Leura, Australia

Well-heeled Leura, packed with cafés and antiques stores, is a scenic spot with views across the Jamison Valley to the imposing plateau that is Mount Solitary. The main shopping strip, Leura Mall, has a wide grassy area lined with cherry trees and makes a popular picnicking spot. In fact, Leura is renowned for its beautiful gardens, and nine are open to the public during the Leura Gardens Festival (early to mid-Oct; $5 per garden, or $18 all gardens; Web: www.leuragardensfestival.com.au ). Open all year round, though, is the beautiful National Trust-listed Everglades Gardens (daily 10am–5pm; $7) at 37 Everglades Ave, 2km southeast of the Mall. There are wonderful Jamison Valley views from its formal terraces, a colourful display of azaleas and rhododendrons, an arboretum, and a simple tearoom. Just over 1km south of the Mall is the Gordon Falls picnic area on Lone Pine Avenue, where Leura's mansions and gardens give way to the bush of the Blue Mountains National Park; it's an easy ten-minute return walk to the lookout over the falls, or there's a canyon walk (2hr return; medium difficulty) via Lyre Bird Dell and the Pool of Siloam, which takes in some of the Blue Mountains' distinctive hanging swamps, an Aboriginal rock shelter and cooling rainforest. From Gordon Falls, a 45-minute bushwalk part-way along the Prince Henry Cliff Walk heads to Leura Cascades picnic area off Cliff Drive (the scenic route around the cliffs that extends from Leura to beyond Katoomba) where there are several bushwalks, including a two- to three-hour circuit walk to the base of the cascading Bridal Veil Falls (not to be confused with Bridal Veil Falls on the north side of Leura at Grose Valley). To the east of Gordon Falls, Sublime Point Road leads to the aptly named Sublime Point lookout, with panoramic views of the Jamison Valley.