The Great Ocean Road

[This blog entry is extremely short time-wise, but the opposite textually.  In other words, you might want to grab a drink and a snack if you plan to read the whole thing in one sitting...]

TL;DR... The Great Ocean Road was beautiful and amazing and exhausting and everyone should come see this place!

This weekend I went on a road trip along the Great Ocean Road.  In roughly two days we managed to stop at least fourteen times to see beaches, landmarks, animals, waterfalls, and incredible ocean views.  At each stop I came to the same conclusion: this country is beautiful, period.

I left some of the sand on the beach.  The rest I brought back in my shoes.

Before I go on to describe in excruciating detail all the things we did, you might be curious exactly who we are.  So meet the characters in this week's episode: myself (duh); Lorenzo, my Italian neighbor from down the hall; Alessandra, also Italian; Lorenzo and Alessandra both study at Bocconi University in Milan.  Monica, a girl from Chicago who goes to American University in D.C.; Alessandra and Monica both live at Yarra House, northeast of the university; and Marie, a French girl who studies in Paris who met Alessandra the night before we left and claimed the last seat in the car.  The five of us got along very well.

Anyways, here goes...

On Friday afternoon Lorenzo and I went downtown to pick up the rental car.  I can really only think of one word to describe the Hyundai Getz: small.  This was basic A-to-B transportation (although as you'll see from the Google map, we took it all the way to I and back).  Since I'm not 21, Lorenzo had to do all the driving.  Even though I trust very few people's driving and prefer to do it all myself if possible, Lorenzo was a good driver.  Interestingly, it was his first time ever driving an automatic transmission (you know those Italians and their cars), and he had to get used to putting the car in P before taking the key out of the ignition.  So we did, in fact, manage to fit five people and five bags in there.  After everyone was done with class around 6, we set off southbound in Friday rush hour...

Our tiny Hyundai Getz (registered in Tasmania) "gets" us there and back.

The drive from Melbourne to Torquay, the beginning of the Great Ocean Road and our first stop, was slow at first, but once we got far enough out of the city the speeds picked up.  I went out and bought an iPod cable right before we left, and it turned out to be quite handy for the longer stretches.  Monica has a very respectable collection on her iPod--a goog mix of songs I know and love and some stuff I'd never heard of.  I played Black Betty, my favorite road trip kick-off song, and then handed the DJ duties back to Monica.  Oh, and did I mention Lorenzo loves to sing classic rock?  Anyways, We passed very close to Geelong and Ocean Grove, where I went surfing during Melbourne Welcome and MUSEX Surf Party Weekend.  Now normally I'd just tell everyone "google it" to see where I've been, but I figured I'd add the map to save you all some time.

Our route along the Great Ocean Road.  Melbourne is off the map about 100 km to the northeast. A is Torquay.  I is Port Campbell.

We got to Torquay around 8.  The second you hit the main drag you can immediately tell what this town is about: surfing.  This town is a great surf spot, and because it's the beginning of the Great Ocean Road it's where everyone rents boards, so there were ton of surf shops and outlets.  When we were driving through I realized everyone who lives in this town probably surfs.  Even the cops.  When we got to the hostel the receptionist was not there, so we went to buy groceries.  We barbecued a heap load of dinner and got to know each other over a beer in the garden.

After dinner we drove down to the beach.  We popped into the bar there for a second, but the crowd was much older than us so we just moseyed our way down to the sand.  It was harder than usual to see the stars because the moon was enormously full and bright.  So bright, in fact, that I could clearly see the craters and lava seas my professor had talked in the first day of Earth Science class.  In fact, at various times during this trip I saw first-hand the geological features he has been lecturing about.  After a few (unsuccessful) attempts at taking a self-timer photo of all of us on the beach, we decided to head back to the hostel because it was past midnight and we had a long day ahead of us.

Staring at the moon...
(Marie had a really good camera and was able to get decent low-contrast exposure.  Nice composition, I might add.)

