Apollo Bay to Torquay

Today is more a day to catch up on the things that we missed on the drive from East to West, however, for the first time on the trip the weather wasn't up to much as it looked quite moody and rained steadily for most of the afternoon. The original plan was that we would take a short drive out to Mariners Falls. However, the news from the tourist information was the main road to the falls would be closed until 5pm for repairs and this scotched any ideas of checking out the natural beauty of the region.

It's not Mariners Falls, but here's a shot of the main beach at Apollo Bay

 


















After taking a quick look round the charming Apollo Bay (not that there was much to see apart from the main beach and a local parade of shops), we set out for lunch in Lorne. En route we made a brief stop to look at Carisbrook Falls. The rolling hills around the area fold dramatically to provide a stunning backdrop for the waterfalls. It was quite an easy walk to the lookout and its only a short 15 minute walk there and back.

Carisbrook Falls are one of the highest falls in the Otway Ranges

When we arrived in Lorne we managed to walk down to the Erskine River at the point where the river meets the beach, before it absolutely chucked it down with rain. Retreating to the nearby cafés on Mountjoy Parade we got a bite to eat while the rain eased off.

I don't think that there's much danger of a fire today.

The next stop of the return journey was to revisit Kennet River to see if we would have better luck with the koala spotting. With a better understanding of where to look, we walked from the very bottom of Grey River Road, instead of starting 4km up the road (as recommended the trail guide). With our eyes focused high into the trees, sure enough before long we were spotting the grey furry marsupials, left, right and centre!

Sleeping koala hanging out in the gums!

We were even fortunate enough second-time round to be greeted by the presence of another echidna, and luckily this one was much closer and around for longer, as it was going about it's business only about 5 meters away from us! Upon reflection I'll have to reassess my impressions of the koala walk, especially after the echidna spotting, although I still feel the guide for the walk is misleading and needs to be rewritten so it's clearer where you should start the walk.

The echidna is one of the Earth’s oldest surviving species!

With the Great Ocean Road snaking spectacularly around the cliff-side from the Wye River onwards, we realised that we hadn't seen an important part of the local scenery - any surfers on the iconic breaks! Wye River is a small town neslted discretely in the steep hillsides with just a few holiday homes, but we were there to check out the glorious golden sand beach and the surfers catching the waves.

A little further along the road is the site of a historic shipwreck (one of many on the Great Ocean Road) where in 1891, the W. B. Godfrey was wrecked. At low tide wreckage from the ship, including the capstan winch, anchor and the iron frame (at very low tide) are clearly visible straight out to sea from the site of The Lonely Grave.

View from 'The Lonely Grave' near Godfrey Creek

Although there were no casualties from the actual wreck, several men died while trying to salvage the ship. A monument was built for the men 30 years later, when workers constructing the Great Ocean Road stumbled upon the graves.

As mentioned in one of my earlier posts, there was an interesting lighthouse at Aireys Inlet called Split Point Lighthouse. This would be the last place to stop off before Torquay, however this was a bit more interesting than the Cape Otway Lightstation (partly because it was free to look at) as it was the lighthouse from the Australian TV series "Round the Twist"! There were also a couple of decent lookouts to take pictures of Eagle Rock, Table Rock and the surrounding cliffs, and to get some moody shots of the coast as the rain swept in.

Split Point Lighthouse or the "White Queen" as it's known locally

Eagle Rock and the cliffs along the coast

Rain moving quickly inland and obscuring the horizon

Lorne to Port Campbell

Getting up early for breakfast, we had heard that the local Sulphur-crested Cockatoos sometimes sit outside the balcony of our motel room and sure enough we were greeted by a couple of unphased cockatoos "looking for a good feed"!

Being so close to the ocean (literally you could see it from our balcony), we took the opportunity to walk down the pier and look out across Loutit Bay, back to the centre of Lorne before driving back into town to have a look around. If you've got the time to check out Lorne it's definitely a nice place if you just want to hangout.

You're never far from civilisation!

