January 17^th 1836

‘In the middle of the day we baited our horses at a little Inn, called the Weather-board. The country here is elevated 2800 feet above the sea. About a mile & a half from this place there is a view exceedingly well worth visiting; following down a little valley & its tiny rill of water, an immense gulf is suddenly & without any preparation seen through the trees which border the pathway at the depth of perhaps 1500 ft. Walking a few yards farther, one stands on the brink of a vast precipice, & below is the grand bay or gulf, for I know not what other name to give it, thickly covered with forest.’

The quotation above is a part of Charles Darwin's diary entry on January 17th 1836. The place where he 'baited' his horse, the little inn called the Weather-board, is where Wentworth Falls is located today. And the walk he did, or a close approximation of it, is now called Charles Darwin's Walk.

It is really an easy stroll by the usual standard of Blue Mountains tracks - very little up and down - and is currently being reconstructed with new bridges and stairs. Today, Ann and I went as far as construction allowed us to and we will save the rest for another day. The portion that we did (perhaps half) was well worth it, somewhat more than the 'little valley and...tiny rill of water' though nothing compared to what we would have encountered at the cliff face ahead.