Our hostel, "home @ bells beach" was not what I was expecting.  Until now, my perception of hostel was the Israeli youth hostels we stayed at in middle school and high school (you know, schnitzel at Beit Agron in Jerusalem).  But this was the other type of hostel, or as Australians call it a "backpackers," where you just have big rooms with bunk beds and a communal kitchen and lounge.  Other than the fact that our room smelled like sweaty socks because a bunch of surfers had already been staying there for a few days, it was actually really nice.  The front garden was watered with recycled water, too, which earned it points in my book.

Our hostel in Torquay.  It was quaint and comfortable, but our bunk room smelled like feet.

We checked out after breakfast Saturday morning and piled into the car at around 9:30.  Our first stop was Bells Beach, really the first beach on the Great Ocean Road.  The weather was a bit gray, but it was still very nice to be on the beach.  In fact, the sun was pretty shy for most of the weekend, but as far as I was concerned that made it nicer because it wasn't hot.  Bells beach has some awesome cliffs and caves that have been eroded by the water.  We did the touristy thing and took a self-timed picture of all of us in one of the caves.  I also tried to climb up one of the sheer walls: I didn't get very far, but Lorenzo snapped a picture in time.

Bells Beach.  Picturesque is an understatement.

Left to right: Monica, me, Alessandra, Marie, and Lorenzo

That's me practicing my rock climbing skills at Bells Beach.

We walked up and down the beach a bit.  I rolled up my jeans and walked through the tide pools, which was really relaxing (a bit cold, though).  We could have stayed there longer, really, but there were more stops to get to so we headed back to the car.

If you zoom in on the google map you'll probably notice that the Great Ocean Road is not at all straight because it follows the coastline.  As a consequence, because of all the twists, turns, dips, and climbs, this is probably one of the greatest driving roads of all time. (Think Kankamangus highway, but much longer.)  And, because there's no snow here, the pavement is pretty smooth.  I kept saying how I would love to do this on my bike, or better yet on a motorcycle!  There were many signs reminding us to drive on the left; I guess a lot of tourists forget that.

Our next stop was Anglesea.  The town itself was not that special--just some shops and a drive-through liquor store (that seems wrong, doesn't it)--but a few kilometers inland there was a golf course we came to see.  Apparently Alessandra is a competitive golfer and has been playing since she was twelve; but that's not why she wanted to see this course.  No, it was because this course is home to a large family of kangaroos!  For the most part they were just sitting and lounging, and we were actually able to get pretty close without being in significant danger, but I got really excited every time they hopped.  It really is as fun to watch as you might think.  They were not exactly wild animals and they were all tagged.  One of the females had a joey in her pouch.  The cartoons have the whole pouch thing wrong, by the way; the joey doesn't stick its head out and smile for the ride.  Instead, the mother just kind of shoves him in there head first so the only way to tell she is with offspring is by her huge bulge and the tiny legs sticking out the top.

In the US there are squirrels and chipmunks on golf courses.  Here, they have kangaroos.

The next stop was Lorne, which is one of the bigger (very touristy) towns on the Great Ocean Road, right by the beach.  We stopped at the visitor center there to get some maps and find out the best places to see.  To be fair, there was not much to do in Lorne other than eat (which we did, at a really tasty restaurant), unless you had surfboards and wetsuits.  Monica likes to shop, though, so we walked the street a bit to look in the stores.  The we gout back on the road and were on our way.  We were in a bit more of a hurry this time because it was already 4 and we had to check into the next hostel before 9 and there was still a couple hours of driving to go.  But, like true vacationers, we didn't rush too much.

Our next scheduled stop was Erskine Falls, but along the way we spotted this lighthouse and I wanted to stop.  Good thing, too, since the views here were spectacular (that's probably why they put a lighthouse here).  The lighthouse was called Split Point Light Station, and it was 36 m tall.  Despite the drastically different geology and flora, the lighthouse reminded me a lot of New England, something you might see on Cape Cod or up in Maine.

Split Point Light Station felt strangely like New England.

