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Hey everyone,
Wednesday we spent the day at the Botanical Gardens. We both took lots of pictures of all the flowers (especially for you Mum B, but not as good as yours), tho we were suprised that not that many plants were actually in flower. We did stumble across a lizard waiting on a path for us, he almost smiled for our photos! We saw all the bats roosting in the trees in the gardens, there were literally thousands of them there. They have really ruined some of the top branches of the trees, but they are such a sight to see! Afterwards we sat by the Opera House and waited for the sunset, which never really happened! We ended up talking to an old Australian couple about their travels, bless them, they could talk the hind legs off a donkey!
Had a good day weather wise in the Blue Mountains yesterday, the sun has been shining on us all day. We went on a small group walk around the major habitats of the mountains, including open & closed rainforest, heathlands & swamps. We walked down to the world's steepest railway, at one point the incline is 52 degrees! it felt like we were practically leaning over in the carriage it was that steep. The hostel here is really nice and Katoomba as a town is nice, but only for 1 night, its very sleepy and remote so theres nothing happening past 9.00pm.
We didnt see much wildlife at all, just a few cockatoos, the odd spider and 1 kangaroo thru the bus window. They must have heard us coming and all ran away from us!
We walked to some good vantage points to see the rock formation of the 3 sisters - see the photos! the Aboriginal story behind the formation is quite an odd one, but if you use your imagination, it could happen! An Aboriginal elder went hunting with his 3 nieces when food was scarce. He took his bommerang hunting and told the girls to wait behind a rock for him to return. The girls got bored and started throwing small rocks down the cliff face. One rock hit the Aboriginal version of the Devil who then chased up the hill to kill whoever had hit it. The uncle came back to find the devil about to kill the 3 girls so to save them he threw something else at the devil, then turned the 3 girls to stone using a stick to protect them from the devil. the elder then turned himself into a liar bird to confuse the devil. unfortunatly the stick broke when he was turning into a bird so couldnt turn himself back from a bird, or turn his 3 nieces back to life, so they sit to this day as 3 mounds of weathered rock.
Today we spent the morning doing a 4 hour walk around the Blue Mountains on our own. We saw the Leura Cascade (big waterfall) and Gordon Falls. Was better walking on our own as we saw much more wildlife, lots of sphinxs, heard some frogs and saw more birds including black cockatoos. Weather is still sunny and warmer than yesterday. Later we're back to the beach as were staying in Coogee for a week. The beach is really nice there and the weather looks to be hot hot hot over the next few days. Dont worry mums & dads, we've both got plenty of factor 30 to slap on ourselves!
Were looking forward to going to the Australian Open, weve got tickets for wed 23rd Jan. Think itll be the last of the quater finals so there should be some good matches on to see on the big screens and there will be lots of doubles matches being played on the outside courts.
Hope everyone is well in the UK!
Rose & Hayley xxx
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