A Day at Mount Wilson - New South Wales - Australia

Mount Wilson is a charming heritage village, completely surrounded by the Blue Mountains National park and renowned for its magnificent English styled gardens and tree-lined streets. A visit to Mount Wilson had been there on the cards for a while and when we heard an Antarctic blob is going to hit parts of New South Wales and bring snow flurries to the Blue Mountains Region, we made an impulse decision to visit Mount Wilson.

For a village that is only 2 hours west of Sydney, Mount Wilson seems worlds away from Sydney or any other part of the Blue Mountains. Nothing much seems to have changed from the time of the original settlement. 

The lavish gardens of Mount Wilson open seasonally to the public for a small fee. Out of the many, we decided to visit one of the original gardens, Bebeah Gardens, 12 acres of beautifully maintained private garden estate.

Bebeah Gardens - White Gravel Pathways

Beautiful Lake is the centrepiece of the Bebeah Gardens

Bebeah Gardens - Daffodils in Full Bloom

After enjoying the Bebeah Gardens, we headed off to the Waterfall Reserve and followed the Waterfall track, a short, medium-grade delightful walk through the rainforest. We had the track to ourselves.


Waterfall Track - Medium Grade Walk with Some Steps

Waterfall Track - A Relatively Easy Section

Waterfall Creek - Lower Falls

Waterfall Creek - Bigger Falls
Weather was quite cold and there were few light snow showers during the day.
Snow Flurries - The Avenue
Next stop was the Cathedral Reserve Picnic Area, a popular camping ground in Mount Wilson. To our surprise, there were many campers in tents and camper vans and this is where we saw the most amount of human activity for the day. Mount Wilson only accounted for 99 residents in the 2006 census and most we saw of the residents was a handful who were walking their dogs. Mount Wilson is a place where visitors are more active in the village than the residents.

Cathedral Reserve

Cathedral of Ferns is a short walk that starts from the edge of the picnic area and curves through lovely fern undergrowth and leads to a giant Eucalyptus tree. The tree has been hit by lightning and only the trunk is remaining now.


The Giant Tree

Mount Wilson Village Walk is an easy walk that covers many points of interest in the village. As we were running out of time, instead of walking we drove around the village passing the Old School, Old Teacher's Cottage, Village Hall, St George's Church, Founders Corner, Old Post Office, and the Turkish Bath Museum.

 

Old Teacher's Cottage and the School

Then we drove to the De Faurs Rocks Lookout to absorb the views of the Wollangambe Canyon. While the views were still spectacular, we saw the devastating effects and the extent of the 2019/20 summer bushfires. 

We were interested to try Chinaman's Hat and Pheasants Cave track which starts from the De Faurs Rocks Lookout. However, though the track was visible, there was no signage to be seen. Bushfire damages were quite apparent in the vicinity and maybe the signage was yet another victim. As it was getting dark and there was no other soul to be seen and mobile reception was poor, we decided to give the walk a miss and call it a day.

De Faurs Rocks Lookout

Views Of Chinaman's Hat from De Faurs Lookout

We enjoyed the tranquillity and the remoteness of Mount Wilson, which also means Mount Wison does not have any shops, cafes, ATMs or any other facilities for visitors except it has few toilet blocks around the village, barbeque facilities at the Cathedral reserve and picnic areas. Mobile phone reception can have issues in some parts of the village. So if you decide to visit Mount Wilson, make sure you are prepared and have water and pack a picnic for the day.

Mount Wilson is a magical place to visit during any time of the year. However, the best times to visit Mount Wilson is said to be the Autumn and Spring. In Autumn, the tree-lined streets filled with all sorts of deciduous Europen trees turn to red, orange, yellow and brown hues.

Though the day was different from our usual lengthy and challenging hikes, we thoroughly enjoyed our visit to this remote corner of the Blue Mountains.

Below video captures the summary of our day.

Comments

Nelunika said…
Beautifully captured Sujee! Definitely a place I would like to visit.
29 August 2020 at 21:30
sujee said…
Thanks Nelu. Check their community web site and visit when the Gardens are open to the public. Autumn would be a great time to visit.
30 August 2020 at 04:24
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