Cyclone

We were in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales when Cyclone Debbie, approached and struck the coast of Queensland, and since my own internal navigational compass has been spinning round and round since arriving here, I think Queensland is far to the north of the blue mountains.

 

From the tvee news reports there was lots of destruction along the coastal areas, but it didn’t appear that anyone lost their life, and most everyone interviewed by the tvee reporters were quite positive that life would go on in somewhat the same manner despite their house boat now being stuck in a tree several blocks away from where the harbor used to be.

 

Far to the south in the blue mountains   It was warm, sunny and clear as we ventured out to shoot the famous three sisters at sunset.

The next day we checked out of our lodging in Katoomba and headed out to Scenic World to ride the steepest railroad in the land and gauze at the stunning vistas from the two cable cars.

The young fellow selling tickets to Scenic World, wasn’t aboot to give us the pensioners discount without seeing our pensioners card that is issued by the governments of Australia, and New Zealand. And since we have no such card it was a tense few minutes as the young fellow determined that we were in fact deserving of the discount, even without the government issued cards. I believe the young fellow was so charmed by our alluring demeanor that he was ready to give us his own grandmothers card, and pension but we wandered off to see the attractions.

The railroad was quite steep indeed, it felt like it might break away at any second and become a carnival ride, but it didn’t and it slowly made its way to the bottom of the canyon. Boardwalks led the way around the lower Scenic Land, past old coal mines, and miner cabin displays. Workers were hanging from some of the trees suspending pieces of art for the upcoming art walk, and near the entrance to the first tram car a display had been installed on the ground.

The day had started off clear, but the fog had since moved into the surrounding canyons, and by the time our tram car approached it looked like the views of the Grand Canyon of Australia were not to be had from Scenic Land today.

On the way, back up our guide pointed out that on the right-hand side of the car you could see fog, and if you looked close on the left you could see fog.

Not to be deterred by zero zero visibility we headed into town for lunch and much needed haircuts.

Only the lady running the small shop on one of the main streets of Katoomba was inside the salon when we entered. She did indeed take walk in customers and since she had nothing better to do she proceeded to trim up my hair saving me from paying several hundred dollars for the same cut on the ship. She was also quite interesting telling us all the things to see in the area, and if I ever got to England several places to visit there that I assured her I would even thought I have forgotten them already.

Up the road to Mount Victoria, that as it turns out is at Victoria Summit the crest of the Western Highway. Our lodging was at the self-catered Cedar Lodge, chosen because the web site had an actual wild Kangaroo standing in the yard, and we needed to see one. As it turned out we saw several that would come out of the woods to feast on the self-catered grass early in the morning as the sun came up, or at dusk.

 In the catered section of the Cedar lodge owners fed a small flock of Sulphur crested cockatoos and several smaller parrots. But the Kangaroos didn’t seem to mind.