Australasia > Australia > New South Wales > Katoomba > Trekking > Articles > Tangled up in Blue

“Ay, ‘an it’s a cool, brit, moonlit nit,” my Scottish friend, Rob said, his words shooting steam towards the streetlights. Toni, Lisa, Brian, Rob, and myself were making the nightly pilgrimage to our Mecca: the Three Sisters, the focal point of the Blue Mountains (read: where the tour buses stop). They are floodlit until midnight. But the last two nights it had been too cloudy to see them.

We had all met by the fire three days ago, arriving from Sydney on different trains, and had burrowed through six bags of marshmallows together. All of us had come for the same reason: to get out of Sydney. The city’s great, one of the best, but the countryside is where a man can relax.

It was 10pm and the whole Katoomban world was asleep. We disturbed the silence with the sounds of breathing and rubbing jackets. Katoomba is a wonderful town, a joy to walk around at any time. It’s claim to fame is the Three Sisters, a rock formation of three separate rocks that extend out from the cliff. They were once seven, but time married four of them to the valley below.

The lookout was deserted; tomorrow it would be littered with tourists and the carpark full of buses. Clouds rushed up from the valley in front of the sisters. We waited. The night was clear, but fog clung to the mountains. Then the clouds were gone, and it’s like a veil had been lifted. The man-made light accentuated different colours, more shadows than light. The odd flying fox glided over the valley and owls hooted in the distance. Two hours away was the sprawl of Sydney and right then it seemed another world away.

The next morning, we took the bus to Blackheath to hike the gorge at Govett’s Leap. Being the only Australian, I’m chosen to lead the hike, to point at scenery, to spot wildlife, and give lessons on how to survive for seven days with eucalyptus leaves and a swiss army knife. They rename me the Bushman of Blackheath; there’s a poem in there somewhere. I’ve also promised to cook damper (traditional Australian bread) on an open fire having expounded on its greatness the night before.

Down into the valley we went, two hours of slippery rocks, old concrete stairs and beautiful flora and fauna. We rested under an overhanging rock and built a campfire, as aborigines may have done 20,000 years ago. I mixed the damper (flour, butter, water, love), wrapped it in aluminium foil, and buried it in the coals of the fire.

After a bag of marshmallows and an explanation as to why the mountains are blue (the haze comes from the many fine droplets of oil from the eucalyptus forest; the droplets cause the blue light rays of the sun to be scattered more effectively, thus intensifying the usual light refraction phenomenon which causes distant objects to appear blue, so the book says), I dug out the damper. Steam escaped as I tore away the foil and broke the bread. We ate it with strawberry jam and watched the birds scamper in the trees below.

“How can something made from flour, butter and water taste so good?” asked Toni. I had no answer. Maybe it’s true what they say about Australia, that there’s something in the water.

Full of damper, we hiked through the gorge, a lush greenery of ferns and trees fed by the stream we were following. We left the stream as it joined one of the many arms of rivers that divide the mountains an ascended to the cliff top walk that would take us back to Blackheath. The walk offers fantastic views of the east side of the valley. From here we could see how the rivers have carved the mountains into valleys over millions of years.

Into the sixth hour, we saw Bridal Veil Falls tumbling over the cliff on the other side of the gorge. At 107m, it’s the longest waterfall in the region. Cascading against the desert yellows, oranges, and reds of the cliff, the falls are stunning.

It started to rain when we reached the bus stop and I tilted my head back to taste a few drops. The ever resourceful Bushman of Blackheath.

A half hour later, it’s feet up by the fire, tea in hand, legs aching. After four solid days of hiking different parts of the mountains, I need a holiday from my holiday. Assorted hikes abound all over the region with no two hikes the same. On my first day, I hiked down the 907 steps (I counted) of the giant staircase to Leura Falls, taking in photogenic Weeping Rock and the car graveyard, where a dozen cars have been “retired” into the valley.

On the second day, I hiked to Ruined Castle; a collection of rocks atop a mountain that resembles, funnily enough, a ruined castle. The crows hold court and get restless if you stay too long enjoying the 360 degree view. The blue mist that hugs the mountains stretches into the distance in all directions.

On the third day, I went back down the giant staircase, this time hiking to Katoomba Falls. Tourists who have taken the skytrain from the visitor centre clamber around the falls, taking as many photographs before the next train leaves. With sunlight streaming through the web of trees, each part of the falls is highlighted by gold light at a different angle. I’m suddenly cast in the role of photgrapher, taking many photos myself and happily snapping tourists in front of the falls with their cameras.

And on the fifth day, I rested, before taking the train back to Sydney, back into the smoggy embrace of the big city. The winding train put the mist behind me and takes me to Australians metropole, where the traffic moves in all directions and everyone has somewhere to go, and has to get there faster than anyone else. No hiking here, and suddenly it’s the mountains that seem half a world away. I sit in the train at the station, waiting for people to get on and off and then let it take me back out to the peace of the Blue Mountains.

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