One of the trips was a visit to the Royal National Park, which is apparently the oldest national park in the world! We went down a trail which took us through bushland, forest, and rainforest. We started at quite a high altitude and the scenery and the plant life were beautiful. There was a small red flower that grew in marshy areas that was carnivorous and ate things like flies by getting them stuck on its sticky nectar. A little further along we started to see prints on the sandy trail, but unfortunately we didn't spot any animals apart from some bees (and I'm sure those who know me can predict how I reacted to them). When we got down to the rainforest part of the trail there was a stream that I drank from. I was expecting it to taste exotic and different, but it just tasted of water. Go figure.
As well as this, a few of us international students went on a trip to the Blue Mountains, which are just to the west of Sydney. After leaving on the Friday of O week and a two hour bus ride, we arrived at the hostel and had pizza galore! We got out our goon sacks and sat around drinking and getting to know each other (can you see a theme forming here?). I can't help but think that I got to know some of the English guys a little too well after a long game of I have never though! The next day we woke up bright and early to go abseiling! I'd never done it before on a proper rock face (in year 6 I did a mini abseil on a climbing wall) so I was really looking forward to it.
They started us off on a small wall of about 5m which was at an angle of about 75 degrees from the ground just to get the hang of it, shortly before moving on to a 15m cliff. This was good, and had a 5m free fall section at the bottom, so you could kind of dangle there and take in the views. After everyone had had a couple of go's on the 15m cliffs, they took us to a 30m cliff, which had about 3m of cliff to abseil, and then 27m of free fall. I managed to go down twice, and the first time I went down I went slowly and took in the absolutely stunning scenery of the mountains. It really put things into perspective, and was very humbling. The second time I went down I decided to go as fast as I could until I had to slow down, and wow, my heart sure was pounding after that!
That afternoon, after getting some lunch, we went on a sightseeing tour of the mountains. We went to see the three sisters formation. There is a pretty cool story behind them, in that years ago there was an aboriginal tribe with a witch doctor who had three daughters. The daughters had seen a boy from another tribe and had taken a liking to him, much to their father's dismay, so to make sure that they never got to the boy in the rival tribe he turned them into stone. If you go to visit the three sisters, then apparently you will have eternal good luck if you touch the first sister. We went back to the hostel, got drunk and got to know each other a little more!
The next day, we went to a different section of the mountains to go on the steepest incline railway in the world. We climbed down the mountain to the bottom of the railway and got on, and strewth it really was steep. It felt like it was almost vertical! In the afternoon we visited a zoo which had all kinds of farmyard animals, and animals native to Australia. Being the idiot that I am, I decided to stick my hand into all the enclosures and let the animals nibble on me, but I put my hand into one of the koala exhibits and he decided to cling on using his VERY SHARP nails, and he wouldn't let go until I shook him off! He left my left hand in tatters, but it was pretty funny. It didn't teach me any lessons though, and after that I let a kangaroo, wallaby, penguin and a wombat nibble on me.
After the zoo our tour guide Reece left and we all pretty much slept straight through the coach ride back to our accommodation. If this O week was this good, then I can't wait until the one in February!
amazing , very interesting country ...
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