South Coast and Southern Highlands, NSW, Australia
The next stop on my travels through New South Wales late last year was the South Coast and the Southern Highlands. These areas are best explored by car, so I booked on a private tour conducted by Korhan of Daily Sydney Tours. Korhan allows you to tailor your tour so that if there is anything outside the standard itinerary that you really want to see and it can feasibly be done in one day, Korhan will take you there. I was keen to spend some time in a couple of the towns in the Southern Highlands, so Korhan very obligingly added this in. In turn, I skipped the Buddhist temple and the wine tasting, which I was not particularly interested in.
The first stop on our tour was Wattamolla Beach in the Royal National Park:
It is a very pretty spot, where we met a number of water dragons sunning themselves on the rocks. They were not so keen to make our acquaintance and quickly scarpered when we approached.
Here are some more views of the cliffs and ocean from the Royal National Park:
We set off again, and our next stop was at Bald Hill for magnificent scenic views of the New South Wales coastline and the Sea Cliff Bridge:
This was also the morning "comfort stop" for coffee and amenities. From Bald Hill, we drove to a stop on the Sea Cliff Bridge so that we could enjoy the view, including a few whales waving their fins:
From there, we drove on to the Kiama Blowhole, and stood waiting patiently for the Blowhole to do its thing (which it obligingly did after about 10 minutes):
After that, we had a few minutes for another comfort stop and to admire the scenery surrounding the Kiama Lighthouse:
Korhan then took us up to the Saddleback Mountain Lookout at Kiama for some scenic photo opportunities:
At my request, our next stop was the quaint country town of Berry in the Southern Highlands, where we stopped for lunch:
There are many historic buildings in Berry, and the main street is short enough that you can easily walk from one end to the other in around 20 minutes, even at a gentle stroll:
After the lunch break in Berry, we drove on to the densely forested Kangaroo Valley and our next stop, the historic Hampden Bridge spanning the Kangaroo River:
On the day of our visit, there was a team of workers painting the bridge. Its claim to fame is that it is one of the few remaining suspension bridges in Australia.
The Pioneer Village Museum is across the road from the bridge, but the thing that captured my attention was the "Wombats Crossing" sign (which is not a common thing to see):
Our next stop was Fitzroy Falls, with magnificent views of the Kangaroo Valley:
Our last stop of the day was also at my request at Bowral, one of the larger towns in the Southern Highlands. Due to limited time, our sole destination in Bowral was the Bradman Museum and International Cricket Hall of Fame. Here is the old fashioned cricket ground beside the museum:
There is a bronze statue of Sir Donald Bradman (a famous Australian cricket player) at the entrance to the museum:
Highlights inside the museum ($20 admission fee) include one of Richie Benaud's jackets from his cricket reporting career with Channel 9:
and for me, growing up with a cricket loving mother, the early one day World Series Cricket uniforms:
Korhan dropped me back to my hotel in CBD Sydney at around 5pm. It was an action packed day full of firsts for me, and Korhan made it very easy to get to the South Coast and Southern Highlands and provided knowledgeable commentary about the areas we visited. I highly recommend Daily Sydney Tours, who also conduct tours in other regions surrounding Sydney (see their website at the link below for details).
50 Gordon Crescent
Lane Cove, NSW
Ph: +61 449140301
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