We awoke to a rare phenomenon for this trip…BLUE SKY… We could only hope that the firies were getting some reprieve.
We only had a fairly
short drive today, so we took the advantage of a slow start, and, with clear
skies, we took advantage and headed back up to the Three Sisters to get a
better view than we had a couple of days ago.
WOW!! What a difference. We were even able to see across the valley to Scenic World. We had not even noticed it before behind the smoky veil.
From Echo Point, we headed to one of my “must see sights” The Hydro Majestic” Hotel. I had seen a documentary of the history and renovation of “Foy’s Folly” awhile ago and always wanted to see it. It did not disappoint. Such a gorgeous example of an historic 5 star hotel.
We booked a $10 tour
and were lucky enough to be the only 2 so our guide was able to answer any
questions we had.
From the top of the escarpment we noticed that there was still an active fire in the valley below and in the time we were at the hotel, it had obviously intensified a far bit ☹
We had a lovely dinner in the “Boiler Room” restaurant before continuing to our accommodation in the little town of Kandos.
On the way, we stopped off at “Historic Hartley” a cute little village that was built in the late 1800’s to service travellers on their way to the goldfields in the Bathurst area.
My fires app showed
me that there was a large fire in the forest near where we needed to go, but
the app showed that the Castlereagh Highway was open, but may be slowed for crews
to do clean up after the fires. After
doing a bit more “googling” we decided that is was safe to take the
highway.
Seeing plenty of traffic on the highway made us more confident that was no danger. We finally came to the area of the fire and there was evidence of a MAJOR fire. We could only imagine the hell it must be fight these intense fires, but we marvelled at how homes, sheds and buildings had been protected.
It was long until we found our accommodation for the night. “Bowers Hideout” is a bungalow at the back of an old shop. Our host had let me know that he would be away, but had given perfect instructions to access the property.
We had organised dinner provisions, so there was nothing to do but relax and prepare for the next day and Dubbo Zoo
Today we travelled around on the Hop-on-Hop-off bus. It was another very hot day, with temperatures of 37 degrees forecast, so we made the choice to basically stay in air conditioning as much as possible. We walked down through the little village of Leura browsing the pretty shops. We found a lovely chocolate shop housed in an old church. Of course, we had to sample a couple of their handmade chocolates. 🙂
We found the bus stop and had a few minutes to wait for our ride to Katoomba. We had decided to get off at “Stop 3”, The Gingerbread House and then walk back up the street for morning tea and then to the Carrington Hotel for lunch.
We had a look at the Ginegerbread House, which is also housed in an old church.
Back up the road onto Katoomba Street, we again just browsed the shops and came across a cafe that had Devonshire teas. Perfect for morning tea.
Next stop was the lovely Carrington Hotel. This historic hotel was built as a fine establishment in 1883 and remained popular for most of its life. It was fully renovated in the 90’s, reopening in 1998 after an eight year renovation. You can read about the history of the hotel here
We were a bit early for lunch, so we made our way back to the bus and thought we might have lunch at the cafe at “Scenic World” As we are both not great with heights, this was not a Blue Mountains attraction we wished to do, but we thought the view from the cafe would be nice. I asked the bus driver, if we could have lunch there without having to pay admission. He said yes we could, but looked at me and said “Why would you? It will like a disturbed ant’s nest there today!” ??
When we pulled up at the bus stop there to let off a number of passengers we understood what he meant. We saw there were men directing the carpark and turning people away as the carpark was full. On top of that, here were at least a dozen full tour buses parked. “Disturbed Ant’s Nest” would probably be an apt description.
We thought we would have a look to see how many people were at the 3 Sisters, but again it was very busy. Jimmy the driver suggested we try the “Leura Garage” We thought that would be a good option as it is literally across the road from our hotel, and backs onto Woolworths. We had a nice pizza and a couple of glasses of local wine ( one of which was free with our bus ticket) topped up our food socks for a couple of days.