After fuelling up for the day, we took a short drive (about 15 minutes from the tourist information centre) up a windy road up to Erskine Falls, which are part of the Great Otway National Park. At the top of falls is a viewing platform, which offers decent views within a short walking distance of the car park. The walk down to the bottom of the falls was quite easy but it was coming back up which was more difficult, although it was worth it for the view. There were also lots of large rocks, which you could stand on at the bottom where the river was calmer.

Erskine Falls is an impressively tall and slender 38m waterfall

Not far from Erskine Falls is a place called Teddy's Lookout which apparently has the best views of Great Ocean Road in Lorne and they weren't half decent! From the lookout we could see the brilliant blue of the ocean all the way round to the Otway ranges and St George's river.

View from Teddy's Lookout

It wasn't until midday before we made some progress on the Great Ocean Road but even then we stopped off at a scenic spot down the road called Sheoak Falls where we did a 600m walk to a rocky waterfall which cascades 15 meters into a deep pool of water. This was another great site but it felt a little eerie especially as the water in the pool was very dark, most likely from the surrounding rocks. There were also lots of small lizards scurrying around, we weren't entirely sure what they were but they could have been McCoy's Skinks or Coventry Skinks because they were a bronze/copper colour.

Sheoak Falls

Some sort of skink, not sure which one but there were loads of them!

Driving on to Kennett River we were really keen to get to Grey River Road as this was billed as the best place to go koala spotting on the Great Ocean Road. However, this was actually one of the biggest disappointments of the trip so far as the trail guide from the tourist info didn't really give us much insight as to where to see the koalas and there wasn't much of an actually walk to do but more of a dirt track to drive up. Eventually we did see some "free-range" koalas, which were very cool but the whole experience didn't quite live up to the hype.*

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No it's a koala!

The only redeeming part of the drive was seeing a wallaby gracefully fleeing into the bush and spotting a wild echinda on the side of the road going about it's business! There also a number of exotic birds around including lorikeets and we even saw a Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo.

Pressing on, we then moved out of the forested area and more inland on the Great Ocean Road as we drove through Apollo Bay (a place to revisit on the return leg of the trip) and entered the Horden Vale flats en route to the Twelve Apostles in Port Campbell National Park. Although we were running tight on time, we had to make a quick stop for these famous monoliths. Having seen lots of photos of these rocky stacks nothing quite prepares you for how impressive they are in real life. I was completely blown away by the view from the boardwalk, which more than made up for the earlier disappointment. Tomorrow will be a better day to revist the other famous limestone rock formations along this strech of Port Campell National Park and hopefully get a picture of the Twelve Apostles at sunset.

* Having revisited this stretch of the Great Ocean Road in June 2013, I can report we had a much more enjoyable and positive experience koala spotting along Grey River Road, at Kennett River. I'm not sure if it was a better time a year because it was a lot cooler, but we spotted at least 20 koalas in the trees on a short stretch of the road. On the flipside we didn't see any Yellow-Tailed Black Cockatoos or any echidnas this time round.* 

A day at the zoo and a day at the beach

In an attempt to explore Melbourne beyond the Central Business District we decided to take a trip to Melbourne Zoo in the inner city Parkville suburb, which was a short train journey from Flinders Street. The zoo is one of the city's most popular attractions and is currently celebrating it's 150th anniversary this year, making it the oldest zoo in Australia and the third oldest in the world.

The main attraction for us was seeing the large collection of native iconic Australian animals such kangaroos, wallabies, emus, echidnas, koalas, kookaburras and Little Blue Penguins (which we're hoping to see in the wild as part of the Penguin Parade on Phillip Island). 

Emus are the second-largest living bird in the world by height

Wallabies

An echidna

Laughing Kookaburras

A tree-kangaroo found in New Guinea and far north Queensland

Little Blue Penguins waiting for lunch

The first koala of the trip - it's so sleepy!

