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PAWS
Newsletter for Parks and Wildlife Supporters
Issue 14 Autumn 2007
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    Blue Mountains National Park    
     
   
Photo FNPW
The Three Sisters, Katoomba, with Mt Solitary in the background

The Blue Mountains World Heritage area is famous for its breathtaking views, steep cliff faces, untouched valleys and swamps. Thousands of international visitors experience the unique eco-system of the Blue Mountains with its native plant and animal communities.

The Greater Blue Mountains Area covers 1.03 million hectares on a sandstone plateau 60 to 180 kilometres inland from central Sydney and includes vast expanses of wilderness.

 
   
   
 

A network of over 140 kilometres of walking tracks for all levels of fitness makes the Blue Mountains a bushwalkers paradise. Canoeing, canyoning and rock climbing are exhilarating yet gentle ways to explore the wilderness of the mountains.

Discovering our national parks is easy and safe thanks to walking tracks and interpretive signage. Some of the best Foundation-funded track projects are located in the Blue Mountains.

The Fairfax Heritage Track allows disabled access to the stunning views of the Grose Valley while signage at several track-heads around the Grose Valley and along the trail from Ruined Castle to Mount Solitary keeps walkers safely on track.

Walkers in the Blue Mountains reading a track sign at the Grose Valley
   
   

To preserve our parks and wildlife we need to understand how nature works.

The Foundation funded Eco Ranger, an innovative environmental education program, that teaches students the fascinating secrets of our eco systems right on the spot, in the bush.

The children aged 12 to 14 use specialist equipment to survey and map small areas of the bush, identify plants and animals, measure acidity and temperature of the soil and present their findings to their classmates.

 

 

Red Hands Cave protects a gallery of Aboriginal hand prints and stencils that date back 500 to 1600 years. The site was discovered in 1913 by a local party looking for a lost child.

The local Daruk people created the prints and stencils using naturally occurring red ochres from Campfire Creek beside the cave. Along the surrounding walking tracks grinding grooves for sharpening stone axes are still visible today.

Since its discovery Red Hands Cave has been exposed to vandalism. By 1934 the cave was ruined by vandalism of visitors writing their initials with charcoal over the original drawings.

Today, thanks to funding by the Foundation for National Parks & Wildlife, the cave is heavily protected through a cage with a Perspex viewing window to shield this irreplaceable part of Australia's cultural heritage from damage.

Photo Jacqui Hickson
Red Hands Cave and stencils

Photo Jacqui Hickson

Large sections of the Blue Mountains World Heritage area were severely burnt in the 2001 bush-fires. Wildlife that had not been killed in the blaze was struggling to find food in the burnt forests.

The Foundation came to the aid of plants and animals with an emergency bush-fire appeal that raised urgently needed funds for bush-regeneration. With this money rangers kept weeds at bay and restored the damaged habitat.

A significant land donation from Integral Energy to the Foundation helped consolidate the Blue Mountains National Park.

The land, immediately south of Katoomba airfield, contains significant bushland as well as a section of the historic Bruce’s Walk from Blackheath to Lawson.

You can help us provide better information to visitors to the Blue Mountains by upgrading the Govett’s Leap Visitor Centre.

To make a donation, simply give us a call on 02 9221 1949 or click here to donate online. Thank you!

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