Oberon,
Australia
Monday, March 20, 2006
We left Melbourne early. our 1st stop would be the Blue Mountains which are 2 hours outside Sydney. We were really looking forward to it. The Blue Mountains get their name from the vapour the ecaliptus trees release mixed with the mountain mist creating a blue haze over the mountains. We made our way through early morning Melbourne traffic to the Hume Highway. From here it was 889km to Sydney so we hit the road. It was straight roads all the way to Goldburn then we had to turn off onto the dirt roads to get to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. By this time it was dark and all the Aussie animals came out to play. The last 2 hours of the drive were awful as we skidded around families of wombats and swerved the roos. We pulled into the next town called Oberon. We couldn't pitch the tent in the dark so we left the headlights on until we got sorted. Bad mistake! We totally under estimated the power of the Telstar's battery. It was only when we woke up the next morning that we realised what shape it was in!
After a jump start we headed further up into the mountains to Katoomba. We planned to stay here for a few nights but the weather was so bad we couldn't even get out of the car. We decided to forget about the Blue Mountains and just head for Sydney. Not a great start to the road trip eh?
