The Blue Mountains National Park is a protected national park that is located in the Blue Mountains region of New South Wales, in eastern Australia. The national park is situated approximately west of the Sydney CBD, and the park boundary is quite irregular as it is broken up by roads, urban areas and areas of private property.

The national park is one of the eight protected areas that, in 2000, was inscribed to form part of the UNESCO World Heritagelisted Greater Blue Mountains Area. The Greater Blue Mountains was one of 15 World Heritage places included in the National Heritage List on 21 May 2007. The Blue Mountains National Park is the most central of the eight protected areas within the World Heritage Site and it forms part of the Great Dividing Range. The park is also listed on the Australian Heritage Register and the overall complex of Blue Mountains regional walking tracks is listed on the State Heritage Register.

History

thumb|The Blue Mountains National Park, shaded in red, as part of the larger [[Greater Blue Mountains Area|Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.]]

The genesis of the national park was a proposal by early conservationist Myles Dunphy for a Greater Blue Mountains National Park in 1932. This included large areas of what are today the Blue Mountains National Park, and the Wollemi, Kanangra-Boyd, Nattai, Gardens of Stone, and Thirlmere Lakes, along with other smaller nature reserves; all managed by the NSW National Parks & Wildlife Service. In September 1959 the Blue Mountains National Park was gazetted covering . In 2000 it was included as part of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. In 1999, 37 walking tracks were added to the State Heritage Register, extending from and the Nepean River in the east; to Mount Tomah in the north; to Wolgan Valley and in the northwest; to Jenolan Caves and in the west; and in the south, numerous walks leading down the plateau from Katoomba, Leura and Wentworth Falls. More recently, volcanic flows covered large areas of the mountains in basalt. These have largely worn away, leaving only occasional outcrops on the high peaks.

Biodiversity

The park contains a small range of eucalypt species across a variety of habitats including wet and dry Sclerophyll, Mallee, swamps, wetlands and grasslands. Some species are of significance to our understanding of plant evolution including the Wollemi Pine, of which fewer than 100 trees are known. Notable plant families include Myrtaceae, Fabaceae and Proteaceae including 114 endemic and 177 threatened species.

This range of habitats supports a rich variety of fauna, including a third of Australia's bird species, and numerous mammals, reptiles and frogs. Notable endangered and endemic species include the regent honeyeater, Broad-headed snake and the Blue Mountains water skink.

Tourism

thumb|upright|[[Govetts Leap Falls|Bridal Veil Falls, at Govetts Leap, .]]

thumb|Mountain ranges at Three Sisters Walk Lookout.

The Blue Mountains National Park is the most visited National Park in NSW with more than half of domestic visitors originating from Sydney and one of the easiest locations to spot wild kangaroos in Sydney. The majority of tourists to the Blue Mountains see the national park from one of the many lookouts between Wentworth Falls and Blackheath, and many of these never actually set foot in the park. Activities for the visitor include short walks to lookouts above cliffs and waterfalls, overnight and longer walks to more remote areas of the park and more extreme sports such as canyoning, abseiling, rock climbing and mountain biking. A number of sightseeing and adventure tour companies can assist visitors in safely experiencing these activities. the Katoomba Scenic Railway.

The national park is renowned for the Three Sisters rock formation. Both north and south of Blackheath, the cliffs are the most spectacular as the rock faces are several hundreds metres tall.

Southern Blue Mountains

The Blue Labyrinth is a forested eroded plateau directly south of the Great Western Highway, stretching from Wentworth Falls to Glenbrook, stretching from Kings Tableland in the west to Warragamba Dam and the Nepean River in the east, and the Burragorang Valley to the south.

The national park extends south as far as the Wollondilly River, west of Mittagong, New South Wales. This area was greatly affected by the construction of Warragamba Dam from 1948 to 1960. This required the flooding of the Burragorang Valley, which created Lake Burragorang and in the process cut the southern part of the Blue Mountains off from areas to the east, for example Camden, Picton and Bargo. Properties and homesteads in the southern part of the mountains were forced to close down, leaving many derelict homes and ruins. These included Bran Jan House and Kowmung House on Scotts Main Range, as well as Twin Peaks, south of Yerranderie.

An exclusion zone of approximately three kilometres was created around Lake Burragorang to protect Sydney's water supply, but a through-track was allowed from Yerranderie to Balloon Pass, then further east, for the benefit of bushwalkers. This pass was later incorporated into the long-distance Katoomba to Mittagong Trail.

See also

  • Blue Mountains (New South Wales)
  • Protected areas of New South Wales
  • Katoomba Scenic World

References

Notes

Citations

  • Aerial video footage of the Blue Mountains National Park (NSW, Australia) around the Jamison Valley
  • Activities and Attractions in the Blue Mountains