Australia's beautiful Blue Mountains!
March 30, 2021
Last month we got attacked by land leeches (yup, not just leeches, LAND leeches), found birds that can mimic noises like car alarms and construction equipment, had a close encounter with one of the world’s most venomous snakes, got tangled up with more spiders/spider webs than I thought was humanly possible, and had a blast exploring Australia’s Blue Mountains!
Keeping it on the shorter side again! We made lots of Blue Mountains videos and I’ll start posting those next week! 🙂 If you’re interested in the text post, though… read along!
Australia’s Blue Mountains, is a stunning! They are filled with rugged cliffs, dense eucalyptus forests, and the most gorgeous, dramatic scenery. We learned that they apparently get their name from the bluish haze created by tons of eucalyptus oil droplets in the air.
The mountains are located only a couple of hours outside of Sydney and we got super lucky and found an Airbnb in a town called Katoomba, which was right in the heart of the mountains, and we had an absolutely stunning hiking track right out our door!
The weather was ugly and cold when we first got there, but luckily it cleared up, and we got some gorgeous last bits of Summertime! The seasons are basically reversed in the Southern Hemisphere (boo we’re going into fall/winter)… I didn’t really think about that before arriving either, lol.
We spent tons of time in the local mountains and exploring the hiking tracks. Alan said it was a lot like the Grand Canyon, but filled with trees and water. I haven’t been yet, so I can’t confirm! All of the trails were wonderfully maintained and SUPER cool because a lot of them were carved right into cliff sides that otherwise you would never be able to access without some serious rock climbing! BUT that also meant that there were SO. MANY. STAIRS. We easily hiked the equivalent of a 60-story building daily… If not more… probably more lol. (On the upside, I should have glutes of steel by now, right? 😏)
On our hikes we encountered (more like got attacked by) land leeches… Yup. LAND LEECHES. And they chased you!!! OMG the place was completely infested and so gross. 🤮 I guess that’s a signal of a healthy, untouched environment… which is nice, but I still hated them! We also found tons of cool fungus and mushrooms, lots of lizards, and an awesome little tree frog.
Oh! And Alan almost stepped on one of the world’s most venomous snakes (pretty sure they’re all like that in Australia though…). I’m glad it wasn’t aggressive since it was tangled up in his feet while walking… Somehow he didn’t even notice until I started freaking out!
Another cool animal we saw was a Lyrebird! You may have seen them in one of David Attenborough’s documentaries. They are the birds that can mimic car alarms, chainsaws, camera noises… whatever it is! I’m not sure if we heard them, but we sure saw them! They are GORGEOUS!
I won’t go too into detail on the hiking, but for the rest of our stay we enjoyed our time in Katoomba. Our Airbnb had a great yard with tons of birds and fresh fruits and herbs. The town itself has amazing lookouts pretty much everywhere, great street art, antique shops, and a takeaway place run by some guy who was a private chef for a bunch of bands like the Rolling Stones, U2, etc. and he was a great cook and guy! If you’re ever in that area, pay him a visit!
We made a few videos while there, so look out for those in the coming days if you want to see Katoomba, our unfortunate run-in with the leeches, the very cool lyrebirds, or the gorgeous hikes!
I also think I am getting slightly better at making them… sorry I suck, but I promise I’m working on it.
Gotta start somewhere. 😂
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