A week away

We arrived safely around 9pm last night after a week in the Blue Mountains at this conference.  (Interesting side note; Jesse explained that the "Blue Mountains" are called such as a result of the blue hue given off by the eucalyptus trees certain times of year.)  The point of the conference is to train youth leaders.  It was exciting to be able to attend; there were 4 of us from church, and the church rallied to support us financially and in prayer to make it happen.  That alone was encouraging.

We each gained some practical tips throughout the conference.  Workshops on packaging a youth talk and serving in a small youth group were particularly useful, and working through an Old Testament Bible Study in a small group for a few hours each day was enlightening and challenging in some ways.  We were exposed to some more reformed concepts of theology, which we're still chewing on and have proved catalysts for us to discuss and refine our own thoughts on the various issues.

Jesse and I thoroughly enjoyed the evening speaker, who preached soundly the first night (text: Gen. 1) that Christians need not be afraid of science, and in fact, those with scientific interests should explore them to the fullest.  His strong position that the Genesis account is meant to be poetry, with emphasis that God created, and that God set up a rhythm in doing so, was a refreshing perspective in light of what I've heard from 'Creationist' speakers in the past.

We enjoyed getting to know some new friends, and catching up with a couple Jesse had met on Iona.  We visited Echo Point, which overlooks the Three Sisters rock formation and the beauty of the Jamison Valley.  A few at the conference had encouraged participants to head out that way early in the morning.  While we never made it, the other 2 from our church hiked out to watch the sunrise over the valley one morning (from another lookout), and reported it had been breathtaking.

The conference finished midday yesterday (Friday), so the four of us did the tourist thing.  We went to Scenic World, where we rode the world's steepest train (450 meters of track, 250 meter drop, or something) down into the valley, walked around, visited a few exhibits on the coal mining that had occurred around the early 1900's (sidenote 2 - I've now explored, or at least viewed from the outside, caves/mines on 3 continents: Mammoth in KY, that one we went to in Wales [does anyone remember its name?] and now this one in Katoomba), examined the flora of the area, saw the biggest termite mound I've seen yet, around my own height, then returned to the top via cablecar.  We also took another cablecar-type contraption with a glass bottom (the glass bottom was only in the middle, though, not all over like the London Eye) across the valley to another cliff point and back; it was cool to have a view of the Katoomba Falls (think Bridal Veil Falls, but with 2 streams of water, and 2 main platforms) from above.  We grabbed dinner at a local cafe (Jesse had a kangaroo burger) before hitting the road for Maitland.

I have yet to see a wild kangaroo.  I saw a few more kookaburras and a white cockatoo (heartily pecking at and killing a tree), but no new Aussie animals for me.

Now, it's off to breakfast, as we purposely left very little food in the house for the week.