Australia 2007

Tuesday, October 23 – Port Fairy to Apollo Bay

We woke up early to a cloudy sky but with a few patches of blue sky, which was a positive sign. We were on the road early and passed a roadside airstrip, a beachside golf course, and lots of large gardens growing Lavender and Geraniums as we drove up A1 to Tower Hill - between Port Fairy and Warrnambool. We had a bit of a time finding it, as it wasn’t that well marked on the highway. We arrived at 8:40 and realized the Visitor Centre didn’t open until 9:00. The reserve is inside the crater of an extinct volcano and, on the way in we found a sign for a lookout spot. We started climbing up the trail and realized it was like climbing the Ayers Rock! It was very steep and quite long, but we made it to the top and took a couple pictures of the beach on one side, and the lake in the volcanic crater on the other. It took as much effort coming down as it did going up, due to the steepness. While walking down, we saw two large Emu’s walking in a meadow on the other side of the road from where we were. When we got down, we could see them walking through the trees alongside the road, and they actually walked down and crossed the road very near to us, so we managed to get a couple pictures.

By the time we finished, it was after 9:15 and vehicles were coming into the reserve. We drove to the visitor centre and there was a large group of school kids having an orientation with a ranger, so we stood by and listened in. The reserve is a large area with Aboriginal ties and the souvenir shop sold lots of local aboriginal art. We looked at the map of the reserve, which showed three major trails, aside from the one we had climbed to the lookout. One of the trails was closed because the conservation officers were catching Koala’s to relocate some of them to another reserve further along the coast, at Otway National Park. Another trail was a lot longer and a bit rougher, and would take between 1 ½ to 2 hours to walk. We decided on the third trail, which was a circuit that went around a large meadow, where there was a number of Emu’s grazing. This trail was about a 30 minute walk, and we were about ¾ of the way through when we spotted a Koala bear sitting in a Eucalyptus tree. As we were looking up at it and trying to get a picture, we spotted a second one in the same tree, but a bit more concealed. While I moved back toward the meadow, I was watching where I was walking and making sure there were no snakes around. When I looked up, we saw a mother Koala carrying her baby on her back, walking along the trail not far from us. She was walking toward us and then turned to cross the trail. We got several pictures of her, as well as some of the ones in the tree. We were quite excited to see the Koala’s in the wild, rather than in a zoo. We finished our walk and then got back on the road toward Warrnambool.

We drove through Warrnambool, which is a fairly large city of around 32,000. About 15km East of Warrnambool, “The Great Ocean Highway” turned off toward the ocean on highway B100. The local area at the turnoff was Allansford, whose claim to fame was a major cheese factory. After several miles, we came to a lookout at Bay of Islands. We parked and walked to a lookout where we were awed by the view of the Islands. We took some pictures and then headed back on the road. A few miles further on we came to a viewing area called Bay of Martyrs. We walked over to the lookout and took a few pictures. This area was called the Bay of Martyrs because this is where Europeans massacred aborigines by forcing them off the cliffs and into the ocean.

We stopped at a place called Peterborough to look at the beach and read about a shipwreck. We took another picture and a couple pictures of some flowers that are growing wild, but at home are very expensive to buy. They were a white Lilly.

We continued on B100 to “The Grotto” and walked down to the water’s edge. There were stairs going down to the beach and for a better look at the Grotto itself. Ina stayed on top, as she had already done a lot of stairs today. I took a couple pictures and we headed back on the road. Our next stop was called the London Bridge. It was a large span of the ocean to a small island that had an arch in the middle of it. However, back in 1990, the bridge from the island to the mainland collapsed, and left just an island with a large arch in it. Nobody was hurt when this happened, but there were two people stranded on the “new” island, and it took several hours to get a helicopter to get them off. It was quite interesting. We then got on the road again and came to Port Campbell, where we stopped and had our lunch on the foreshore, overlooking a large bay that came in to the town. While we were there, we saw a large Black Swan on the beach. He kept trying to get out into the bay, but the waves kept carrying him back in. It was comical to watch this swan and his antics trying to get to the bay. He was making all kinds of gyrations with his neck and wings, and put quite a show on for the many people who were having their lunch on the foreshore.

After lunch we got back on the road and stopped at a place called Loch Ard Gorge. There were a number of viewing areas that stretched along the coast for a few Kilometres. It was all about a ship coming over from England, and on their last leg of the journey, ran aground off the gorge. The whole ship went down with only two survivors, a young man and a young woman. The two survivors had been washed into the gorge and landed on the beach. The man climbed the cliffs to get help, and found some farmers to help him. It took 2 days to get the young woman out of the gorge, up the cliffs. There is a cemetery there, where the remaining passengers were buried.

We got on the road again and went to the Twelve Apostles. There is a large National Park here and the car park is on the other side of the highway from the viewpoints. There is a motel there and an airfield where they offer helicopter rides to view all the highlights of the coast. The parking lot was quite full, with several buses of tourists. We walked across and took a number of pictures. The sun was out by now, but the temperature was still around 12 degrees. We headed out again on B100 toward Apollo Bay. The road was very winding and, although the speed limit was 100kmh, most of the curves were posted at 30 – 40kmh. We decided to go all the way to Apollo Bay, even though we would have to backtrack tomorrow to Otway National Park, because there was more choice of accommodation in Apollo Bay. We got to town and checked out a couple motels. We selected the second one because, although it was the same cost as the first, it had FREE wireless internet. The first one was $10 and hour for internet.