Sunrise and Wallabys.

So earlier this week, I journeyed 3 hours into the Blue Mountains to visit a couple of schools. I left my hotel/apartment at 4:30am.

4:30 am you say?! That's ridiculous! Well, yeah, a little. But with the jetlag, it didn't feel ridiculous. It was 2:30pm Boston time. But I made a discovery on my drive.

The sunrise is the perfect time to discover a place.

I drove into the mountains at the sun was rising. The air was pink. The mountains were purple and blue. There was a mist all around settling into the valley. I pulled over on the side of the road to take it all in, and a heard of wild kangaroos bounced out of the fog and into the woods. It was one of the most unbelievable things I have ever seen. I was more than happy to be up before sunrise.

On the way home from the mountains that afternoon, I stopped at the Jenolan Caves. They weren't too far off of the Great Western Highway. I hiked through the caverns, through the Nettle Cave and the Devil's Carriage out to the woods on the other side. While walking along the trail, I saw a little hopper out of the corner of my eye. I stopped and looked for a moment, and snapped a photo. I thought it was a wallaby, or a kangaroo. He looked like this:

I hiked on, past the river and a pond.

Yeah, the water was really that blue.

On the way back to my car, I stopped by the ranger station to show them my picture of the hopper, to ask what it was. They got excited. It was the rarest type of Wallaby. They asked me to email it to them. I felt pretty cool, to say the least. Australia is a magical place.