Expats go to the mountains

On Saturday, Atlassian hosted a day trip for the expats at the company. Quite a variety of us came out for the day: people from Spain, Belgium, Germany, France, Netherlands, Canada, Argentina, Englad, even Iran. Oh and a couple other Americans. =) Atlassian tries to take good care of us people far from home, and this day trip was no exception! We had a pretty big day lined up: a bus ride to Featherdale Wildlife Center, then to the Blue Mountains, and finally to the Olympic Park where we could catch a ferry back to the city.

I went solo, since Toby had gone to the mountains a few weeks before and wasn't too keen on riding the bus up through the mountains all day long. I was OK with this, since this was one less person whom I would be competing with for wallaby-attention. He saw the new Superman movie instead, so we both had our own kind of fun day!

First stop, Featherdale

I was so so so excited to get to back to Featherdale again. We had so much fun the last time, and I was pretty excited that it wasn't going to be 100 degrees this time. I was a little worried that the animals wouldn't be as interactive since it was pretty chilly, but I didn't need to worry. 

Thanks to lovely Susan for the pic!

This is the neighborhood wallaby hangout...

I was happy I'd been there before, because I got to capture some of the people hanging out with the awesome Aussie animals for the first time. Lots of smiles all around!

Saw some cute birds...

And then, right as we were leaving, we saw this park ranger. He was carrying a six-month-old kangaroo in the sling around his neck. Turns out, the kangaroo was having a bad morning and needed a bit of pouch-time. 

A dunny break, overlooks, and lunch

After we left Featherdale, we headed up into the mountains. When we got to the foothills, we stopped off at an orchard for a little bathroom stop. The orchard owners had a little roadside shop that sold local products and had a little balcony that overlooked a grove in the valley. 

We had a quick stop at an overlook called Mt. Banks. 

And then on to lunch! We stopped at the Imperial Hotel in Mount Victoria. This hotel, I am pretty sure, hasn't changed since it opened in 1878. That includes no heating being added. It was really lovely inside, but definitely a bit dated.

We all ate our lunch in the "Old Vic Ballroom" with our coats on. It was a bit strange; we were the only people around besides some kitchen staff that brought out our lunch. The ballroom did still have a Christmas tree up, though. 

I stopped off at the "ladies lavatory" before we left - it hadn't been updated to be a general restroom yet. It still serves as the bathroom for all the female hotel guests. There were two showers and three bathroom stalls inside - and every inch of it pink. Also, it felt like there was zero insulation in the walls, which there probably wasn't, so it was actually a little bit warmer outside than in the bathroom. I feel sorry for the ladies who have to shower there!

Katoomba & Scenic World

The last stop of the day (well, for sight-seeing anyway) was Katoomba, which is where the Three Sisters lookouts are. We went to Scenic World, the most touristy part of the Blue Mountains. Scenic World has a cableway that you can ride down the side of the mountain, a skyway you can ride across to the next ridge, a treetop walk you can take over the rainforest at the bottom, and a 52-degree incline railway, which is the steepest in the world. 

Most of us opted to take the hiking trail down the side of the mountain. It was pretty steep going. 

But it offered us some amazing views of the Three Sisters and Katoomba Falls. 

The trail ended in the valley, right at the foot of the incline railway. It was $14 to ride back up, which was pretty pricey for a just a minute or two of thrill. But considering that it was more than 1,000 steps back up to the top, I happily paid it. And it turned out to be pretty cool! (For some reason, they piped in the Indiana Jones theme song during the climb? I don't think you can hear it in the video, but know that there was a touch of random to the whole thing. Toby says you should read "random" as "awesome.)

Back to Sydney

After one more stop to see the Three Sisters from Echo Point, we headed back to the city. The plan was to go to the wharf at Sydney Olympic Park and catch a ferry back to Circular Quay. Things got a bit "Australian" at that point...

The driver/tour guide, who the whole day had made an effort to share interesting facts with us that were occasionally interesting but more often just random, drove us past his house and pointed out his car on our way back to Sydney. He also seemed completely unperturbed that there was pretty much no way that we would get to the park in time to catch the ferry, and sure enough, we missed the ferry by a good margin. He said he "reckoned" that the next ferry would come in thirty minutes or so, so we all piled off the bus and stood huddled in a tiny, frozen circle on the wharf. It then came to light that, in fact, the next ferry wasn't for another hour, so the driver decided it would be best to take us to the city. By this time, most people were wiped out and fell asleep as soon as we got on the road. I suppose the driver hadn't really prepared any facts or anecdotes for this part of the trip since it was unplanned, so he cranked up some music. It seemed to be a playlist with a mix of 80's hits and Australian children's songs, starting with "Beds are Burning." If you've never been on a bus of 40 people, hardly 2 of them from the same country, listening to songs about dingos as your tour guide highlights points of interest like apartment buildings, then you might not have been to Australia.

All in all though, I can't complain about a single part of the day. It was extremely generous of the company to provide it for us, the weather and scenery was wonderful, and every single person on the trip was lovely. It was a great day to be an expat!