Australia - Part 5

Blue Mountains

This morning we drove through heavy traffic to leave Sydney. Our first stop was Parramatta, not far west of Sydney. There we visited ruins of an old observatory and toured the historic Governor's Mansion. This house reminded me of historic houses near home in Virginia. It had the same sort of early 19th century furniture within.

Before we entered the mansion I saw several white cockatoos on the lawn and in trees. Finally, they were close enough to photograph.

Cockatoos may be extremely common to Australians, but they were exotic and new to me!

We also saw an ibis walking along the grass.

The mansion tour highlighted several aspects of 19th century life, including a Downton Abbey-like bell system for calling servants, and an in-house school room with lesson posters on display.

I found the next poster particularly helpful in understanding British money and references to British money in novels. Before seeing this poster I never understood what a guinea was.

We then drove on west from Parramatta to Katoomba to see the Blue Mountains - Australia's version of the Grand Canyon. The blue tint on distant mountains is similar to what we see in Virginia and North Carolina in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Our bus took us to Scenic World, where we joined lots of tourists to see the sights. At one of the cable car stations we had this nice panoramic view.

There were three ways to see the canyon floor - two different cable cars and a railway. The first cable car, called Skyway, featured a waterfall view. The waterfall might have been dramatic at full volume, but due to the Australian drought, it was a mere trickle, hardly worth all the time we spent waiting in line for Skyway. We then took the more spectacular Cableway down to the canyon floor. The next picture is a view from the cable car on the way down. There are unavoidable reflections on the glass.

A rainforest covered the canyon floor.

We enjoyed walking on boardwalks through the rainforest. From time to time, in more isolated locations, we escaped tourist crowds and had nice quiet moments alone. Steep climbing was involved at some places as we hurried to get back to our bus on time.

Among geologic layers was a coal seam which was once mined.

After seeing the coal mine we needed to return to our bus at the top of the canyon. The return trip took place on a slightly scary 52-degree inclined railway which, at one time, ferried workers and supplies to the now defunct coal mine. Our seats faced backwards for the trip. It was a bit of a thrill ride to be zipped up the steep incline while facing downhill.

While waiting on our bus for some tour members to return I heard what I thought was a child whining and moaning. It took a few moments to realize it wasn't a child. Instead, I heard the strange eerie call of an Australian raven perched on a ledge close to the bus. I tried to record this bizarre sound, but when I approached the bird, it stopped calling and gave me an evil eye.

Before going to our hotel we drove to a different viewing location to see the Three Sisters rock formation.

The panorama below shows a view of the canyon from this new overlook. .

After viewing this last scenic panorama we drove a short distance to the Blue Mountains Heritage Hotel and checked into our rooms. I briefly explored the pleasant hotel interior where bird portraits decorated hallway walls.

The canyon was visible from the hotel porch.

After dinner I went outside with several other tour members to attempt stargazing and photography from the hotel parking lot. Unfortunately, there were too many inescapable streetlights in the vicinity. We could see how dark the sky would be away from lights, but there was no light free place within easy walking distance. In addition to streetlights, the Moon was beginning to add its own glare to the mix. Nevertheless, in spite of illumination obstacles, I was able to see both Magellanic Clouds in my small binoculars. I could also see them, very dimly, with the naked eye.

The next imperfect picture is the best I was able to capture with my phone camera. Hazy streaks below and right of center are reflections from the cursed streetlights. Electric wires show up at lower left. The small and large Magellanic clouds are very dimly visible just above and below center.

With the help of one of my star charts I've labeled the image so you can see locations of some stars, constellations, and other celestial points of interest. All the constellations in the image are not visible from Virginia.

I could see globular cluster 47 Tucanae, labeled above. Alpha and Beta Centauri, and the constellations Crux, Triangulum Australe, and Grus were also visible to the naked eye, but these are not in the field of view of the images above.

In spite of frustrating observing conditions so far, I was making progress in my quest to see new southern hemisphere celestial objects. Our next stop was Siding Spring Observatory where I hoped to finally see a truly dark sky.