Today Carroll took me to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, about a 2-hour drive outside of Sydney. They're called the Blue Mountains because the eucalyptus trees, which make up most of the forest, let off an oil into the air which, when seen from a distance, creates a blue haze. Most of the drive up into the mountains reminded me much of northern Ontario, around Lake Superior, with huge rolling hills and vistas. Along the way I found myself thinking, "OK, this is pretty and all, but is it really worth this drive?" Well, yes, yes it was - because when we got to Echo Point, this is the vista that I saw!There really are no words to describe how tremendous the view is from this point. This is an awesome canyon, spreading as far as the eye can see in all directions. It is hugely deep - my estimate was that the bottom of the canyon was over 1000m down! The Three Sisters rock formation shown in the first photo here is enormous. There is a very steep staircase (called the Giant's Staircase for obvious reasons) that lets you walk out and
stand at the base of the closest Sister. The second picture I've included shows the view from this point. The Giant's Staircase continues all the way down to the bottom of the valley, but, after descending for another 100feet or so, I realized that if I continued all the way down that there was no way I'd be able to make it back to the top again! As it was, it was challenging enough to climb back up to the top lookout and back to the car.Carroll also took me to a couple of other lookout points further down the valley, where I was treated to equally spectacular views. Later on in November, Jen and I have been invited to come back up to Sydney and go abseiling with Ruth and Carroll - and this is where we'll be doing it! Eeep! For those of you who have no idea what abseiling is, this is where you descend over the side of a cliff in a climbing harness, using ropes and a descender, to make your way to the bottom of the cliff. Yikes! Carroll has assured me that we will do some practice on some smaller cliffs first before we tackle one of these big ones. I promise that when we get to the abseiling, I will get my friends to take lots of pictures - 'cause much like whitewater canoeing, it's gonna be a challenge to convince myself I can do it!
