There are very reasonable explanations for why life seems to pass more quickly as you get older. Such as a single unit of time increasingly being a lower proportion of your total existence on this planet. Yet why is it some things – like being happily married for a year – pass in the blink of an eye while others, such as the tenure of certain demagogues and nincompoops and tax-dodging grifters feel like they go on forever?

Anyway, I can’t believe it’s Easter already. Bring on the chocolate eggs.

Now, if you listen to the type of person who gets annually enraged about the packaging of pagan chocolate eggs pooped out by a giant corporate bunny, you’ll also hear that <insert their home country> is an absolute shithole what with its taxes funding essential services and just about intact sense of compassion for its fellow humans. What patriotism.

Whatever your beliefs, it sure is hard to square this sentiment in Australia with the vistas out the window, the openness in the streets, the chirping in the trees, the coffee in the malls and the geniality in the Bunnings sausage sizzle. Admittedly I haven’t been in a petrol queue recently, and perhaps that is part of the problem. I remain a little distanced, a little disconnected from Ford Rangerman. But, sheesh, Australia, you are a spectacular country.

I find this spectacular country smugly accessible by an electric powered vehicle; no blow ups, no geo-blocking, no sloppy coolant ingress into an automatic transmission causing fraught nerves and $10,000 worth of damage. Just a quick top up in Goulburn while peeing and drinking coffee and eating a peppermint slice before intrepidly entering a charger free zone of 200km. And a lovely drive along the back roads to the Blue Mountains.

Not quite there yet but spectacular already. We spend a night just out of Lithgow, one of a handful of visitors on a hilltop resort overlooking Lake Lyell. There is a mountain chalet vibe to it, which makes sense when you find out it was the labour of love of a Swiss man named Tom. Instead of cows there are kangaroos, the alps replaced by alpacas.

You’d be hard pressed even in Switzerland to experience the absolute serenity of a morning from the deck. Early mists hover over the lake, low clouds rising as a watery sun strengthens. The dawn chorus rejuvenated and expectant of another day in paradise. Or at least until the bogans on speedboats launch from their very expensive taxpayer subsidised utes.

From here it’s funny to turn a few corners and stutter along potholed roads to find yourself in the town of Lithgow. Greeted by the hut of pizzas and the famous colonel. We stop to recharge, take coffee, pop into Woollies and proceed replenished up into world heritage. What better way for Avery to see this for the first time than at Govetts Leap, and the far from Grose Valley.

It is, in contrast to most recent days, cool and a tad cloudy. A good day to grab a warm pho for lunch in Katoomba. Brighter afternoon spells ensure Scenic World lives up to its name. Plenty of scenic and plenty of world. Jammed into the various cable cars and famously steep cog railway.

Wary of being stuck deep in the valley as closing time nears, we make our way back up to the plateau and find ourselves in a charming cottage for a much loved cup of tea and biscuit moment. And as blanket cloud builds, a quiet night in eating one pot noodles and watching The Full Monty on SBS. Time now passing just that little bit more slowly.

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We were both a tad surprised to hear the creaking gate sqwawks of gang-gang cockatoos as we walked out of our cottage in Wentworth Falls the next morning. I suppose we shouldn’t have been, it’s just that for Avery and I they are very much a Canberra thing, a small part of Red Hill thing, an area of land now referred to as gang-gang, as in “Shall we go for a walk at gang-gang?” They are one of our things. And how fitting to be greeted by a pair on our anniversary.

In other bird news, the black cockatoo is frequently spotted on walking trail signs and their cries are also heard from afar, along with astonishing lyrebird repertoires somewhere among the rumpled forests and creeks adorning the Megalong Valley (bonus points for the name). The cockatoo provides the emblem on markers for the Grand Cliff Top Walk, though I’m not quite so sure it’s all cliff top. It is almost impossible to do a walk here without encountering many a stairway.

We walk for a couple of hours, at times atop rocky outcrops with stunning views, at others immersed in Jurassic forests and watery glades. It’s quite an archetypal loop walk, under cliff, over cliff, wombling free. Some use it for their Saturday morning marathon, others for their artistic muse.

In a land of sublime points and narrow neck lookouts, the modest Den Fenella track is unlikely to get the imagination racing. Especially since before I came to write this piece I had in mind it was called Dan Fenella. I pictured some rough track hacked out by old mate Dan to a small clearing where he could smoke a cheeky joint before getting back to that plastering job. But Den Fenella is another matter. And more tediously named after some obscure Scottish ravine.

There’s a little adventure to be had following the creek as it creeps down to the escarpment edge. Umbrella ferns disperse fingers of light, water swirls and cascades among the sandstone. A cooling overhang and a sunny ledge linked by stairways to an inevitable lookout. A natural rock garden with a succulent view.

Of course, getting into this beautiful predicament results in a lumber back up, all the way again to a car park where sightseers can get a small glimpse of Wentworth Falls itself. We need to loop back a bit further to the start, where the gang-gangs congregate and humans pause, eat, drink and embark upon their own adventure. Our particular morning escapade is capped off with high tea at Conservation Hut. A birthday to mark as much as a wedding anniversary.

Bushwalks, lookouts, waterfalls, gang-gangs and too much cake. It sounds like my dream birthday, apart from the fact it isn’t. I self congratulate myself on being such a wonderful husband arranging all these treats for Avery, safe in the knowledge that what is yours is mine (and vice-versa).

Continuing with the not-my-birthday treats, an inevitable food coma nap followed by a highlights tour of more local lookouts. Saving the best to last. First, Evans Lookout, with its commanding panorama overlooking the Grose Valley. Here some influencer caked in makeup not wearing very much climbing a wall. Then the various balconies of Cahills Lookout with mega big views across the Megalong. Here some Korean tourists posing with an Australian flagged towel, naturally made in China, wrong shade of blue.

The final stop the ultimate lookout. The archetypal, iconic, distinctive, cliched spectacle of Echo Point. Creeping golden as the sun lowers, one of the Three Sisters within not quite touching distance. And, yes, of course there were various poses and narratives being beamed to the world here too.

Looking back at my own photos, it turns out we were enjoying this moment pretty much exactly one year after we were bathing in similar golden light among the pine trees behind a sweltering church in Isaacs. Bonded together like a pair of gang-gangs, eternal as sandstone outcrops risen among a sea of gum. Within this vastness, small and insignificant. Together, an entire world.

Thank you again for marrying me. And thank you for your attention to this matter.