jumping off rocks into 15-ft pools of cold, mountain water, with steep canyon walls on either side of us. At some points there were even some natural rock waterslides. Eventually we came to the waterfall and set up our ropes and decended down. It's tough to concetrate and remember what you were taught only hours ago when gallons of water are being dumped onto your head and body. We all made it down.
I met some good folk at the hostel, some from England, and two from Scotland, and spent the rest of my time up in the mountains with them. We rented bikes one day and headed out on a 30 km trip. The conditions were intense, and we wound up walking our bikes at some of the steeper parts, but all in all it was a fun day with some great views. We treated ourselves at the end of the day with some pints of Thooeys at the Carrington Inn.