Question on Driving from Sydney to Blue Mts
 

We will be flying in and out of Sydney on our 6 week trip to Australia. We arrive in Sydney at 7:30 am. We are arriving from Hong Kong where we will have spent 5 days. I was thinking that we could pick up our rental car at the airport or in town and drive to the Blue Mts where we could stay for a few days before taking off. We will spend time in Sydney at the end of our trip. Does ths make sense? Thanks!

If you are coming from Hong Kong to Sydney and arriving at 7:30 am, you are on an overnight flight where I imagine you may not get much sleep. Also, are you familiar with driving on the left or is it all-new or relatively-new to you?

If I were making this flight, I would not attempt driving to the Blue Mountains right away since I don't sleep well on planes and it has been several years since I drove on the left. On the other hand, my spouse, who does sleep well on planes and is well-versed in driving on the left would probably do fine.

Forgot to include we're in biz class so should be able to sleep.

It's only a couple of hours from Sydney to the main city of the Blue Mountains that is Katoomba so if you get some sleep you should be OK.

If you are getting a car at the airport, don't feel the need to hurry, as "rush hour" in Sydney lasts until about 11am and you are just going to be stuck in traffic for the first 30 minutes of your drive anyway. You will be going against the traffic flow as you are outbound so it will be slightly less.

Your journey from the airport will most likely take you on the M5 motorway which has tolls so get an e-tag for the car. Around the airport the M5 if probably most the congested bit of road in the city

Once you break through the suburbs of Sydney, it should be smooth sailing on motorways all the way to Katoomba or wherever you are going.

Are you familiar with using a GPS? I would thoroughly recommend one for getting out of Sydney (and other driving) - even though I lived there most of my life, driving from the airport is tricky even for the initiated!

At least at that hour you would be travelling against the main flow of commuter traffic. Di

Thanks! This is helpful. Yes, I use the gps on my iPad when traveling.

You could also consider taking the train to Katoomba and renting a car there if you wanted to do some exploring. It is relatively inexpensive and convenient.
Are you accustomed to roundabouts? they can be confusing especially if you are driving on the side on the ‘opposite’ side of the road.

Doing by train is a great idea. Lots of roundabouts, we are used to them, but not driving on the opposite side from our driving.

If you do the train, there is a hop-on hop-off bus that does Katoomba and Leura. We found the drivers friendly and able to offer some interesting commentary. We found Katoomba interesting but a little ‘down at heel’, both in the BnB we stayed at and downtown, Leura looked nice when we rode through on the bus.

What time of year are you going? A good place to relax for 3 nights or so. It can be chilly.

We arrive on 31january and will be in AU for 6 weeks.

<<Doing by train is a great idea. Lots of roundabouts, we are used to them, but not driving on the opposite side from our driving.>>

Doing by train takes well more than 2 hours to get to Katoomba (plus a transfer, there's no direct line from the airport) but just about 1.5 with a car.