Cascade Markets

An indoor market is an unusual thing to recommend, right up until you have stood in a Katoomba forecourt in July. Cascade Markets run inside Tibbi Whalan Hall at the Civic Centre, which makes this one of the few Blue Mountains markets that works exactly as well in winter as it does in spring.

Makers, and the people who rescue things

The stall list is a good snapshot of what the mountains actually make: handmade jewellery, honey products, specialist tea, knitted and woven goods, crochet toys, succulents, printmaking, felting. Alongside those sit the recyclers, collectors and vintage dealers, which gives the room a browsing quality that a pure craft market does not have. Food specialties fill out the rest.

Six hours in the middle of the day is a civilised window by market standards, and being indoors it does not thin out at the first sign of rain. January is the one month off.

Good to know before you go

The train is the sensible way in from Sydney, and it puts you a few minutes' walk from the hall. If you drive, Katoomba Street parking on a Saturday is the usual mountains lottery, so aim for the side streets and walk. Bring layers whatever the season, because the walk between the station and the hall is exposed even if the market is not. Once you are done, Katoomba Street's cafes and second-hand bookshops are immediately outside, and Echo Point is ten minutes away, so the market slots neatly into the front half of a day up here.