Erskine falls is several kilometers off the Great Ocean Road, but it's well worth the drive.  You get to the parking lot by via a treacherously steep access road and then you have to walk down a couple hundred steps to the base of the falls.  I don't think it's the tallest waterfall I've ever seen, but one of the better looking.  The rocks are covered in lush green moss and the water makes a cool mist in the whole area, which is surrounded by tall cliffs.  I don't think it was technically allowed, but we climbed off the trail to the base of the waterfall to take pictures (everyone else did, anyway).  I was very careful not to slip with my phone and camera in my pockets.  If you haven't gotten the sense of it yet, Australia is one of the most naturally beautiful places I've ever been.

It's hard to tell, but that rock was actually pretty hard to balance on.  Nice waterfall, eh?

After realizing that I'm out of shape from climbing back up the stairs, we piled back into the car.  The tiny little four-banger worked hard to get back up the hill with all five of us weighing it down, but Lorenzo pushed the pedal to the floor and we made it back up.  The next stop was Kennet River.  I should preface this part by explaining that Alessandra's main goal for this trip was to see a koala.  Once she saw one, she would be happy.  So we asked at the information center where a good place to see them is.  The guide there said she often sees them in her backyard (cool, I know), but there is also a caravan park where they just hang out in the trees.  So we went there, to Kennet River.  Sure enough, the lady was right, there were koalas in the trees!  The first one we spotted was asleep in a branch.  the second was eating leaves, slowly but surely comping away, minding his (or her) own business despite the small crowd of tourists and loud caravaner kids below.  Apparently the leaves they eat have drug-like sedative effects and also lack nutrition, so they spend most of their time (22 hours per day) sleeping.  The rarely move, like sloths.  Once a year they mate, but that's it.  That koala has probably been in that same tree for months!

Nothing much see at Kennet River...just a koala up in the tree.

What I thought was really cool about the caravan park was the birds.  There was a hord of colorful red and green birds, and people were feeding them so they were not at all shy.  You could go right up to them and snap a photo in their faces.  I'll have to find out what species that is.

I don't know what this bird is called, but its really cool looking and they were everywhere.

 At this point we were pretty pressed for time, since we booked a hostel in Port Campbell, about a two-hour drive away, and had to be there by 9.  A lot of this next portion of the Great Ocean Road was actually inland, so it was a good part to do quickly.  You could tell how exhausted we all were because we all fell asleep (poor Lorenzo had to stay awake the whole time).  We did make one stop, though, to see the twelve apostles.  We had planned to see it the next day, but we had been told that it's beautiful at sunset, which is coincidentally the time we arrived there, so we took a twenty minute break.  Great choice.  The twelve apostles are a set of rock pillars that have been created over millions of years by erosion of the soft limestone.  I learned form my Earth Sciences class that the layers on each rock match up, as they were originally one piece of stone.  There were only ever nine pillars, but now there are eight because on fell down a few years back (they can get unstable as the waves erode their bases).  The erosion continues on the cliffs, though, so it is likely that there will be more apostles in the future (maybe someday there will actually be twelve).

Some of the Twelve (well, nine) Apostles at sunset.

The hostel in Port Campbell was larger than the one in Torquay (and it didn't smell like feet).  We cooked up some pasta for dinner and ate family-style before hitting the hay (before midnight, this time). One thing I especially liked about this hostel was how environmentally friendly it was.  Everything in there was designed to save electricity and water, or both.  For instance the lights in the shower had a ten minute timer, so you couldn't take a long shower or leave the lights on.

With a long day of touring ahead of us again, we got an early start after a cereal and toast breakfast.  Our first stop was back to the Twelve Apostles.  We ran into some friends in the parking lot to the Gibson Staircase who we knew were on the road also but we hadn't coordinated to meet up.  They had two huge campervans between the nine of them.  Anyway, time we climbed down to the beach to get a closer look at the rocks.  You really got a sense of how the crashing waves eroded the pillars.  I remember being in awe at the power of nature at that point.  Again, beautiful.

