Newnes State Forest – The Lost City
The Lost City lies just a few kilometres north of Lithgow.
It is a series of unusual pagoda structures that resemble an old decaying civilisation swallowed by the wilderness.
Some Pagodas look look like old castles, others like apartment blocks and some even look like houses with thatched roofs.
There is also an old coal mine and two old dams in the valley below the Lost City.
Fire trails lead to the Lost City but require serious 4WDs
Address: Follow Statemine Gully road from the Statemine heritage park until it turns into Glowworm Tunnel road. Continue along Glowworm tunnel road and keep an eye out for Bungleboori picnic area on your right at the intersection of Glowworm tunnel road and old bells line of road.
Distance: It is only about a 3.2 km walk from the picnic area to the Lost City. I had a ranger there point out the way for me or else I am not certain if I would have found it myself. Once in the Picnic area parking lot I crossed Glowworm tunnel road and went straight through a very small section of forest to find a road on the other side. The road led past a power station on the right hand side and continued straight all the way. If there are any leftish/rightish forks, choose left until you will find your way.
On the drive in I came across these interesting remains of some old brick houses built into the cliffs near the entrance to the state forest. If you climb up to the house on top of the cliffs there is a tiny skate park inside of it!
The drive to the Lost city is only a few kilometres from the picnic area and technically doable in a four wheel drive but I had seen videos of this particular drive so I am leaving the X-trail and doing this one on foot.
The forest was burnt extensively in the 2019-2020 Gospers Mountain bushfire. You can see the forest starting to come back to life in a lot of places but it is still rather bleak and creepy throughout most of the area.
Who needs to go all the way to the northern territory to see the Bungle Bungles when we have our own dog friendly version?
Sheets of ironstone sandwiched between layers of sandstone create this amazing city of high rises in the middle of no where.
The sandstone was dropped here by a massive river delta that flowed across the area a couple of hundred million years ago but no one knows where the iron actually came from or how the formations were created.
We came here on a weekday when it was pouring rain which made the walk in a little muddy and slippery but we had the forest mostly to ourselves which is always great. How stunning is this place?
So make sure you come and find the lost city yourself one day 🙂
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