We got back to the apartment around 3:00pm. I did a load of washing and we had an easy afternoon. It had again been very smoky and hot. Although neither of us has any asthma, both of us felt tired from not breathing “properly”
We were both falling asleep on the couch so decided to just go to bed… it was 7:30pm!!! I thought we would be up at some ridiculous hour of the morning, but we woke at just after 6:00am We MUST have been tired.
We had a really good stay at our last night’s stay. Even though I had booked this thinking it was
just a “place to stay” to break up the trip…it turned out to be one of the
nicest AirBnB’s we have been in so far ? Super
comfy bed, lots of thoughtful inclusions…great space.
We had a later start because we slept so well and woke later. As we were on a rural property, we kept our showers really short and after a quick breakfast and a farewell chat with our host, we headed off to Bathurst. Again the sky was full of smoke, but no fires in our path. On our way out of the driveway of our AirBnB, we noticed that their dam was also bone dry. We were glad that we had minimised our water usage as best we could.
Is there anybody that goes through Bathurst without driving around the famous “Mount Panorama”? Anybody who has driven this iconic course will tell you it is nothing short of awe inspiring. We see it so many times on TV, but to drive it yourself makes you realise the skill the race car drivers have. (it is also REALLY hard to stay below the 60km speed limit of this public road)
Just off the racetrack is the National Motor Racing Museum. The museum houses a number of Race Cars and Bikes that are synonymous with the history of the Mount Panorama circuit. I grew up watching many of these race heroes so it was a fun time seeing the displays.
From Bathurst, we headed east toward the Blue Mountains. The
area has been wracked with a number of catastrophic fires over the past few
weeks, but we have been so fortunate to be not affected. We have been thanked on a number of occasions
for travelling and helping the communities.
Although the drive from Bathurst to the Blue Mountains was
very smokey, we only saw the evidence of one very small fire on the side of the
highway. It is a credit to the “fireies”
that all the major highways have been kept open for the majority of the time.
We arrived in Katoomba around 11:00am and stopped off to buy our “hop-on-hop-off” Bus ticket for the area. This double decker bus stops at most of the attractions is much easier than driving and trying to find parking at what are usually very crowded places.
Our accommodation ( a sister hotel to our Hunter Valley hotel) was in Leura, just a short drive in the next village from Katoomba. We were lucky that our room was ready before the official check-in time, so we were able to put our things in the room before crossing the road from the resort to catch the sightseeing bus. The room we have booked had a spa bath and we were anticipating that a good relaxing soak in the tub would be nice after a day of sightseeing.
As the bus gives us unlimited travel for the next 3 days, we had decided to go directly to “Echo Point” to see the “3 Sisters” that are is most famous for. We knew there were cafes at the lookout where we could have lunch before doing the rest of the sight-seeing tour.
When we arrived at the Echo Point Lookout stop, there were a couple of tour buses parked and the lookout area was very crowded, so we decided to have lunch first, then come back to the lookout.
Hop On – Hop Off Bus
Hot Dog..and…
Fish and Chips for lunch
We had a nice lunch and had plenty of time to get to the lookout before the next bus was due. Of course because of the fires we did not get the best of the views. I did have to laugh as this view matches my other non-picturesque views of the Swiss Alps and Toowoomba’s Picnic Point. Oh well…at least I may be able to return ?
3 Sisters – Blue Mountains
Picnic Point- Toowomba
Alpenhorn -Swiss Alps
Back on the bus, we took in the sights with a view of where
would come back to tomorrow. We chose to
get off the bus at a couple of stops before the stop opposite our hotel, and
have a look at the shops of Leura Village.
As we walked “home” we made a quick stop at the local
Woolworths to pick up a couple of steaks for dinner.
The aforementioned spa bath was quickly filled with warm water
and Radox Bath Salts and we both enjoyed a good relaxing soak.
After dinner, we planned out the next day using the “hop-on=hop-off” bus and watched a little TV before turning in for the night.
Today’s travel takes us to Cowra and on to our AirBnB in a little town, King’s Plains, approximately 50 minutes away.
