(A) Brief Background: On Monday 25th March 2024, the historic 1930s ‘Prince Henry Cliff Walk‘ track, after being mostly repaired, upgraded, extended in a joint tourism infrastructure project by NPWS (Parks Service) and BMCC Blue Mountains {city} Council over about four years, was officially and publicly launched. But the red ribbon was publicly ceremoniously cut before this trail was finished. […]
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This 19+km trek is officially promoted equivalent to a proverbial ‘walk in the park’ as being do-able in just 2-days… like ‘easy peasy’? Yet, from our on-ground hiking experience of this trail, it seriously is anything but! The Parks Service’s (NPWS) March 2024 public opening launch of its new concept ‘Grand Cliff Top Walk‘ in the Australian Blue Mountains, was […]
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In the Australian Blue Mountains, during the cooler months of June and July 2025, Nature Trail’s Tour Director, Steve Ridd, has decided to undertake a series of segmented practice reconnoitre trips (‘recces’) of the recently and mostly upgraded and renamed amalgamated hiking tracks branded the ‘Grand Cliff Top Walk‘. This track is situated in the central upper Blue Mountains Region, […]
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This Trail Segment 1: Specifications: This Nature Trail Tour Title: Grand Cliff Top Walk Trek NT Tour Code: MT-GCT/1 NT Tour Code Description: Multi-Day Trek Tour Category Tailored Trail Official Opening Date: Monday 25th March 2024 Tour Current Status: Scouted> Recce > Practised > Commercial Trail partial closure, with roadway detour Nature Trail Version: Grand Cliff Top Walk – Original […]
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(Content TBA) This lead feature image is our snippet photo of an Australian native Broadleafed Geebung (botanical name is Persoonia Levis). This particular trail segment of the 2024 ‘Grand Cliff Top Walk’ is situated in an sunny exposed escarpment heath open woodland natural environment. This flaky paperbark type rich red coloured bark is of the inner peel layers within […]
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Nature Trail has specially selected this trail segment of the 2024 Grand Cliff Top Walk trail because it is has a relatively medium grade hike (yet with still many staircases up and down) which may be undertaken in a manageable half-day duration, yet by only hiking-fit adults and teenagers, but not sensibly for infants/toddlers nor anyone disabled. This trail segment […]
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On Friday morning 4th July 2025, Friends of Nature Trail chose our recce of this particular segment of the Grand Cliff Top Walk from west of Leura Cascades Picnic Reserve to Echo Point Lookout. This is because currently Leura Cascades Picnic Reserve is closed for council upgrade, plus a recent landslip on Round Track has close the track route as […]
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(A) Brief Background: On Thursday 31 July 2025, Nature Trail managed to reconnoitre the 2024 ‘Grand Cliff Top Walk’ trail version which we have decided to label as ‘SEGMENT 6: Echo Point Lookout to Katoomba Falls. We have hiked this track many times over the years, being so close to home. However, this recent trail infrastructure upgrade project deserved our […]
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(A) Brief Background Let the truth be known, the ORIGINAL ‘Grand Cliff Top Walk‘ as proposed in the 1980s was to construct a hiking track to extend from the original Weatherboard Hut (from 1814) site all the way to the Explorers’ Marked Tree (from 1813) – to create an epic 30+ km amalgamation mega trail concept to link up old […]
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Since Wednesday 9th November 2022, Wolgan Road has been closed due to heavy rainfall along the road pass below the Wolgan Valley Lookout, causing a number of landslips making the main road access in and out of Wolgan Valley impassable. That was more than two months ago. The Wolgan Valley is situated just about 30km north of the western Blue […]
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At Nature Trail, we happened to be holidaying in New Zealand’s South Island at the time of this latest terrible Blue Mountains tragedy. Photo of our Milford Sound cruise above (Click image to enlarge plasma screen view) We chose and recommend Mitre Peak Cruises for safety first, quality in every way, being local and very personable. Visit: ^https://www.mitrepeak.com/) So, we only […]
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Bushfire disaster destroying the Blue Mountains World heritage ecology by government neglect then decreeing a blanket shut down of all visitation was just the start from 10th November 2019. It was the worst carbon particulate pollution event in New South Wales history, perhaps for millennia. This was immediately followed the China coronavirus global pandemic and the abject failures of […]
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Leading Blue Mountains environmentalist Keith Muir has called the shutdown of the Blue Mountains National Park a gross “overreaction” by the Parks Service, akin to closing all beaches along the 2000km New South Wales coastline after a fatal shark attack such as at Little Bay on 16th February 2022. That didn’t happen. NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) management […]
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Tragically again, two more people have been killed by a landslip in the Jamison Valley just south of the village of Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains. Yesterday, Monday 4th April 2022, a group of tourists (a family of five from Britain) embarked on an unguided day hike along the Wentworth Pass loop track. They likely followed the UK-based website […]
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We are perplexed by the thrill-seeking desire of certain bushwalking clubs to promote dangerous chasm “exposure“. Bushwalking is on-track bushwalking. Then again adventurous bushwalking clubs beg to differ, insisting that bushwalking can do whatever they want and go wherever they choose – bush-bashing through sensitive ecology, vertical rock scrambling, canyoning, lilo canyoning, rock climbing. But are such heightened hazardous activities […]
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The harbinger to a year of calamity started at 10.17pm on Wednesday 7th August 2019 when a 1.9 magnitude quake struck Katoomba. Many of the reports came from Katoomba and Leura but there were others from nearby Wentworth Falls and Hazelbrook. The tremor brought back local memories of previous quakes. The last one in the Blue Mountains Region was on […]
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Here we go again… Bushfires lockdown the entire Blue Mountains The widespread bushfire ‘mega-blaze‘ disaster of Christmas 2019 that was mishandled and allowed to rage and spread over two months, ended up destroying 80 percent of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area as well as many other natural regions of New South Wales. Dubbed by our sister conservation entity […]
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Tragically, just before midday smoko on Wednesday 29th November 2017, three contractors with the NSW NPWS (Parks Service) were suddenly struck by a boulder fall from some 10 metres above them. They were repairing a cliff section along the historic National Pass in the Blue Mountains National Park at Wentworth Falls. These were the boulders. At the time of the […]
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