More Sydney Pics....

Some more pics of syndey views. The top is me on top of the south east pylon of the sydney harbour bridge with the city behind me. The second is looking over the bridge from the same pylon. The middle is me and my brother Chris sat infront of the opera house and the harbour bridge and the fourth is a one of those plus the city skyline in the distance. The last picture is the lit up harbour bridge onits 75th Anniversary that was celebrated while we were there by thousands of people walking over it.

Blue Mountains

With my brother we visited the Blue Mountains, a couple of hours by train west of Sydney. We caught the train to Katoomba a town in the Blue Mountains near the famous three sisters rock formation (top pic) and where a number of walks start from. The walk we did took us aruond the edge of the valley and down the back of the three sisters descending over 800 steep steps down to the valley floor. Then we walked round the base of the hill to a railway which took us back upto the top. Well, I thought the train in Hong Kong taking you to Victoria peak was steap bu this must have been even worse, and with the foot rest, horizontally infornt of you at the start, your bascically standing up on the way up pushing against the rest. Was great fun. It even had a notice reminding not to leave infants loose on the seat as they may get damaged! bit of an understatment if ever I head one. The views from all around the high areas was spectacualar.

Hunter Valley

My brother and I on a visit to the Hunter Valley, a major wine making area of New South Wales. We also visited an animal sanctuary on the way down where you could feed wallabies and emu's. Although no one wanted to feed the emu cos it pecked and wasn't as cute as the wallabies. They also had Kiolas, a croc, Tasmanian Devils and Casowarys amongst the typical spiders & snakes of Aus.

We visited three vinyards on the trip making sure we were polite enough to sample there wears on the way!

Cape Tribulation

Cape Tribulation is a few hours north of Cairns and is where the rainforest comes right down to the sea and meets the barrier reef. Theres some gorgeous beaches as well as walks through the rainforest. I did a night walk round the forest where we saw some spiders and glowing beatles that flutter around. Didn't see any snakes though but did get soaked as it suddenly rained while we were out incredibly hard. The waters around north Queensland are full of Jellyfish and Singers (box jellyfish) this time of year so its not safe to go in the water (+ theres saltwater crocodiles around here).
Also tried 'jungle surfing' around the jungle canopy which was fantastic fun. The pictures of me hanging upside down sliding between trees.

Trip up to Cape Tribulation

On the way upto Cape Tribulation we stopped off at the Daintree River, the mouth of which can be seen behind me above. We went on a boat trip along the river seeing crocodiles, a big one that surfaced right near the boat and one that was just lying on the bank. There were also thousands of huge fruit bats hanging from the trees along the bank of the river.
Also explored the rain forest a bit. The rainforest here has some of the oldest plant species on earth and haven't changed for millions of years.

Cairns

Haven't got many pics of cairns for somereason so heres a view form the boat on the way ot the barrier reef and a greyhound bus, one of the many ones I travelled on up the east coast.
The trip to the barrier reef was a bit of a let down as it was really stormy, think a cyclone was brewing off the noth east coast at the time. The snorkelling was still brilliant but because it wasn't sunny the colours didn't really stand out and as it was stormy we had to go to a particular site which unfortunatley didn't have coral right upto the surface or turquose waters around it like the photos you see.

Magnetic Island

On the way upto Cairns from Airlie beach we stopped off at Magnetic Island, just off the coast from Townsville. The island was really small so we hired a car for a day and drove around it, which didn't take long. Theres a walk upto an old fort from world war II that is intersting and has some great views. Theres a number of small okay beaches. The best bit were the rock wallabies that live suprisingly in rocky areas. These came down from the rocks if you put out some fruit for them.

Whitsundays

Fraser Island 2

Fraser Island 1

Australia Zoo