The blue Blue Mountains of NSW

From the Snowy Mountains to the Blue Mountains isn't too far. We stopped in Bathurst on the way, an inland city with a University. Eat your heart out Goulburn, this is a different league. It even had a great restaurant, "The Crowded Man" if you are ever passing. Unfortunately our dinner was interrupted by a tropical storm (we had been sitting outside), fortunately we were between courses so just grabbed our bottle of wine and scuttled inside.

The Blue Mountains proper start a bit nearer to Sydney. We stayed in Katoomba, the heart of the region and depending on your point of view, the centre of the tackiest tourest trap in Australia or one of the most beautiful places in the world. Both are true. You can reach Katoomba on the Sydney suburban line train in about an hour so it is very touristy (with museums of handbags, plates and teddy bears among the less sophisticated cultural offerings). I felt sorry for Faulconbridge, a small town near by whose sole claim to fame is that its name is thirteen letters long, no letter is repeated and every vowel is present. Even having a museum of handbags seems a step up from that. And where did the 'u' come from?

About 100 yards from our motel window was Echo Point. The plateau on which Katoomba stands ends in a precipice going straight down 200-300 metres into a vast bowl of sub-tropical forest. In the distance are other mountains, some isolated peaks poking through the vegetation, others, very blue and very distant, forming a wall around the forest. There are waterfalls every half mile or so falling into the forest. At dusk the sky is red on one side, across the bowl clouds drift. Turn around and you can see the tourist tat but why bother!

We walked down into the forest the next day. It's quite tame if you keep to the signed tracks. Until recently, most years some ill equiped hiker would wander off and get lost. Even helicopter mounted heat-seeking sensors don't work through forest canopy and that was that until years later when the remains would be found. But mobile phones have changed all that, if you get lost just dial 000.

Our track was easy to follow but steep. There are steps down and up but there are about 1000 each way. One option is the direct 1000 Stair Route - straight up/down. We aren't macho enough for that and meandered down slowly through "Ferny Bower" and "Fairy Dell" (Australians have a weakness for whimsey). Ferny Bower had a notice listing wildlife we might see. It included ten types of snake though none I remembered from the list at Sydney Zoo, still the Death Adder didn't sound exactly warm and cuddly. As it happened the most impressive creatures we saw were a couple of soot black cockatoos. When we first saw them it was hard to pick out where wings, tails etc started. They were more like a pair of black holes in a pine tree. When they did fly off they showed solid scarlet under their wings. Think of Dracula spreading his cape. There were also lizards and lyrebirds but we're used to them.


It was our last night before returning to Sydney and we had a meal in an excellent fish restaurant in Katoomba with window seats facing a small side street opposite. A beaten up old Holden screeched to halt in the side street. Two identical men got out. Black tee-shirts, black baggies, black hair. As wide as they were tall. And they were tall. They looked tough. The suspension on the car rose a foot when they got out. I thought of a line from Woody Allen, "I know these people, well not exactly people." They banged on a door. If they were collecting rent I'd recommend paying. An old van drew up. A similar figure emerged but with a grey ponytail. El capo. He supervised as black bags are taken from van to house, then a large black crate like object big enough to hold a body. They talked briefly and drove off. We were feeling brave and thought we'd investigate. Perhaps a crime had been committed. Down these mean streets a man must walk .... We crossed the road and into the side street. It was the collection point for a charity shop. The underworld heavies had left a black sofa and its cushions.

So back to Sydney for a peaceful couple of days, relaxing and visiting a friend from Bristol, Peter Aplin. Peter and his wife recently returned to Australia after he had spent about thirty years at Bristol University. It was a wonderful chance to ask all the questions we'd accumulated. Also Peter had worked on SILLIAC which was Oz's first big computer (Sydney ILLIAC) and Eleanor was probably rather bored as we talked about computers and how things work. A few bits of my long lost physics came back.

He mentioned that his brother-in-law had been researching the family tree and found a convict ancestor. This is the prize all Australians seek these days. Normally you find someone who was transported for poaching a rabbit to feed his starving family, stealing a silk handkerchief for his sweetheart or a was a political prisoner (i.e. Irish). Even Australian academics are a bit doubtful about this. At the risk of facing universal outrage, at least one has pointed out that a) British juries were notoriously independent and tended to find defendents not guilty if they thought the punishment would be disproportionate to the offence, and b) the records shows most transportees were guilty of major crimes. So what happened to the descendent of murderers, highway robbers and burglars? I have a theory: they all got jobs at Tourist Information Offices.

With that, it's time for NZ. Last thoughts on Australia? Just send the immigration papers, if they'd have us after that last comment I'd sign up any day. But maybe NZ will be even better.