We climbed the stairs down the cliff to the beach to get a closer look at the apostles. 

After the Twelve Apostles we got petrol (gas) in the tiny one-horse-town of Princetown (I thought I had gotten away from there, but apparently it followed me).  Filling up the tiny econo-car cost $67 with these crazy Australian per-liter prices.  We stopped at a boardwalk nature hike called Maits Rest along one of the inland portions of the Great Ocean Road, which the Lorne visitor center lady told us to see.  To be honest, it wasn't that spectacular, but the rainforest landscape was a nice contrast to the rocky, sandy beaches along the coast.  The trees there had a sort of fuzzy red bark, which I remarked looked like orangutan hair.

A boardwalk.  Pretty self explanatory, I just thought it was a fun picture.

Since it was about lunch time, we headed to Apollo Bay, another of the larger touristy towns along the GOR.  (We actually passed through it the night before on our way to Port Campbell.)  I had some greasy fish and chips for lunch and split a baklava and an apple crisp with Monica for dessert.  The fish was nothing special, but those desserts--two of my favorites--really hit the spot.  Needing to digest that large meal, we headed to the beach for a nap and then a walk.

I'm not sure how we heard about the next stop.  I think Alessandra and Marie just saw it on the map and thought it sounded cool because it was a waterfall.  And indeed it was very cool, in more than one sense of the word.  We got to Marriners Falls via a dangerously windy and narrow dirt road, which was one of the more nerve-wracking experiences on this trip.  There were lots of little farms and bed-and-breakfasts tucked away along its twisted length.  When we got to the parking lot at the end, there was a sign at the trailhead that said the falls were closed.  What the hell, I though, lets go anyway.  Right before we started two people came back, so we asked them if it was still possible to go, to which they answered affirmatively.  The sign said it was about an hour round trip, which we were up for.  The whole time we were speculating as to why it was closed, since there didn't appear to be anything wrong  with the trail.  Monsters, maybe?  Capitalizing on that potential fear, I hid behind a tree and scared Monica and Lorenzo, who were lagging a bit behind.  Will I ever grow up?

The waterfall was well worth the walk.  I'd say it was about twenty feet high, and it ended in a shallow pool about two fee deep.  It was such a relaxing spot.  Alessandra, who absolutely loves everything water (boats, beaches, etc.), Monica, and I were brave enough to go in the frigid water.  They were wearing bikinis, but I didn't having my bathing suit on so I just went in with my underwear (perks of being a guy).  I was the only one brave enough to dip, though, and I even stood under the waterfall.  It was absolutely freezing, and being under there felt like being pelted with ice cubes, so I only stood long enough to pose for a picture.  (It reminded me of the waterfall at the end of our family hike in New Hampshire two years ago, where Asher and I both swam in the waterfall, only this was colder.)  I'm glad we took the hike, and I'm glad I went in the water, despite a somewhat chilly walk back to the car.

Marriners Falls, in which I froze my ass off. 

I changed into dry clothes and we drove back up the scary dirt road to Apollo Bay.  We bought food at the grocery store and cooked it on the public barbecue in the park by the beach.  I brought out my portable speaker (thanks, Asher) so we could listen to music while we ate and drank wine (classy, I know).  We probably stayed there until 10, then it was finally time to drive back home.  Poor Lorenzo had to stay awake again, but I managed to squeeze in a little nap, despite my rather uncomfortable perch in the middle of the back seat.

We got back to Melbourne at about 1 AM.  After we dropped the girls off, Lorenzo and I returned the rental car and walked back from the city to our apartment building.  Even on a Sunday night the CBD was hopping with bar/club-goers, which was a strange contrast to my relaxing weekend out by the beach.  It was weird realizing it was still the weekend, since it felt like we had been vacationing for way longer than two days.  As seems to be the theme with my time here in Australia, we crammed more activities into such a small time than seems humanly possible.

The Great Ocean Road will be a trip I'll remember forever.  I love it here.

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