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Blue Mountains Tours › The Blue Mountains With Kids: Which Tours Take Them and What the Day Looks LikeUpdated 2026-09-09

The Blue Mountains With Kids: Which Tours Take Them and What the Day Looks Like

Hours, prices and access verified by the Blue Mountains Tours team — last checked 2026-09-09

A koala feeding on eucalyptus leaves at a wildlife park

The short answer

Minimum ages here are set per tour, not across the board, and they run at five, six, twelve and fourteen. So the first question is not what to do with children in the Blue Mountains — it is which days will take them. The coach tours built around Scenic World and a wildlife park sit at the low end; the bushwalking and sunset days sit at the high end, and one sets its floor at twelve.

The thing nobody tells you first

Most family guides to a destination start with what there is to do. Here that is the wrong order, because a good half of the guided days will not take a child at all, and the ones that will are not always the obvious ones. One coach day takes children from five. One walking day sets fourteen as the floor and says so plainly. A late-start day built around wild kangaroos — which sounds perfect for children — sets its minimum at twelve.

Check the age before the itinerary. Every card states the cap and the minimum where the listing gives them, and day tours to Blue Mountains from Sydney are set out so you can see it before you get attached to a plan.

Which days take children, and from what age

Kind of dayTypical minimumWhat it involves
Deluxe small-group coach with Scenic WorldFiveRelaxed walks only, no hiking at all
All-inclusive coach with lunch and a wildlife parkTwo, with infant seatsRides, a zoo and a ferry home
Coach with Sydney Zoo and a Discovery PassLowFlat lookouts and a koala photograph
Sunset day from George StreetSixGuided bushwalks, late finish
Waterfall walk with lunchFourteenNinety-minute descent, about 200 steps
Late-start kangaroo dayTwelveFormed trails, 8,000–15,000 steps

Read that table as a shape rather than a promise: the exact bands sit on each tour's own booking page, and they are the operator's to set.

Where the animals actually are

Not in the mountains. Featherdale Wildlife Park at Doonside and Sydney Zoo at Bungarribee both sit on the western edge of Sydney, on the way out and the way back, which is why so many itineraries stop at one. Several days include entry to one of them and one lets you pick which if you say a day ahead. One coach day throws in a digital photograph with a koala.

Wild animals are a different proposition. Cockatoos turn up on the walking tracks without anyone arranging it, and the Megalong Valley day is built around finding kangaroos in their own country — but nobody can promise you an animal. If seeing one matters more than seeing one in the wild, take the wildlife park.

What the walking is really like

This is where family days go wrong, and it is entirely avoidable. Three levels exist:

  • No walking at all. Echo Point, Govetts Leap, Cahill's and Sublime Point are each a step from a car park. One coach day states outright that it involves relaxed walks only and no hiking, which makes it the straightforward booking with small children.
  • Easy and short. The Three Sisters walk is 0.8km return, graded easy, twenty-five to forty-five minutes, and accessible with assistance as far as Oreades lookout.
  • Genuinely hard. The Wentworth Falls track is 1.4km return, graded moderate, with about 200 steps down to Fletchers lookout, and it is not suitable for prams. Every walking-heavy day uses it.
Useful tip. Ask about storage before you book, not on the morning. Several operators state plainly that there is no room on board for prams, walkers or luggage, and one bans oversize bags outright. The FAQs page lists what each one allows.

The cold, and why children feel it first

Katoomba runs about five degrees colder than Sydney by day and closer to six overnight, in every month. A child dressed for a warm morning in the city will be cold at Echo Point by eleven, and colder still if the day ends at a sunset lookout in the wind. Closed shoes, a warm layer and a rain jacket, whatever the coastal forecast says — the month-by-month figures are worth two minutes before you pack.

Timing a family day so it does not unravel

The early coaches leave central Sydney between 6:30 and 7:30 and return about six. That is a long day with a small child in it, and the drive home is the part that goes badly. Two things help. The all-inclusive day comes back along the Parramatta River by ferry rather than through the traffic, which turns the worst hour into the best one. And a late-start departure, leaving at ten or noon, removes the early alarm entirely — though it finishes after sunset, which in high summer can mean ten at night.

What the day actually looks like, hour by hour

Worth picturing before you commit a child to it. An early coach day collects you in the CBD somewhere between half past six and half past seven. You drive for two hours with one comfort stop, usually in the lower mountains. You are at Echo Point in the late morning, Scenic World or a village in the early afternoon, and a wildlife park on the way back down. You reach Sydney about six.

That shape has one weak hour in it and it is the last one. Two of the itineraries deal with it directly by finishing on the Parramatta River, so the run home is a ferry rather than a motorway, and you arrive at Circular Quay instead of a kerb. With children, that single detail is worth more than most of the inclusions above it.

A late-start day inverts the whole thing. You leave at ten or noon, you skip the early alarm and the peak-hour traffic, and you finish at a lookout in the last of the light. The trade is the return time: in high summer it can be as late as ten at night, which suits teenagers and does not suit a five-year-old. The things-to-do page sorts the options by how long you actually have.

Or stay a night

The version that works best with children is not a day trip at all. A night in Katoomba removes four hours of driving, puts you at Echo Point before the coaches arrive, and opens the three departures that start up in the mountains, including a three-hour run on fire trails in an open ex-army Land Rover that is a great deal more interesting to a ten-year-old than a coach. The accommodation page sets out where to base yourself.

Check the minimum age first and the itinerary second — it is the one thing here that cannot be worked around on the day, and Blue Mountains Tours states it on every card.

Days that take children