Although you can see the two most famous landmarks of Sydney really clearly from many different angles around the harbour, it's increasingly difficult to see either of them the further you move south into the CBD (Cental Business District, as City Centres are known over here...)

The Bridge gradually disappears between high-rise (and in some cases, quite low-rise) buildings...



...and the Sydney Tower, which boasts Sydney's Best Views, only manages to squeeze the Opera House in between a couple of skyscrapers...



But Mrs Macquarie had the right idea...

Mrs Macquarie was the wife of Major-General Lachlan Macquarie, Governor of New South Wales from 1810 to 1821. He has all sorts of things named after him, Lake Macquarie, Port Macquarie... even Mrs Macquarie. But she did well in Sydney with a point, a road and a chair.

The point is well visited because it has the standard postcard view of the disappearing icons...



Once you have this photo (or one like it with better, bluer skies), then your work is done and you can go home.



So it's a good job it's the last day really...

(There is a "me in front of..." shot - in fact, there are several... and a story...)

The Blue Mountains are part of the Great Dividing Range and only a couple of hours west of Sydney.

They are actually not mountains at all, but a divided plateau of sandstone. As such, the best way through them is over the plateau linking the highest points and not through valleys and gaps like in normal mountain ranges.



You can see the cliff edges and roads across the ridges really clearly.

If you try to get through these mountains by following the valleys and gaps, you just end up with sheer cliff faces in front of you and have to go back. As the orginal colonial explorers found...

Never mind, their memory lives on in some of the towns which are named after them: Wentworth Falls, Lawson, and several others which I can't remember.

Scenic World is a reasonably environmentally friendy attempt to build what is essentially a limited set of theme park rides in a World Heritage Area.

First you go across...



(The nowdays-obligatory-tourist-attraction-glass-floor...)



And the views are just spectacular...



These are the Three Sisters. They are basically sandstone eroded by the wind and rain of thousands and thousands of years but, as with everything here, there is some Aboriginal Story about how they got their name.



Then you go down...



...on the steepest inclined funicular railway in the world. So steep that the seats in the train are angled back to stop you falling out the front...

(This is a very shaky, out-of-focus shot, but that's because it was bloody scary and I as hanging on for dear life.)

And then you go back up again on some bog-standard, Swiss-built cable car, perhaps second-hand from the ski slopes...



What doesn't fill you with confidence about any of these experiences is that there is a fourth ride...



...a roller coaster which the family who owns the park built down the sheer cliff face.

You're waiting now for the story of the tragic accident which meant it was never used. Sorry, that's not coming. It was just that having commissioned, designed and built it, they realised that the annual health and safety maintenance checks would be prohibitively expensive and mothballed it. The track sits there still as some kind of Scooby Doo Ride to hell. Apparently, it was only ever used once, by the owner's daughters. Rather them than me...

...while we upgrade your highway.

The final push to Sydney!

The road gets better on the final stretch - just a couple of hours' drive and much more scenic. Views of the huge lakes and the beautiful hills you go through north of the city.

In many cases, you literally do go through them...




... there are long stretches of road where a cutting has been blasted through solid rock, leaving another wall of solid rock as the central reservation. A further cutting takes northbound traffic. It all makes for quite scary driving and is part of the upgrade work they are doing on the highway generally. Bypasses and dualling, new bridges and junctions. If I come back in five years it might be an easier drive...

But look! We made it...



...and did the iconic drive across the Harbour Bridge. Had no time to appreciate it really due to stressing about what lane we should be in, avoiding going the through the tunnel instead by accident, fumbling for the tolls and preparing for which exit to take at the other side.

(Don't worry - I was a passenger when I took the photo!)



So well done, little car! And fortunately they did take the car off our hands at Sydney, despite all the paperwork implying that we would have to take it back to Brisbane.

Past the banana.

In the words of Madonna and Justin Timberlake "We only got four minutes to save the world... (Wikki Wikki Wikki)"

In the words of the Queensland Hotels Association, "You only got four minutes to take a shower..."



This is because...



I always like to read the papers when I am on holiday (national and local; and try to get The Guardian when I can - Nancy Banks-Smith withdrawal symptoms...) In The Australian, the debate about the water shortages continue.

Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland all share what's called the Murray-Darling basin - the two main rivers which provide water to the major east coast cities. Victoria and NSW have introduced stringent irrigation regimes to prevent the water being wasted, while Queensland has not. This is pissing Victoria and NSW off as they suffer for Queensland's decision. This means there is mounting (water) pressure for control of supplies to be taken under federal control.

In the meantime, huge billboards in cities and along the roads remind you about the state of the supplies and give you advice about how to conserve water. All the water features in cities bubble and gurgle and fountain without worries, but proudly display signs telling you they operate on reclaimed water.

Anyway, that would be fine, but there is a compulsion in hotels to use all the mini shampoo and conditioner and shower gel goodies that you've paid for, which takes way longer than four minutes..!