Greater Blue Mountains Area

Eucalypts rule the Greater Blue Mountains in remarkable variety: 91 taxa grow across a million hectares of sandstone plateaux, cliffs and forested gorges west of Sydney, and the haze of their oils lends the ranges their blue cast. In 1994 a hidden canyon here yielded the Wollemi pine, a conifer previously known only from fossils. Eight reserves, together holding a tenth of Australia's vascular flora, make up the World Heritage Site UNESCO inscribed in 2000.