Since I really wanted to see the blowhole in action we drove back to the blowhole in the morning but it was equally pathetic as the day before. So we headed off and drove to the Illawarra tree top walk. It is a new skywalk in the temperate rainforest of the Southern Highlands. The road which led to it warned that no vehicle over 10 meters should drive on the road. We didn’t know how long we were but I “measured” it with our electrical chord and decided that we were only 9 meters long. We decided it’s a go and Hendrik drove up the mountain as the path got narrower and narrower. At the most sharp, steep bend we had a car behind us and one going the other way towards us so I just held my breath and prayed that we wouldn’t stall because the engine was making gurgling sounds as if it was going to crap out at any second. I don’t know how the engine managed to pull up through the bend, but it did. That was the hardest part of the road and we made it to the treetop walk.

View from the treetop walk

The treetop walk was new and the tracks from the construction of the structure were still very visible so we thought it was pretty ironic that they had signs everywhere saying how they preserve the nature considering they had to rip the nature out. It was nice but it wasn’t worth the money they charged.

We planed to get to Canberra today and had to continue driving. On the way we drove through Gouldburn and saw the big merino which is a type of sheep regarded as having the finest and softest wool. Personally, I thought this was the most impressive big thing we had seen.

big merino

The scenery on the way was beautiful and at one point we drove along this huge valley with sheep and cows grazing in it. We pulled over at the lookout and a sign said it was Lake George. I thought it was funny to see sheep grazing on a lake but apparently it empties and fills on a cyclical basis. It was a very impressive sight, probably more so than it if was filled with water.

Lake George

We found a campsite near Canberra but did not go into the city because it was already evening so we just had a relaxing night.

We went to the Buddhist temple near Wollongong the next morning which was pretty and the workers were enthusiastic to talk to us and explain all there is to know about the temple. We ate lunch in their restaurant which I enjoyed especially since it was vegetarian.

Then we headed a bit further south to Kiama. We weren’t planning on spending too much time there but Kiama was adorable, so we spent the night there. It was a cute little town with pretty nature around it, the most touristy being the blowhole. A blowhole is a hole in the rocks by the sea that when the waves crash water blows through the hole creating the impression of a blowhole. We went to see it, but it wasn’t spraying too high, which I was disappointed in. At most it sprayed about 5 feet. We went to the information centre where all the brochures showed the water from the blowhole towering over people’s heads. I asked the lady in charge how often the blow hole looked like that. She said, “Almost every day, it’s been a while since I’ve seen it like this.” Great. There were two blowholes in Kiama and the second one was smaller and we went to see it as well with equal success.