The Great Ocean Road

Saturday we woke up and did a bit of house renovations and US business calls and then we packed up the car (our darling little Apple) and headed to the Great Ocean Road (check out the photos). This is a beautiful coastal drive (similar to Hwy 1 in CA). The beaches in Australia are so amazing. The water colour is almost indescribable. We passed through Geelong (with only a bit of misdirection) on to Torquay where we stopped at the famous surfing spot, Bells Beach.

Bells Beach is amazing. The terrain is so different. We went down a thousand stairs to reach the beach at the bottom. The first part was your typically sand beach. But as we climbed the rocks and went around the cliff, the rocks were covered with this strange seaweed. It basically looked like strings of grapes with little bumps. We watched the surfers and then climbed back up all the stairs and were on our way to Lorne.

Lorne is truly like a Mediterranean city with hills and buildings and expansive ocean views. We had a burger at Bottle of Milk for lunch and then headed to a local hotel with a roof top bar for a drink and a chance to take in the view.

On we go, through Anglesea and to Apollo Bay. After another bit of misdirection, we found our hotel, The Beacon Point Ocean View Villas. We had a great villa with a kitchen, living room, balcony, large bathroom and separate bedroom. We purchased a bottle of champagne at check-in and enjoyed the ocean on the deck before heading to explore more and get dinner.

Our explorations took us to the Cape Otway Lighthouse. We got there after it closed, but did the small hike and caught a glimpse of the lighthouse. On the trip out there, we ran into a koala bear sitting in the middle of the road. Such a strange sight, coming from the US where you don’t see that every day. I tried to take his photo, but he ran away. They are very cute and you want to scoop them up and hug them, but you can see they have big claws. On the way back, we took a diversion off the main road and saw tons of koalas paired up in trees sleeping and eating leaves. They are too cool. We also saw some wallabies, which are a smaller version of kangaroos. They have darker fur and really small heads.

Then we headed back to Apollo Bay for dinner. We ate at La Bimbo. It was very good – we had a bit of tapas and some Asparagus and Leek Soup. We were pretty tired, so we went back to the hotel to get some sleep.

The next day, Sunday, we woke up and got some breakfast in Apollo Bay and then did the rainforest hike. It was a short trail, but really cool. Then we made the trek back to Melbourne. We stopped at the arts & crafts fair in Anglesea at bought some microbrew.