Figure Eight Pools near Sydney
One of the top Instagram places near Sydney: Figure Eight Pools in the Royal National Park. Is it worth going there?! #figureeightpools
How to get there? You don’t need (to hire) a car, just take the train to Otford Station (on Sundays it costs just 2,60$) and walk from there to the main road where the trail into the national park starts. There are no toilets, kiosks or drinking water stations the the park. The walk from the train station is about 6-7km, but it takes quite long, so plan at least two hours walking for each way (consider this when you look up the tides).
When to get there? Check weather, tides and safety information before you plan to go there! It can be quite dangerous otherwise or you won’t be able to see the pools.
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- The path from the train station is beautiful, we crossed already the forest on the mountain behind
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- The last metres are only reachable in times of low tide
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- The pools are quite hard to reach and still it can be super busy with people
Is it worth going?
I really liked the day in the national park, the walk there is beautiful and it is definitly worth going. But keep in mind that it will be quite busy when you reach the pools, it won’t be a quiet, empty nature place. The perfect Instagram picture of you in the Figure Eight Pools will be even hard to take, because there can be big groups of people. Since the low tide leaves only a short time window to visit, it just gets crowded.
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- Figure Eight Pool 🙂 one of many small rock pools
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- All these little round pools in the rocks
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- The whole area is really special
Even beautiful on a rainy day
The day I went to the national park, it was the worst weather ever, we had strong rain about half of the time and got very wet, although the forecast wasn’t that bad (I really recommend taking rain ponchos and plastic bags for your phone and camera). It was still a very beautiful day, so on a good day it must be a dream (and probably busier)! It’s a very scenic walk through the forest from the train station and the last metres you walk along the cliffs towards the pools. There are a few maps on the way, so we didn’t really need online maps to find to find the Figure Eight Pools.
When we reached the place, people were just leaving, so it wasn’t actually too busy. We even spotted a few whales in the sea and went for a quick swim in the pools. For me the spot around the pools is really magical! The cliff above is in the form of a triangle showing into the direction of the round holes in the rock floor. If you like small adventures you will love it!
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