One of the most interesting animals that we saw had to the bizarre, but unique, platypus. This semi-aquatic animal is one of two mammals known as monotremes which lay eggs instead of giving birth to live young (the other monotreme being the echidna). What makes it even more unusual is it has a a soft, toothless rubbery bill, webbed feet, beaver-like tail and the males have venomous spurs, making it one of only a few venomous mammals - it's truly like no other animal on earth!

Lizzie outside the "Platypusary"

The platypus in all it's greatness!

However, poor water quality in Australia is threatening the platypus and many others species, so the zoo has been running the Wash for Wildlife campaign, which encourages people to use washing products with less phosphates, as these ultimately find their way into the ecosystem. High phosphate levels can cause:

• The potential for algal blooms
• Oxygen starvation of water, inhibiting the survival of some wildlife
• Decreased water clarity, creating a physical barrier to wildlife finding food and escaping predators
• Smothering of some habitats caused by disrupted light infiltration.

I'm sure this is not a problem exclusive to Australia, so it would be worth considering using products with reduced phosphates or even those without any to help preserve our wildlife elsewhere.

The other notable incident of the day was when a bottle of lemonade exploded in my face! In what seemed like a fairly harmless idea, I decanted some lemonade into a water bottle to take as a drink to the zoo.When it came to sitting down for lunch I unscrewed the cap and all hell broke loose. Having the bottle in the pocket of my day-bag in the thirty degree heat must have built up the pressure of the gassy liquid, as before I knew it the cap flew off and hit me in the face with a loud bang, with all the lemonade jetting out. It must have been quite funny to anyone who was walking by as I would have laughed at that!

Heading in the opposite direction, we decided to pay St Kilda a visit on a different day, catching the number 16 tram from Swanson Street. St Kilda once had a seedy reputation but has enjoyed a resurgence. During the Edwardian and Victorian eras, St Kilda became a favoured suburb of Melbourne's elite, however, today, St Kilda reminds me a little bit of Southsea in Portsmouth, in that it looks run down but is potentially quite a nice place to be.

One of the more famous attractions in St Kilda is Luna Park, which is a traditional-style amusement park that opened in 1912. The entrance to the park is iconic, as you have to walk through the creepy Mr Moon's gaping mouth! Once inside there's a heritage-listed wooden scenic railway, which is the oldest operating roller coaster in the world. Luna Park as a whole is listed by the National Trust of Australia, and the main heritage features are listed on the Victorian Heritage Register.

The iconic "Mr Moon" entrance

 

Walking down the foreshore we headed over to the pier to check out the St Kilda Pier Kiosk and the nearby colony of Little Blue Penguins. The original kiosk burnt down in 2003 in an arson attack, one year from its centenary, but was it was faithfully recreated using the original plans and what remained of the original materials.

St Kilda Pier

St Kilda Pier Kiosk

Round the back of the kiosk is a stretch of breakwater which protects the harbour and is where the colony of penguins have set up residence. It is thought that the penguins might have originally come from Phillip Island and decided to stay. My good deed for the day was removing some litter from the beach by the Little Blues, although its a shame none of the locals thought to do it, seeing as they enjoy the penguins as much as the tourists they attract. However, we did indeed catch a brief glimpse of a Little Blue Penguin under by the boardwalk, down by the sea.

View of the Pier Kiosk from the penguin breakwater colony

Unfortunately, our day at St Kilda wasn't as successful as we would have liked it to have been as it rained on and off (although thankfully this was the first real bit of rain we've seen the entire time we've been here). Once the rain stopped the winds picked up and kept pelting us with sand, which got quite painful and irritating quickly, especially along the foreshore path to Albert Park.

On a final note, a special mention needs to go out to the Soda Rock Diner in South Yarra. Having stumbled upon this on the corner of Toorak Road and Chapel Street, this restaurant is a faithful recreation of a 1950s American diner. The thickshakes were thick, there service was great and they even catered to vegetarians, serving a decent veggie burger. If you're ever in the area be sure to check out this diner if you want a nostalgia trip, good music and fine burgers.

Soda Rock on the corner of Toorak Road and Chapel Street

Vinyl-seated booths complete with a jukebox!