We had breakfast, packed up the car and headed off at about 8:30 First stop was to top up the fuel tank then head to Cowra, where we wanted to see the Japanese Prisoner of War Camp, before ending up at our accommodation for the night.
The sky was again very smokey, but there were no fires showing on the fires app. Out of the city and into farming land and again we were struck and how dry it was. There were not a lot of stock in the paddocks, and most dams were bone dry.
We reached Cowra at around 11:00 and found our way to the POW camp site. The site is the place where, in 1944, the largest Prisoner of War breakout in modern military history occurred at Cowra. More than 1000 Japanese prisoners attempted to escape.
There is a replica of the garrison tower and a recorded message tells the history of the camp and the story of the breakout.
Even though it was again 35 degrees, a nice breeze made it a bit cooler and the information boards were under cover out of the sun.
The recorded message informed us that there was a holographic display presentation of the breakout story at the Cowra Information Centre, so we headed there to have a look.
The presentation is really cleverly done. I found a copy of it online.
Next to the Visitor Center was a cafe, so we thought it was as good a place as any to have lunch. We planned on a lightish lunch as we had chops and vegetables in the Engel fridge ready for dinner.
The menu looked nice, so I ordered drinks, a “Works Burger” and chips and asked if it could be cut in half for us to share. Apparently, it was too much to ask, and I was told that the burger was stacked up too high and it would be difficult to cut it in half. We changed the order to a “Steak Sandwich with the Lot” and Chips and that was OK 🙂 Our sandwich came out uncut, and we had to explain that we had asked for it to be cut as we were sharing. The waitress brought back a second plate and a knife for us to cut it.
After lunch, we were back on the road again. I was not able to find an AirBnB in Cowra, but managed to find one about 50kms further up the road on the way to Bathurst.
The AirBnB host had messaged me earlier in the day to say that our check-in time was 3:00pm. We were running a little early, so we drove around Cowra to have a look. Cowra has been the first place we have seen that is green 🙂 Council have done a good job keeping the parks well watered with bore water and it makes the town quite pretty.
We came across a car wash, so decided to wash the dust and bugs off the car. 🙂 The water also cooled the car down a lot and for the next half hour or so, the air conditioning worked much better.
On the highway, we saw a sign that said “Historic Carcoar”. We have plenty of time for a detour so off to the left we went.
What a surprise!!! A gorgeous little town, full of historic buildings from the late 1800’s A lovely creek runs through the town, and people were taking advantage of the cool water.
Our AirBnB accommodation for the night is a comfortable space attached to the host’s home. Originally, a large garage, it was converted by the owners for their friend to live in for a while.
We cooked our lamb chops for dinner, watched some TV and had a nice evening.
We spent some time last night organising a loose itinerary for today. Originally we thought we may use public transport to look around, as we had noticed that parking in the city was $3.00 per hour, however on a closer look at the bus website, we found that there was a daily travel ticket that would cost $9.60 each. We would not spend that much on parking, so we decided that it was easier to take the car.
We awoke to another very smokey hazy sky, which sadly meant the views were not as clear as they could be. The smoke in the air meant the sun appeared as a glowing red ball.
We decided to start at the Australian War Memorial. We arrived too early for it, but we were able to have a look at the displays outside. We have both been here before so we were not too disappointed.
The view from the War Memorial to Parliament House is impressive. We then decided to see it from the top of the hill behind the war Memorial. We drove up to the lookout on Mt Ainslie.
From the War Memorial, we drove to the National Art Gallery We had to pay to park here so paid for an hour that cost us $3.20. We wandered around looking at the displays and we can say we have now seen Blue Poles 🙂
I had intended to visit the High Court and the Portrait Gallery while we were in this area as well, but as it was now around 10:30 am, I chose to go to Parliament House, as there was a tour starting at 11:00 that we wanted to do. I knew the parking here was free for 2 hours.
We arrived at Parliament House. with time to spare only to discover that the tours now start at 11:30am!! We had plenty of time to look around before the tour. The 40 minute tour was very informative and we both thoroughly enjoyed it.
