Trip to Warragamba Dam

In the German Catholic Church bulletin (don't ask me to explain why I got my hands on this) I read about a daytrip of a group of senior residents to Warragamba dam. It sounded as if they had a lot of fun so I decided its time for our family to go there too. Australia is the driest inhabited continent of the earth so water supply is vital.

After a short drive west towards the Blue Mountains we left the M4 just near Penrith. Then we were driving through beautiful countryside and felt like a million miles away from Sydney. As we reached the grounds of the dam it seemed like an oversized park with picnic areas, given there were only 5 or 6 cars in the parking lot. Unfortunately visitors are not allowed to walk onto the dam wall, so one can only look at the dam from a viewing platform. The sight of the dam and especially the level of the water was still impressive.

Usually when I check the rain radar it never rains over the catchment area, but last summer and this winter have been very wet so the dam has reached full capacity, it even began spilling this April which was big news on TV. The all time low of 32.5% of capacity was recorded in February 2007.