Sydney: No Blues In The Mountains

FREQUENTLY we are asked how, financially, we are able to keep travelling the way we do.

It's a perfectly valid question, of course. But the answer is we have to be prudent with our funds and also find creative ways of making our bucks stretch further.

One way has been house-sitting, which we have been doing for nearly three years and involves caring for someone's home (and, usually, pets) while they are away, giving the owners peace of mind that their home is and animals are safe in their absence. In return, we get free accommodation, which is one of our biggest costs. 

We are members on two websites - trustedhousesitters.com and housecarers.com - and apply when we see house-sitting jobs become available where we are travelling or about to travel. We pride ourselves on doing a good job and leaving homes cleaner than when we arrived.

We have come to meet some genuinely amazing, gracious and generous people this way and see and stay in fantastic places from Notting Hill to Brecon to Huddersfield to Kuala Lumpur. Our most recent assignment was in the Blue Mountains, about an hour outside of Sydney. We stayed there - in a beautiful family home - 11 days, looking after a dog, rabbits and a hen.

It's a spectacular part of Australia, hence the advertising promo for the region which reads, "Easy to get to. Impossible to forget". The Blue Mountains is so called because of the density of Eucalyptus trees which emit into the atmosphere droplets of oil which, when combined with dust particles and water vapour, form rays of light that are predominantly blue.

There is so much to see and do in the region that you could live here years and not scratch the surface, so we took the more popular options, starting with the famous Three Sisters near Katoomba, which was about 45 minutes drive from where we stayed in Warrimoo.

The Blue Mountains covers some one million hectares and became a World Heritage site 12 years ago. In it you will see trees that have been around from before mankind and cave systems that have survived 350 million years.

At Echo Point in Katoomba is a large visitor centre and observation area where you can get the best views of The Three Sisters - three rock formations, each over 900m tall, that stand out side by side with a massive open landscape as a backdrop.

Aboriginal folklore says the rocks were three sisters who were turned to stone.

There is a walkway that extends for miles, it seems, around the cliff edge. It is all perfectly safe, spotless and perfectly maintained.

We didn't have time to see everything on our first visit, so returned to take in the Scenic Railway - the world's steepest incline railway - a cableway that takes you back to the top and a Scenic Skyway, another cable ride. You can purchase a ticket for all three with discounted rates for families and if you arrive before 11am.

Zenchai was particularly fascinated by the history of gold mining in the area and the log cabins for workers that have been preserved and some of the other equipment that was used.

Katoomba itself is a quiant little town that has a giant screen cinema (six stories high) showing film of the region's environmental value, but we didn't have time to check this out.

Fresh and organic food-lovers should make a trip to the food co-op on Ha'Penny Lane, just off the main high street, though we also found other stores in the region offering a wide and good selection of fruits, vegetables and such items.

Another destination we visited was Wentworth Falls, which, like in Katoomba, has special views and dramatic trails.

Being in the mountains was cooler than in the city. It felt so much fresher and healthier. We took several local walks, on one occasion - foolishly as it turned out - trying to follow a 5km trail from the house we were sitting, but got lost as the sun started to go down.

Thankfully, we came across a family riding their horses and they kindly offered to drive us most of the way back. Only then did we realise how far we had come - with Zenchai on foot and me carrying Kobra - and that the shortcut back to our 'home' would have involved scrambling through a overgrown bush trail.

As serious snakes and poisonous insects live in the region, the local lady thought better of suggesting we try this and dropped off all of us - dog included - where we could make it back safely, which we did. But, as someone once wrote, "If everything always went to plan there would be no adventures"!