After the tour ended, we decided to head back into the city to have lunch at 65 Northbourne, a restaurant that we had a voucher for. We parked at a carpark we had seen the day before from the free bus and decided we would get 2 hours parking. Being in the middle of the city, parking here was $9.00
The menu looked really good, and we decided on Entrees and Mains (but decided against Wallaby Shanks! ) and a glass of wine each. We were not disappointed, the meals were amazing.
Trio of Dips & Turkish Bread
Scallops with Prosciutto and Balsamic
Veal Saltimbocca
Turkish Marinated Lamb Cutlets
After lunch, we were going to head back to the Art Gallery but decided against it as was just too hot (35 degrees today), and we still wanted to visit the Royal Mint.
The mint was very interesting with lots of information about the history of our currency. We arrived too late to join a guided tour, but the guide book was helpful and each display has good informative signage.
Back in the car, we headed to Woolworths to get some cheese and crackers for dinner and top up our food stocks for the next couple of days travel.
We arrived back to the apartment at around 5:00pm and both had showers to cool off before watching some TV and having an early night.
After a busy Christmas Day, we had an early night and a good sleep in. We packed up, had breakfast and left Wollongong on our way to Canberra where we will stay two nights.
Rather than going straight down the highway, we wanted to look at a motel in the town near where our grandsons and their parents live. This motel used to be really rundown, but we were told it has been sold and renovated.
We stopped in and found the owner/manager who was more than happy to show us a couple of rooms. We were very happy and will be booking in when we come done for the little guy’s first birthday.
Back on the highway, we decided to detour through Mittagong, Bowral and Mona Vale before coming back to the highway.
There were fires about to the south west of us and the sky was very smoky. We got a text from the family who are also travelling south for a few days. They are travelling the coast road and they relayed that the fires had been VERY close, and the Rural Fire Service have done well to save houses and caravan parks.
We stopped off in Goulburn and swapped drivers. I little further along, the map on the navigation, showed we should have had a very large lake on the left of the highway. All we could see were grass paddocks?? I ‘Googled” Lake George on my phone and found that it is a very odd phenomenon. The lake has no surface outlet and the depth rises and falls depending on rainfall, run-off and evaporation. You can read more here. Hubby sent a photo from his phone to his Dad showing the “lake” and Dad sent back a text saying he knew a boy from school who drowned in the lake!!
Lake??
Open Paddocks
but no water
to be seen.
We arrived in Canberra in time for lunch. We were planning on a restaurant that we had a voucher for, but being a public holiday, it was not open. We saw a “Hog’s Breath” for which we also have a 25% off, so decided to go there for a nice steak lunch.
After lunch, we found our AirBnB in a brand new suburb on the outskirts of town. We did have a little bit of an issue opening the gate we need to get through to access our unit, but we managed in the end. After we unpacked, we headed back to the city to catch a free “Culture Loop” sightseeing bus. We chose to drive the National Sound and Film Archive as we could park there and catch the bus. The plan was to just do the loop (which takes an hour) and decide on an itinerary for the next day.
We had a 15 minute stop in the middle of town, so we strolled down a mall and came across a carousel!!
We did the loop and returned back to the Film and Sound Archive. I decided we should have look around. Unless we missed something, there was not a lot to see 🙁 There was a theatre that was playing a short film about life in Brisbane in 1964. So, of course, we had to stay to watch it. You can watch the video here…It was fun to watch and see familiar sights.
There are 14 videos in this “Life in Australia” series. You can view them all here
Back in the car, we found a Woolworths and bought enough groceries for the next few days. We were surprised to see that the suburban supermarket did not have free parking. Luckily it was free today as it was a public holiday. $2 an hour for parking would make you quicker with your shopping.
Back to the apartment, we settled in for the evening and work out what we would do the next day. I did plan on going to the Telstra Tower but it is so smokey, I don’t think we will bother 🙁
Telstra Tower shrouded in smoke
I am pleased to see that one week in, our budget is at an acceptable $0.74 per km. Many of the caravanning travel blogs I read say that $1 per km is the budget to aim for. You can see our costs at the bottom of this post.
