The Blue Mountains

[khiemtran]

It's the last day of the school holidays, so Liem and I are on a drive to the Blue Mountains.





Here's me doing the driving. Photo courtesy of Liem.



First stop is Wentworth Falls, after nearly two hours of driving from Sydney.



Coffee for me, peach iced tea for Liem. Note the binoculars at hand for exploring...



At last we've reached Katoomba and Echo Point, the viewing location for the Three Sisters.



And here they are! Note the walkway on the bottom left...



The Blue Mountains are extra blue because of the eucalyptus vapour from the trees enhancing the Raleigh Effect, the same scattering of light that makes the sky appear blue normally. The further away the mountains are, the more blue they look.



Liem's tolerance for sightseeing only goes so far, so next it's off to Scenic World for some scenic rides.

First, the Skyway...







One interesting aspect of this cable car is the section of glass floor in the middle of it. It starts off vaguely translucent...



Then becomes transparent with a flick of a switch.



It's a long, long way down...



But the explorer soon finds other things to look at...



Katoomba Falls, which gave the town it's name...



The Skyway takes us to the cliffs on the other side of the falls, where it's time to explore...



The view from the other side. The small rocky outcrop on the hill near the middle of the frame is the Ruined Castle. But note the brown trees on the bottom left. No, it's not because it's winter. That's where a bushfire has been through.



Up close, you can see how the trees are recovering. The trunks are blackened, but the trees are all still alive. The fire passed through here very quickly.



Many of the trees around here are actually fire dependent. Their seeds remain dormant until a fire has been through and then germinate right when the undergrowth and the bigger trees' leaves have been cleaned out, giving them the best chance to thrive.



Next it's time for the Scenic Railway, down to the Jamison Valley floor.



This involves a lot of waiting around (owing to construction work).



And then a very rapid descent!



They claim this is the steepest railway in the world.



The passengers disembarking at the bottom.



Tree ferns seen on the walk along the valley floor.



Vines in the rainforest...



Liem wasn't convinced these were vines, on the grounds that they were just "sticks".



This Lilli Pilli was killed by lightning. You can just see from the gash on its side that it's been burnt through on the inside.



Another dead tree...



Time for the last leg - the Cableway back to the top of the cliff...





A last glimpse of the Three Sisters from the Cableway window...



And, at last, time to head home (and time for explorers to get some well-earned rest). As usual, there's no rest for the explorers' loyal assistants. Somehow has to drive home...

Comments

[zornhau.livejournal.com]

Kurtzhau is ambivalent about the glass floored cable car :)

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

It's supposed to be 400m down at the highest point... Not recommended if you suffer from vertigo.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

The Blue Mountains are extra blue because of the eucalyptus vapour from the trees enhancing the Raleigh Effect, the same scattering of light that makes the sky appear blue normally. The further away the mountains are, the more blue they look.

Oh, that's very cool. I had no idea such a thing was possible.

One interesting aspect of this cable car is the section of glass floor in the middle of it. It starts off vaguely translucent... Then becomes transparent with a flick of a switch.

There's an glass-walled office with walls like that in the East Midlands Conference Centre (or E MC², as it's known) in Nottingham University. It's very cool: like Blade Runner made reality (only faster).

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

There's one in Melbourne too, where there's an entire room with opaque walls that gets pushed out from the rest of the building and then suddenly gets made transparent. Haven't tried that one yet. I have heard they also use similar technology for dimming the windows of the 787 Dreamliner instead of using window shutters - only to find that it's not actually as effective on a bright day as using window shutters...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

The three pillars in the top photo, are those what's known as the three sisters? wakanomori's aunt lived most of her life in Australia and sent him picture books when he was a kid, and one was an Aboriginal myth about a rock formation that looked, from the illustration, just like that.

Tell Liem thanks for the photo! It's great to see you.

And the tree ferns. Wow! Love the tree ferns.

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Yes, those are the Three Sisters. They're the most famous tourist attraction in the Blue Mountains. The story goes that three sisters were turned into rocks by an elder in order to protect them during a battle, but then he died and no-one could turn them back. But when I checked on wikipedia just now, I was surprised to learn that it might also just be a recent invention. Or maybe I shouldn't be surprised.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

In the story I read, it had something to do with a bunyip--which sounds totally like someone throwing in All The Mythology.

(Oh look! here is the book itself!)

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Some googling suggests the bunyip version is an "alternative" legend, and there are also versions with the Rainbow Serpent instead of the bunyip. Interestingly, from this article (http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/once-were-seven--now-we-must-protect-the-last-sisters/2005/08/28/1125167552293.html), it looks like the rocks may actually have been a sacred site for rituals to do with the Seven Sisters (of the Pleiades star cluster) and there were originally seven pinnacles.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I had no idea about eucalyptus vapor!

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Also very convenient for starting fires. It's remarkable how careless these fire resistant trees are when generating accelerants around their non-fire resistant neighbours...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

A really devastating version of "I'm all right Jack"

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Eucalypts: great for clearing sinuses, but also plotting to kill you.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

We just had visitors from Australia who were telling us about how many varieties of Aussie flora have developed seeds/methods of reproduction that are either fire-resistant or depend on fire to get them going.

ETA: Nature is formidable!

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

My father gave me a memorable demonstration once by boiling an acacia seed and showing how a tiny hole had opened up afterwards, ready for the seed to germinate.