1. Hunter
Valley
I went
along with Usyd’s Unimates on a trip to Hunter Valley. I’m not really into wine
but I wanted to visit anyway. It was a two-hour drive there via chartered bus.
We tasted
all sorts of wine and I did fall in love with one particular flavor in the end. I didn't buy it but I made a friend on the trip, and he bought it, so I got to drink more of it back in Sydney anyway!
We also had
some cheese tasting which I just cannot appreciate. I’m sorry, I like regular cheese, but these special types of cheese were just too
disgustingly cheesy for me.
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| Hunter Valley Gardens |
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| Alice in Wonderland |
I liked
Storybook Garden in particular. It consists of all the tales you heard as a
kid like Humpty Dumpty, Jack and Jill, Hey Diddle Diddle, and of course, in
these pictures, Alice in Wonderland.
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| I'm at the Hatter's tea party! |
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| Lounging in a chair that's made for a giant. |
2. Blue
Mountains
I visited
the Blue Mountains twice with different groups of friends.
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| The Three Sisters |
The first
time I visited, I had planned to take the typical, cliché, touristy route. We
took a two hour train ride to Katoomba Station. We walked to Echo Point pretty
easily – just follow a map or a bunch of tourists. They are all usually headed for the same
place.
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| At Echo Point Lookout! |
From there,
we found a path leading downwards and just kept on walking.
Along the way, we could find waterfalls, creeks, more lookouts and signs with explanations about the park, such as information about the cliffs, trees, and birds.
The sound of the water was pretty loud and I could feel drops of water on my face!
Here, we learn about how mining was like in the past.
There was
an information board about lyrebirds. I didn’t see one but I was hoping to!
Lyrebirds are masters of mimicry. I remember watching this video during my LSM1303 Animal Behaviour lecture.
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| A copy of the original Mountain Devil Scenic Railway car. |
When we
grew tired of walking, we took the scenic railway up. It’s a newer version of
the Mountain Devil I think, because it looks similar. Except much safer
and enclosed, of course. It’s a 52 degree incline and therefore a steep ride
up. You could adjust your seat to ride at a 64 degree incline, if that's more thrilling to you!
During my second visit to Blue Mountains, I alighted at Wentworth Falls Station instead.
After alighting, just follow the signs towards Charles Darwin Walk.
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| The start of the walk. |
Along the way, there are bridges over small streams. We saw pretty flowers, birds, and lizards. It was a pleasant walk through nature.
We saw some trees that looked like they were burnt in a forest fire. There was a fire the previous month or so. I was in school and it made the sky look like this:
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| A beautiful yet hellish sight. |
Anyway, back to the journey. We were so happy to reach the waterfall!
This sign shows that if you reach this area, you’re only looking at a small portion of the huge waterfall. Wow.
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| Cute little ducky! |
I don’t know if you can tell from this photo, but the climb was getting tougher. The steps were quite steep and as you can see, apart from the railing that shields you from the crazy cliffs, there is also a rope for you to hold on to.
At certain parts of the trail you had to half-squat in order to get pass. Mind your head!
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| Narrow paths |
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| Tiny spaces |
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| And a vertical ladder |
As I feel
that these would pose a challenge to some, I wouldn’t advise everyone to embark
on this trail. However, I must say that we met a couple of older women who had
no problem at all. We were wondering if we should head further down, and they
encouraged us to do so as they were making their way back up. They were
probably a lot fitter than we were!
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| It’s like it’s raining! |
3. Sandboarding @ Port Stephens
When I was
in Sydney, I hadn’t gotten my driver’s licence yet. So when I heard that
Unimates was organizing a trip to Port Stephens, I signed up! It took us
approximately 3 hours to get there via chartered bus.
Our first
stop: Australian Shark & Ray Centre.
We were
given a cup of prawns and a stick with a plastic peg at the end of it to be
used to feed the rays. You could pay extra to get up close to the sharks but we
didn’t. The rays were good enough for us.
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| Slurp! It was so fun! |
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| Time for lunch by the sea. |
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| So many pelicans! |
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| Huge pelicans everywhere. |
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| This little bird caught a fish. So cool. I love observing animals! |
Next stop: Sandboarding. You could choose to ride a camel to the sandboarding area but our group clambered onto a small bus which drove us to the destination.
We were
given boards and told to climb up the sand dune whenever we were ready. It can
be a bit difficult climbing up the sandy slope, but you can make use of your
board as a walking stick! The slopes closer to this area are less steep but if
you are a thrill-seeker, you can choose a steeper slope to descend from.
We were instructed
to go down the slope in this position. You can see that I’m smiling in this
picture, but that is a big mistake. When you’re going downhill, DO NOT scream
or even open your mouth in the slightest way, because all the freakin’ sand will
go into your mouth. And I think that even if you just stand at the bottom and
talk to your friends, the sand will find a way inside your mouth somehow. By
the end of this, it was like we were chewing sand. Ew, gross. But definitely a
fun experience, nevertheless.
4. Kiama
Lighthouse, Fitzroy falls
A friend of
a friend had a car, or was it rented? Borrowed? Anyway, with a car, a bunch of
us decided to drive down to Kiama. I was planning on going there myself via
train, but I knew that it would take me three hours just to get there and I
didn’t want to make the trip by myself in case I got lost. In any case, I was
glad that my roommate invited me to come along with her friends.
We made a quick stop to check out this well and to admire the view.
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| It was a gloomy day. |
I think it was a two-hour drive from Sydney to Kiama. This is Kiama Lighthouse!
Kiama Blowhole. There are two: the little one and the big one. I thought that it would be more spectacular because of the pictures I had seen on the Internet and because I had read that the blowhole can spray water up to 25 metres or something. So when I said “like that only ah”, my friends thought that I was hard to impress.
After
Kiama, we drove to Fitzroy Falls. Again, it was a rather gloomy day and it was
rather misty when we visited.
We spent
the rest of the day kayaking somewhere in Kangaroo Valley. Didn’t take any
pictures because I was afraid of getting my phone wet. And obviously, we spotted many wild kangaroos while kayaking.
5. Royal
National Park: Wattamolla Beach and Lagoon
My friend’s
girlfriend had a car and she kindly agreed to drive us (her boyfriend, my
roommate and me) to Royal National Park. I think there was an entrance fee
charged to every car that went in.
It was so bright that I couldn’t really tell what I was taking pictures of! So here are some poorly taken pictures.
This is the prettiest part of the lagoon but my picture doesn’t do it justice! I randomly took this picture before burying my phone deep into my bag and going off to have fun in the sun. There were a few people jumping off the falls but this was supposed to be banned and so we didn’t try. Safety first!
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