Tuesday: Melbourne to Port Campbell – 285km
Day 3 of the journey, today we should see the coast. Just about to leave the Hotel and get the car.
After negotiating the city with its “Turn right to turn left” retardedness, we arrived on the express way headed to our breakfast destination of Torquay. One thing that we have found whilst driving is that with all this technology, you still can’t rely on it. Nothing beats a man’s intuition and sense of direction. According to GPS we were heading in the correct direction until it started giving us turns that didn’t exist. So second consultation on “Trackme” identified that we were on a highway that hadn’t been built yet. this screen shot shows we are in the middle of a vacant paddock, next to a suburban estate. Anyway, after a bit of negotiating, we found our way back to Torquay.
After arriving, we setup a late brunch at 12pm, consisting of Pancakes overlooking the beautiful Torquay bay. During this time we embarked on some “Hard Core Parkour” on the kids play equipment. Stay tuned for uploaded footage later. We are now on the great ocean road embarking on the rest of the journey. Current destination: Anglesea.
A little further on we came across the Split Point Lighthouse which is known for the filming of Round the Twist. A few photos and the trip continued along the southerly coast of Australia. We passed Apollo Bay where we picked up some essential supplies from IGA and the local independent butcher. We grabbed some marinated lamb chops and a few snags. A bit further down the road we took the turn off to Otway Lighthouse only to be denied entry even though we arrived 15minutes before closing time, bastards.
We chucked a uturn and headed back to the main road only to be stopped by giant drop bears. We stopped and took some photos of real live Koalas, living in their wild habitat which was actually pretty cool. There were a few of them kicking around in the trees. From here we made our way to the 12 apostles.
However… we got stuck behind a campervan doing 30-40km/h in a 100km/h zone with blatant disregard to the signposted “Slow drivers pull off here” and “Be courteous to following drivers”. This went on for approximately 20mins and was driving us nuts. Also being on the Great Ocean Road, there’s not a lot of straight road for overtaking, but when we did get a chance it was time to open up the LPG powered commodore with fresh tyres. The fun lasted for approximately 20mins till we realised we had to switch to petrol as the “Distance Till Empty” got as low as 7kms.
We ventured on and found the signs for the 12 apostles. As you can imagine, it’s a popular destination so we weren’t the only ones there with our cameras. There was a carpark and some decent amenities so we parked the car and grabbed our camera gear.
I have to say, the 12 Apostles are a pretty special sight. As you walk over the hill, towards the red cliffs you can really see what all the fuss is about. Arriving at around 6pm as we did, the sun was about to go down so we had just enough time to take a few practice snaps and get the cameras set for the “golden hour”, that time when the sun is just setting and the light is perfect for capturing the focal point of the trip. It was a bit of a clamber to secure a good vantage spot for snapping the sunset but we managed to claim a raised platform to set the tripod on.
Once the sun had set it was time to find a camp site. A 10 minute drive into Port Campbell we came across a caravan park and camp ground. The old bloke who runs the place didn’t want to let us in because he was cranky that his dinner was interrupted by our arrival, however with some gentle persuasion the forces of capitalism overcame his objections and he saw fit to assign us a campsite. With tents set up and after changing into some warm clothes (its freezing down here) we walked up to the ‘camp kitchen’ to cook up the steaks ‘n’ snags we purchased in Apollo Bay.
So day #3 is coming to a close. We’re gonna spend the rest of it with a coffee and a chat before we hit the hay. We’ve got a bit of driving to do tomorrow so we are planning for an early exit.
Until then…
No related posts.