Sydney in summer is like hanging out with a pubescent teenager on mood swings. There are the weeks of radiant sunshine, full of lively activity from sunrise until deep into the night. Smiles everywhere, bright eyes and invigorating happiness, instantaneously contagious. The never-ending white noise of chatter in a million different languages, excited or relaxed, but never fearful. Life is good. Life is full of tanning on beaches, swimming, surfing, playing volleyball. Full of watching cricket, trying new restaurants and cocktail bars. Full of camping and hiking and feeling close to nature. The trains are full at every hour, the city awake 24/7. Hangovers are for adults; sleep for when you’re old. It is hot and humid, sweat is everywhere, sunblock a must and clothing optional. Though not for long. At the highest point of this paradisical oblivion, humidity levels turn critical, the sky from baby-blue to granny-white and the energy levels drop sub-zero. Winds and rains and storms and thunder and lighting put an end to everything good. Or so it seems. The mood becomes dangerously close to depression. It is cold and dark and home is the place to be. No motivation, no excitement, no hope. This is the time when the blue mountains live up to their name. After a few days of heat, the oils of the trees in the Eucalyptus forest become volatile and mixing with the water droplets of the first rains reflect mainly blue light, or so that chatty old lady at the start of the Grand Canyon trail insists. Not as dramatic in view but more so in experience as its American namesake. From the top it looks like an ocean of green and blue, stretching as far as the eye reaches in all directions. In the distance the shimmering surface of a valley-stream is the only indicator that this is just the top, the impenetrable canopy, of a gigantic forest. Below it the world has suddenly contours again. Shapes, colours, scents and sounds. Under the protection of the majestic Gum-trees countless populations of other species thrive and amaze. Tree ferns outline a maze of creeks and streams carrying brisk mountain water over rapids and small waterfalls, through rocks and at the bottom of narrow canyons, always accumulating more, coming from all directions, splitting up merging again, an orchestra of rushing, dripping, flowing, falling and splashing waters. Down there the sky is green and brown, a mixture of leaves and branches, neither the sky nor the sun visible. But noticeable. When it comes up, all the water covered surfaces suddenly glow in the light and warmth spreads in glittering clouds of water droplets into all the dark corners and cold niches. Birds become more active, difficult to see but oh so easy to hear. Their humming and calls create the melody that accompanies this hike. Simply beautiful.