Nature Trail

Introduction

Hello and we welcome your interest in the Blue Mountains in Australia.

Nature Trail is an independent family-run local tour operator centrally based in the township of Katoomba in the Blue Mountains.

We first travelled here in 1993 and decided to buy and settle in Katoomba in 2001.

Nature Trail was conceived as a tour operation venture in 2010 by its founder and tour director Steven Ridd whilst on holiday visiting his wife’s family in Northern Ireland and participating on a walking tour arranged by his wife atop Cave Hill reserve outside Belfast.

Our contact number is Tel: +61 2 4782 1300. If we are unavailable then please leave a message with your contact details and we shall phone you back as soon as possible.

This website is best viewed from a desktop computer with a monitor larger the better, just as tour bookings are best made before you depart home, at the same time that you book your accommodation. We can assist with local option for stays as well.

We focus on exploring Nature and the best places to see throughout the Blue Mountains region and adjoining regions beyond. Visitors are on holiday after all and our detailed local knowledge can allow you to experience the best of our region and beyond to suit your particular interests.

We are a small family run business operating completely independently. Our Tour Director, Steve, designs each tour, plans each trip to deliver a quality tour experience to match the preferences and capacities of each Tour Guest. Nature Trail is accountable to no franchise, but only to our Tour Guests, and we’re committed to ensuring a quality touring experience in the great outdoors.

We’ve been hiking and road touring the Blue Mountains since 1995 and we are more than happy to share this vast region’s many magnificent natural features, experiences and insights with visitors.

We offer premium bespoke (made-to-order) tours specialising in mountains hiking as well as more leisurely country road touring (guests travel in the comfort and familiarity of their own vehicles).

Our tours generally start and finish in Katoomba in the heart of the Blue Mountains and keenly extend westward into the Central Tablelands region of New South Wales.

Being centrally based in Katoomba where we live, our tours start and finish where our Tour Guests are staying anywhere in the Upper Central Blue Mountains from Wentworth Falls to Mount Victoria.

OUR SMALL GROUP SPECIALITY:

Nature Trail is a local, bespoke tour operator based in Katoomba where we live, surrounded by the Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. Each of our tours is made-to-order and private to a dedicated single group booking.

To ensure each Tour Guest can enjoy a personalised quality tour experience, we limit numbers.

Our pricing is per Tour, not per Tour Guest.

OUR SMALL GROUP HIKING TOURS:

Our bespoke Hiking Tours allow for tour guests numbering from just 1 solo individual up to a maximum of 6 Tour Guests – but only as part of the same private booked Tour Group. We do not offer ‘public’ tours.

Our hiking tours are easily-paced (say ~ 2kph with interpretative pauses), so focusing on what we see along track, rather than ‘clubber’ how fast we go and then later ask “what was that we saw”?

We focus upon interpretative commentary about what we see.

We start from just a Short-Day of 1, 2, or 3 hours, to a Half-Day to a Full-Day. It all depends upon where we go and so how reasonably long it takes.

We focus on the best of the Blue Mountains hiking experiences – magnificent vistas, waterfalls and rainforests and wilderness experiences.

Our special interest nature workshops vary from nature photography to Blue Mountains wildflowers, ecology, geology, to hiking skills, gear selection, and other Nature-based interests.

OUR SMALL GROUP TREKS:

We offer a range of both 2-Day Treks and Multi-Day Treks throughout the Blue Mountains Region exclusively to members of our Trek Alumni – who are vetted experienced and self-sufficient hikers.

Our 2-Day Treks mainly explore either the Jamison Valley or the Grose Valley within the Blue Mountains National Park, which are readily accessible from Nature Trail’s base in Katoomba.

Whereas our Multi-Day Treks venture into the more distant and remote national parks within the Blue Mountain World Heritage Area. These treks vary in duration according to the start and finish locations and the transport travel distances. They vary in duration from 3 days to 6 days.

OUR SMALL GROUP ROAD TOURS:

Regrettably due to NSW Government’s recent dictatorial regulations and costly fine threats, it has become mandatory that all our Tour Guests must drive their own vehicles as we lead our tours in our private 4WD Range Rover. We term this mode of travel ‘Tag-Along Road Touring’.

Nature Trail is not authorised to drive any tour guests in NSW due to punitive fine threats of $110,000 and more.

For added safety from tour start to finish, we loan each tour guest vehicle with a ‘walkie talkie‘ hand held UHF radio to provide audio coms between all vehicles, at no charge.

This allows our tour guests to experience a small comfortable convoy (no buses) – it’s novel and fun! Whether you use your own vehicle or to hire one specially (which we can help arrange locally) it is up to you. Tours that require a 4×4 vehicle are clearly notified at the time of booking enquiries.

Country road touring experiences (using your own vehicle), taking in a range of interests:

Blue Mountains Village Tours
Country Backroads & Heritage Tours
Art & Craft Trails
Slow Food & Growers Tours
Gardens & Nurseries Tours
Tours to Country Fairs Events
2-Day Countryside Indulgences
Multi-Day Deep Country Escapes

Our Road Tours allow for Tour Guest numbers from just 1 up to a maximum of 10, in which all our Tour Guests are required by NSW Government regulation to travel along in ‘tag-along‘ configuration seated in their own vehicle(s) following our private lead vehicle.

For all enquiries about any of our tours and about what your group would like to do, simply Contact Us