A weekend away in the Blue Mountains staying at the Fairmont - now an Accor MGalley hotel.
We left Sydney on Friday February 17 and returned Monday February 20. The forecast was not the best but it turned out much better than expected.
Friday Feb 17
No rushing around required - we got up and packed and left around 9:45am for the 2 hour drive to the Fairmount. We stopped at the Conservation Hut at Wentworth Falls. We planned to do a 1-hour walk before having lunch at the Hut around 1pm. Alas after about 15 minutes the clouds moved in and a thunderstorm seemed to be approaching. So we turned around and had lunch a bit earlier than planned - it was a good decision as while we were waiting for our our lunch the rain started. After lunch we headed over to the Fairmont, a short drive away and checked in. We spend a bit of a lazy arvo as the rain came and went.
As planned we had dinner at the fine dining restaurant, Eucalipt It was pretty good particularly since we got 50% off the food with our Accor Plus card.
Saturday Feb 18
We got up in time for our planned early brekkie at 8am so we could get a serious hike in while the weather was still good - a fine morning predicted with showers in the afternoon. As it came to pass it was fine and warm (high 20’s) all day. We did big hike (2.5 hours) from the Fairmont to the Conservation Hut via Empress Falls and return. Many steps involved - Dieter did just great - he even got a medal !!! We had a light lunch back at the hotel and pretty much dagged about in the afternoon. We did drive into Leura for a walk around and boutique crawl. We had dinner again at Eucalipt - again pretty good but the main courses were not particularly hot.
Sunday Feb 18
Again the day turned out much better-wise than forecast. After breakfast we drove to the Leura Cascades walk and did a medium grade walk for 1.5 hours. We then went into Leura and had a light lunch at Bon Ton - one of our old favourites. We then drove around with the roof down on a beautiful afternoon - sunny but not hot - low 20’s. We did the Leura Cascades walk + part of the way to Echo Point - about 1.5 hours. Enough after our mega walk the previous day.
We had lunch at Bon Ton - an old favourite then headed back to the hotel - resting, showering, reading and so on. We had dinner in the hotel’s Bistro (the only restaurant open) - we both a rib eye steak - it was excellent but very filling then it was off to bed early.
Monday Feb 18
It was another amazing day - sunny with a temperature range of 6 - 21C. After breakfast we packed up then went to the scenic railway and walked down the million or so very steep steps (aka Furber steps) - there’s now a 2k board walk at the bottom of the railway - very nice. I opted to take the train up while Dieter walked in an amazing 30 minutes.
We went back to Bon Ton for lunch then drove home.