Saturday, March 24 – The Great Ocean Road

After the storm last night, this morning was cloudy and the skies still looked angry. We had a pleasant breakfast on the porch overlooking the waterfront, then we packed up and headed out. 

It was a short drive to Warrnambool, where the road started, and there was an occasional shower along the way. But we could see blue skies in the distance, so we remained hopeful.

Chris at Bay of Islands

We made our first stop about an hour in, at the Bay of Islands, and the lighting was pretty. The rock formations glowed in the golden sunshine.









And some blue skies as a bonus.

Bay of Islands

The next stops followed, fast and furious. It seemed that every few minutes, we were making another stop. It might be hard to make good time here, as it's so pretty!

Bay of Martyrs, Great Ocean Road

Here is the Bay of Martyrs.

Next, The Grotto. With the sky reflected in the tidepool under the arch, it's hard to see where the ocean ends and the pool begins.

Rock archways were a common theme here.

London Bridge, with and without the tourist.

And this one was simply called "The Arch."

Panoramic view from The Arch, Great Ocean Road

This ship would be wise to stay well clear from the rocky shore. It looks idyllic from here, but the ocean is powerful, and the wind is strong. I would not want to be out there in a boat!

Loch Ard Gorge, Great Ocean Road

We pushed on, wanting to get to the Twelve Apostles soon. I'd been wanting to see this since I saw pictures in a National Geographic book almost 20 years ago. But all of the other stops were pretty too, so we kept making detours along the way.

The Razorback, Loch Ard Gorge

Loch Ard Gorge was the prettiest yet.

Apparently this area got its name from a nearby shipwreck (The Loch Ard). This rock is called the Razorback. It does look sharp. It used to be longer - you can see its foundations further out, where the taller portions of the rock have weathered away. The waves are persistent.

Razorback Lookout, Loch Ard Gorge

This small arch atop The Razorback was carved out by the wind.

Different layers of rock have differing hardness, and differing resistance to erosion. Thus the grooves in the side of the rock shelf.

These columns remind me of the chimneys in Cappadocia. Nature is grand. 

I could have spent a day on this first part of the road alone. Luckily, we were going in the opposite direction of most traffic, so the going was pretty good.

Eventually, we made it to our goal, arriving at The Twelve Apostles before noon. It was a bit of a zoo compared to the other sites, with a huge car park on the inland side of the road. We found parking easily enough and headed down to the main attraction. 

Finally seeing The Twelve Apostles!

What a view! And the skies were looking very pretty too. Lots of blue, and decent lighting, and enough clouds to keep it interesting.

We lingered, enjoying it all. They were as pretty as I had imagined!

There is a formation in Germany called the Twelve Apostles. It's cool, but this is prettier.

But we had a long way to go still.

No time for a leisurely lunch today. We grabbed some food to go from the snack bar at the visitors center, and pushed on. 

As we approached Cape Otway, we had a choice between heading inland and doing a treetop canopy walk in the forest, or staying on the coastal route for more scenery. We chose the inland route, so goodbye to the big roads, hello to winding wooded lanes. 

We made it to the Otway Fly and started hiking. It was a lot of downhill to get to the beginning of the canopy trail, but it was a pretty cool experience. There is a nice circuit of walkways which climb progressively higher.

It's a good climb. You really get high off the ground, into the treetop canopy.




This tower is a little scary, actually. I am not a big fan of heights. And this tower is 45 meters off the forest floor!

But the tower wasn't the worst part. At least that was a little bit enclosed, and well supported.

If you look at the picture above, the right side walkway in the distance seems unsupported. That's because it is unsupported! It's cantilevered out from the middle. It sways in the breeze while you’re at least 25 meters above the ground. And it sways more when it’s crowded.



That made my hands sweat a little bit! Chris doesn't mind the heights, though. Here she is, egging me on, wondering what my problem is. I did go to the edge. I didn't stay long. Some guy and his little kid were running around and the swaying was merciless.

 Nice forest, though. Lots of moss.

Back through the rest of the walkway and then the hike uphill, back to the visitors center. 

You can see how huge these trees are. Even 45 meters off the ground, they towered above us.

Now time to move on and rejoin the coastal road. We decided not to backtrack, which made for a far more interesting ride than I expected! As we continued to traverse Cape Otway, he road got very narrow and very curvy, reminding me of the Road to Hana on Maui. 

Well, there were some differences! I was in a bigger car than I wanted, and I was driving on the left, and oncoming cars were driving down the middle of the road like lunatics – probably not expecting oncoming traffic! Finally we reached the larger road, fully intact, and much to our relief. 

We headed downhill, back towards the coast, and rejoined the Great Ocean Road for the second part of the journey.

We had a few more stops on our agenda, but we had to start being selective if we wanted to get to Melbourne in good time. The trip should really be a 2-day affair, if not 3 days, so we were really pushing it trying to do it all in a single day.

Memorial Arch, Great Ocean Road

So we skipped a waterfall that would have required a detour, and stopped off briefly at the memorial arch. This memorializes the workers who built the road.

There was a larger group of about a dozen college-aged kids who waited for a gap in the traffic, and then all ran under the arch for a typical shot of them jumping for the camera. Cute!

Memorial to Laborers, Great Ocean Road

We passed on that opportunity, although playing in traffic probably would have felt a lot safer, compared to the cantilever walk and that insane drive across the Cape!

Split Point Lighthouse, Aireys Inlet

We had a longer stop in Aireys Inlet to see the Split Point Lighthouse. Nice views, gorgeous blue sky with afternoon sunshine made for pretty pictures. 

Just a few clouds left in the sky – amazing how it’s cleared up!

Lorne-Queenscliff Coastal Reserve, Aireys Inlet

This is a long, inviting beach. But no time for that!

Eagle Rock, Airey's Inlet

Eagle Rock. Catching a few late afternoon rays of sunshine.

Such a nice sheltered cove. Looks inviting! Maybe next time.

Point Addis, Victoria

Onward about a half hour to Point Addis for more coastal views. We saw some surfers in the parking lot but it looked like they were all coming in and calling it a day.

Shortly after Point Addis, the Great Ocean Road ended in Torquay. 

We did it! Only about 5:00. We hightailed it to Geelong and then towards Melbourne, stopping along the way to fill up with gas a few km out. 

The traffic got more intense as we approached the city, and there was a little bit of rain but that led to a pretty rainbow.

Of course the signs for exits didn’t match what the GPS was telling me, so the route I ended up taking into the city was a little different than Google had wanted.

St. Patricks Cathedral. Our room, with a view!

But we made it to our hotel, the Park Hyatt, in good time. The staff took care of the car, and we were settled in our room before 7:00. 

It was a gorgeous room, with an equally beautiful view from our window.

Time for the million-dollar question – would we be able to meet up with Ron and Ann, our CruiseCritic.com correspondents? We had never met, but we've corresponded from halfway around the world for several years, and by a stroke of luck we all happened to be in Melbourne tonight. 

I texted, and we arranged to meet for drinks in about an hour and a half. But we needed to grab a bite to eat first. Luckily, I had booked a room on the Club Level, so we went to the Regency Club lounge for snacks. We hoped that would be good enough, instead of a full dinner. The offerings were quite nice and we managed to get enough to eat.

The evening with Ron and Ann was delightful and we enjoyed finally meeting them. We had a bit of wine in the bar in our hotel, and shared stories about our past and future travels. Ron gave me some tips about Tasmania, as we're heading there after Melbourne. 

So ended a very successful few days of driving all over Southern Australia and Victoria. Yes, another day or two on the Great Ocean Road would have been ideal, but our time was limited. Even though we had tried not to cover a large area. It’s amazing how much there is to see and do here!

One oddity today. As we were driving along this afternoon, I had received an e-mail invoice from Hertz, thanking me for having returned the vehicle to the Melbourne Airport. That’s odd. My reservation ends tomorrow, and I’m returning the car in Downtown Melbourne, at the Hertz location there. In fact, we were still driving the car when we got the e-mail!

We will have to see what that’s all about when we return the car tomorrow morning, as scheduled. Or perhaps, as we think is scheduled...